It’s a trap.
I, first, heard of this from Sal Khan of Khan Academy. It’s a study done by Scientific American. They broke kids into two groups and had them do some schoolwork. Both groups scored around the same to start.
Then, they broke them off into their separate groups.
One group was constantly praised by their parents and teachers for how smart and talented they were. The other group was praised for their work ethic. Then, each group was given a new set of assignments.
The kids who’d been praised for being smart… mostly gave up.
The other group dramatically outperformed the first group.
Why?
Because the kids in the first group were praised for being smart and so became focused on maintaining their “smart” status. While the other group was praised for their work ethic, so they focused on working through the problems, even when they were really difficult, and figured them out.
This is all you ever really need to know about being a developer.
The ability to grind.
The reason you have this group of know-it-alls out there that constantly yip and yap about how smart you have to be to be a developer… isn’t because it’s true. It’s because it makes THEM feel better about themselves.
(No doubt, I’ll get a bunch of breathless responses from some of you who were “offended” by this blog post… writing a book about it.)
But, the truth this…
There’s plenty of stupid, and yet, highly successful developers out there.
It’s not about intelligence.
It’s about work ethic.
Persistence.
Courage.
All this “prodigy” s!@# is overblown.
So, don’t fall for this trap.
You’re smart enough. Quit worrying about it.
Instead, head down. Grind. Focus on work ethic.
And, you’ll be fine.
What’s that?
You’re fired up and ready to grind, but not sure where to start? That, my padawan, is where I come in. I’ve got a full library of Jedi training for you to grind through and make this s!@# happen.
And, you can get started for nothing.
It’s all on SkillShare and you can start your 2-month no-cost trial here: https://johnmorrisonline.com/skillshare.
And once you’re in…
Hustle, grind… whatever hip cliche you use.
Actually DO it.
