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Nočnica Mellifera for Heroku

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If you had a time machine, what would you tell your younger self?

In many ways, I love the path I've taken in the tech industry. It wasn't a straight line but it worked for me. And the place I ended up was beautiful. But if I had the option I'd go back and tell myself a few things. What advice do you wish you'd had earlier?

Oldest comments (39)

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Ben Halpern

I'd tell me older self that I can program for fun and it's not that big a deal if there are things I don't understand. I don't need to get discouraged if I'm struggling with something, there's plenty more out there!

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Lex

Keep away from coding, study for be lawyer, keep away from the bad friends and the bad girls, don't be discourage, smile, keep trying, Never give up, have faith someday you will be happy.

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Eliomar Garzon

I don't get it, No coding ?

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Lex • Edited

Yeah, no coding, I like coding but some persons of this community, have been doing my life a hell, mostly opsec community 😉😁👍✌️, thech isn't place for a hippie.

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Lorraine Lee

The practice of law, I take it, is?

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Lex

Yeah law, lawyer 😉😁👍

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Gavin

I would tell young me that the business minor that I got would be really important, and I should do more work in those classes. Also, more importantly, I’d tell myself that my opinions are valid and to express them more. It took me a long time to figure that out, but, once I did, I started liking work more and my career improved.

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Ben Halpern

I definitely undervalued how important my education was at the time in certain classes.

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Mike Bybee • Edited

Conversely, I overvalued mine. I've used maybe 2% of what I learned in my two degree programs (first IT/SysAdmin, second Software Dev), and have applied far more of what I learned as a barista, waiter, and retail/service industry manager to my career in tech. I'd like to have those several years and tens of $1000s in tuition back for self-teaching and FOSS project/portfolio building.

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Andrew Baisden • Edited

I would tell my younger self that he should start learning programming ASAP to get ahead of everyone else. Then I would give him a path to follow and the languages and frameworks to learn as soon as they become available.

Then I would give him some winning lottery ticket numbers for the next 10 years and tell him to read and learn everything he can so that he will become Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos combined 😎

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Brad

"Buy a bunch of bitcoin"! haha

Besides that, I'd tell my younger self "to not worry about it, everything will be ok".

I'll probably say the same thing if my future self came to me right now. :)

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Eliomar Garzon

I would tell me : Please dont study petroleum engineering, start to code right now.

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Juan F Gonzalez

This is one of those posts that triggers me to go on a massive diatribe of all the things I found were wrong, several mistakes I made and all the ways that my younger self (or anyone in that situation) could use to avoid the pitfalls and save himself years on his journey.

But on one comment it wouldn't be worth the time. I'd rather pack it all up and turn it into something that can be more accessible to a wider range of people.

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dinhanhx

Tell myself, you will encounter bad things and difficult obstacles. That will make sure he prepare for the future.

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scroung720

Three things:
a)Don't be like the rabbit from The Rabbit & The Turtle - moral story. If you are good at something, that doesn't mean that you should work little, on the contrary, you should work harder than anyone. Discipline beats talent. Just because right now the people in your environment are not competition for you. It doesn't mean that there is no one better than you.
b)Never tell lies.
c)Always listen to everyone like they know something you don't.

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abdellatif.dev

I'm still young but I would when I was about 12 and 14 and tell never ever use a think of installating windows on your machine

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Fulton Browne

Lol same here

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Valentin Radu • Edited
  1. Discipline weights more than smarts in the equation of success.
  2. Rewards come in steps: sometimes you have to work really hard while making no apparent progress for a long time. Don't give up.
  3. Unfortunately, school is full of it. Your teachers/educators are more ignorant and insignificant than you think. Focus on learning, read more, ignore everything else.
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Mr.13 • Edited

I would have tell my younger version:

  1. Don't run from life, It will happen sooner or later.
  2. Follow your dreams, don't quit them. (although I started following my dreams again but kinda wasted 3 years).
  3. Don't sell those 100 Bitcoins you have.
  4. Don't mess with your laptop hardware (it will cost you 2 peak years of your life)
  5. Love Yourself.
  6. Share your knowledge and create awareness, don't be stubborn.
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Matthieu Cneude

I would tell to myself:

Don't worry. It will be fine. You'll enjoy the ride!

I need my future self to tell my present self exactly that sometimes, too.

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pentacular

Just remember, this too shall pass. :)

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Olivier JM Maniraho

Same here

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Nexus Denim

I would tell younger self that Software Engineering was worth every moment and every penny.

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JoelBonetR 🥇

I'll tell myself some lottery numbers so I can create a start up without needing of third party funds 😂

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Sattwik Sahu

That's the cleverest comment in the whole comment section.

Tip my hat to you.

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JoelBonetR 🥇

Thanks! I hadn't any doubt about the answer TBH, don't know if it's the aging or what but... 😂