lessons learned from “HOW A BLACKSMITH LEARNED TO CODE”

Last week I did a ton of reading on Joshua Kemps’s site. He has a really interesting story. He started out as a blacksmith who mostly shoed horses for a living. That line of work is admittedly really difficult and it seemed to not be very rewarding or secure. After a series of injuries he got fed up and decided to become a coder, and he talks you through the process he went through.

He has a blog, an e-book, and he offers coaching as well. I read a bunch of the blog posts and his e-book. He has some good, simple advice that boils down to:

  • network in person with people. go to every user group meeting within 50 miles(!)

  • hustle hard to learn coding. every day spend 2+ hours doing focused work.

  • only learn what you need to get in the door. you will never know everything.

  • document your process with a blog,twitter, and github.

  • present something before you are ready to the user group. this is your resume, cover letter, and coffee session in one. It introduces you to the entire group and tells them all that you are an approachable person who is working hard to learn.

That all seems to be logical, sound advice. I’m going to try to make a few deadlines for those bullet points.

Network in person – this month (july) go to two meetups. try to do two a month from here on out.

Hustle hard – on it. I made a calendar to visually help. Keep the momentum up.

Only learn what you need. idk how to make this actionable, but I’ll try.

Document – on it. blog, twitter, and github.

Tell me what you think.

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