> Our dislike of feeling like a noob is our brain telling us "Come on, come on, figure this out."
Maybe I'm projecting from my own social anxiety, but I believe most of the negative sensation of feeling like a noob is being seen to not know something.
People want to come across as valuable to others and one way we do that is by offerring expertise. If we are seen to be noobs, it implies we may be less valuable to others because we don't know a thing.
Unfortunately, being a noob is a necessary precondition to actually learning a thing. It's very hard to learn without putting yourself out there in some way and trying. So there is this tension between wanting to be comfortable with looking like an amateur so that you can immerse yourself in the kind of environments where rapid learning happens, while also wanting to come across as an expert at other times.
I do have an anxiety disorder so I absolutely get this. A big breakthrough for me through therapy was working on my self worth and realizing that I have inherent value. I can't speak for everyone but I was raised to believe that my worth was really only the sum of my actions in a very utilitarian sort of way rather than a deontological way. I suspect a lot of other young men in my generation were instilled with very similar values. If you know that you existing just as you are is valuable regardless then the social anxiety around not knowing something or being "perfect" tends to melt away (or it at least helps). Perfectionism is a lot more insidious than most folks realize. That said when you get to the place where you can get past that it's quite liberating.
I learned to play hockey about 5 years ago. Part of that was going to stick and puck sessions during the week, where I could basically do whatever I wanted; work on skating, stick handling, etc. Sometimes there would be literally no one else at the rink, and during those times it was super fun being a noob. I had a ton of stuff I could work on, and I would see progress from week-to-week. I started playing on a real team not long after starting to learn, and the games were the opposite. I just felt super embarrassed the whole time.
>People want to come across as valuable to others and one way we do that is by offerring expertise.
I've found the trick to getting over this is realizing no matter how good you are at something, there's always someone better and when you find yourself as the noob, you get to ask all the questions and learn and everbody will be ok with this. You also get to make mistakes, and everybody will be ok with this.
I've recently found myself going from being the expert to bottom of the barrel noob again and honestly it's refreshing, there's no pressure on you, somebody else makes the decisions, you just kinda do what you're told and absorb knowledge, and when something goes wrong you don't need to figure it out. It does make a nice change, though it can be frustrating, especially when it's a situation when you know what to do, but nobody listens because you're the noob.
You just have to remember, at some point you won't be the noob again and someone else will be, might as well enjoy it while you can.
It's also kind of an interesting situation, I started my new job just after a younger guy who's only had one or two other jobs before. There's a big difference between the way the two of us learn and work just because of our gap in life experience. It made me realize there's different levels between even noobs based on a bunch of different factors.
In the end though, i've found it best when you're the noob to just learn whatever you can as fast as you can, bring whatever knowledge and experience you can, but do it unspokenly through actions rather than words and eventually, without realizing it, you're not the noob any more.
> Maybe I'm projecting from my own social anxiety, but I believe most of the negative sensation of feeling like a noob is being seen to not know something.
I can anecdotally agree with this. In general, I don’t care at all what people think about me (I still care if people think I’ve wronged them, it’s more what they judgementally think of me), and I have never felt bad about being a noob, or being seen as a noob.
I’ve learnt two languages through immersion, and I’ve been told I pick them up very quickly. Learning languages like that is basically repeating things you’ve heard, and then figuring out what everything really means through asking questions and a huge amount of trial and error... with lots and lots of error. Really I’m not any better at learning things than anybody else is, but because I didn’t ever feel bad about making those errors, I’d wake up in the morning, and spend the whole day happily making “embarrassing” language mistakes. Which over time quickly became less and less common.
Along similar lines, it's not just that you can't offer expertise. It's also that you're participating in a community defined by knowledge of a particular topic. And relative to that community, you're an outsider since you don't have that knowledge. So all of your primate fears about approaching a community as an outsider kick in.
There's also generally the uncomfortable feeling of confronting your ignorance when being informed, or skilled, or intelligent is a major part of your self image.
I don't so much care about being seen as a noob. If I don't know something I'm fine with asking. What I hate is when one of the junior devs asks me something and I don't have an answer for them. I don't know everything about our product so often the best I can do is show them how I would find out the answer.
The trick I've learned is to never assume I'm an expert, and always question basics. It's suprisingly easy to do, and makes honest the most paramount. Also, this perspective has made me look at folks who are always trying to convince others how expert they are as silly and annoying.
I'm not sure I relate to Paul Graham's experience of finding being a "noob" unpleasant -- if anything, I find it's the opposite, because any time you're a "noob," there's so much low-hanging fruit to pick.
New city? There's a bunch of cool/fun things to do that you haven't tried yet. New hobby? Hop onto Youtube and there's hundreds of hours of "explainer" videos made by passionate hobbyists looking to share their favorite parts of that hobby with you. New to a particular field? Other people have probably already done the work of curating the 1% most interesting, important, and fascinating things to learn about. It's easy to feel like you're making progress when you're starting from zero.
I recently bought a guitar and started playing Rocksmith -- think Guitar Hero, but with a real guitar hooked up to your computer, with learning tools designed to help you learn how to play songs of your choosing, along with lessons covering everything from how to play power chords to the very basics of how to hold your guitar when sitting vs standing. I'm a total noob when it comes to playing guitar, but I've enjoyed every part of my time with Rocksmith, from the very first moment I plugged in my guitar and let the software step me through the process of tuning it.
