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Comment by natch | Hacker News Reader

I would encourage people to think even tinier than the items on their list. Calling some of these items tiny reeks of humblebragging.

At the start of my programming explorations, tiny would be something like learn how to create a file with an editor and how to save it. Or how to add 2 + 2 in bash. Not full blown programs, but bricks that can be put together.

And now no longer as a beginner, there can still be tiny things on the same scale that I’m doing for the first time because it’s a new problem or a new language.

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I wouldn't be so harsh on the author, as to accuse them of humblebragging. What counts as 'tiny' depends entirely on where you are in a learning journey. What is 'tiny' for someone with 5 years experience is 'huge' for someone new.

As shown by fairly regular posts on imposter syndrome, we can all identify our own failings, so regularly think we don't know enough. We're mostly all seeking progress, so this is a tiny step, for her, based on where she was previously.

Agreed.

Also, re: imposter syndrome and seeking progress, I appreciate Dr Ben Hardy's concept of "Gain vs Gap". We tend to focus on the Gap in front of us (between where we are now and where we want to be), but it's important also to look back at the Gain (relative to where we started). The Gap will always be there, as our goals inevitably evolve, so focusing exclusively on it can be disheartening. The Gain, on the other hand, steadily increases according to our efforts. Using the OP's method of accumulating concrete evidence of increase in the Gain makes good sense to me.

>What is 'tiny' for someone with 5 years experience is 'huge' for someone new.

While true, this is exactly the boring conventional wisdom that I tried to steer attention away from with my above comment.

While it’s a blatantly obvious duh-level truism that people can take on larger challenges as they learn, I mean come on… it’s helpful to realize that there remain tiny things — tiny by almost anyone’s definition — even later in a career. I’m not just starting out and just last week I learned yet another way to add in bash, for instance.

The point isn't that you _can_ take on larger things, it's that it can be beneficial to celebrate your learning no matter what size it is (from your own perspective).

You may find it conventional wisdom, but I often find it rare for people to celebrate small achievements. They just wait for the final payoff and don't feel like any intermediate step is 'enough'.

As web developer, I don't even know how to do some of those "tiny" items at all right now.

One of the principles Evans is leveraging here but not really explicitly talking about is the power of time coupled with compounding growth. She's been working at this stuff for a decade now and continually building and learning. She's also been writing about what she learns which probably helps a great deal.

It might just be a case of Baader-Meinhof, but this is a theme that seems to be coming up more and more. James Clear's Atomic Habits book is built on the idea and Cal Newport (Deep Work) has been writing about it[1] under the name of slow productivity.

I think many of us would be better off if we took a longer term view of ourselves.

[1]: https://www.newyorker.com/culture/office-space/its-time-to-e...

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