I've found it incredibly edifying largely because the experience of picking up an instrument and learning how to play it has reminded me of what it's like to learn a completely new skill from scratch -- I think spending a week with Rocksmith has not only taught me guitar basics, but also given me a refresher course on how to learn a new skill.
In fact, I wonder if this can lead to its own problem -- someone who gets too much pleasure from the experience of being a noob and may turn into a dilettante, moving from hobby to hobby without ever taking the time to spend years cultivating a deep expertise. Which, I suppose, is fine on a certain level, but there are definitely times when I've procrastinated and hidden from the intimidating prospect of achieving mastery in a field where I already have a lot of experience, and instead spent that time venturing into new fields where there's still low-hanging fruit for me to pick.
To add my two cents, I've studied half a dozen languages over my life and managed to become fluent in three, give or take. My favorite part of the process is always the first few months, when new concepts come the quickest and one sees major progress made every day.
In the end, I think the learning process for almost any skill follows an S-curve, and that initial takeoff is always the most intoxicating period for me. That said, I've spoken about this with others in my classes, and most of them find this early period more daunting and relish later stages, when their footing has become solid.
Yeah I definitely relate to this enjoying the rush of so many new concepts falling into place and making sense. That said I realized there is another level of enjoying a kind of mastery or advanced skill. For me theres this huge intermediate desert thats hard to cross its like first 6 months - enjoy noob gains, 6mo - 5 years kind of sucking, and after many years finally starting to get some new insights at most people never get. I’ve only ever managed it once too and getting paid definitely helps.
There is the assumption that people necessarily mind feeling like a noob. I don't really. What I dislike is a situation where I freely admit of being a noob and then people who know clearly even less about the situation than I do acting superior. Or people who know more than me now about it, but will know less than me in a month acting superior. Or, just people acting superior :-)
Agreed. I don't mind being a noob since I think it's perfectly ok to be a noob and I have a ton of respect for anyone else who is trying to learn something new.
I got angry recently when I asked a question on amazon about a home improvement hardware item and one of the responses I got was something like, "This job is better left to a professional." They completely dismissed my question like everyone who works in that profession was born with this knowledge.
I just wanted to know if it was possible to disconnect two of the pieces (and someone else confirmed it was possible, so it wasn't a dumb question after all). Not to mention, it was for an art project, so the "professional" quality/safety advice doesn't apply. That's when being a noob feels bad.
There's a fundamental human need to feel better than others.
It's not always a bad thing, as it is used as a carrot to bond teams and push for excellence (Think "Semper Fi").
But it is quite grating. The main thing that gets me, is when folks being superior either withhold information, or deliberately try to interfere with my learning.
On StackOverflow, I have almost twice as many questions as I have answers. This doesn't really get me any respect.
What I dislike is a situation where I feel like I _ought_ to be a noob, or feel like a noob, or be acting like a noob, but other people treat like an expert who doesn't realise that he is acting like a noob.
If you're a constant noob, you're a tourist of knowledge. Actual competence takes time. In many fields, it takes a lifetime. In some fields, it takes more than one lifetime -- you can't achieve greatness if your parents weren't already knowledgeable.
Being a noob is neither pleasant nor unpleasant. We are learning machines and curiosity is one of our main drives in life.
Appearing as a noob can probably rub some people the wrong way. People who are, how should we put it? Ego sensitive?
Being a noob is more a feeling. You can have that feeling with two generations of experience while you are the most knowledgeable person alive in the field.
When you do not feel like a noob anymore, you might become complacent. That, I think is the main problem.
My daily yoga practice has taught me to embrace challenging new poses (or situations in life) in a great new way.
A paradigm shift, if you will.
I used to look at challenging poses with dread. "Oh god, that's going to be uncomfortable..." or perhaps "There is no way I am strong enough to do that..." and I am always right. It is going to be uncomfortable and I am usually too weak to perform the asana with grace.
But what really excited me upon learning recently... and what helps me pull through it every single time now is this:
I am about to be able to move my body in a way that was never before possible... at least not possible since I was 6 years old or so most likely...
If I can just bear through it...
In a few weeks time I know I'll be able to move my body in ways that I never even thought was possible... and that's really exciting for a yogi!
Trying new things is exhilarating!
I feel sorry for my former self who dreaded them for far too long.
I changed careers and at 40 something I'm a noob again.
It can be frustrating not knowing and I'll go down the path of analysis paralysis and procrastination sometimes. I'm a bit prone to that as in my previous career I kinda had things down pretty solidly.
But I try to embrace it. Is this the right code here? No better way to find out than try things and see what happens....if it doesn't work, well I'm a noob, that is going to happen. (obviously these are somewhat educated / calculated risks, not just random)
I like it. There's a freedom in not worrying if you're doing it right all the time and recognizing that doing it wrong is ok provided you learn.
How did you manage the drastic income change that comes with a late-life career change? I've considered it several times in the past, but with a family to support it's not really that feasible.
Meh, I think post could have been a tweet. Learning new things will have you feeling like a noob. It's okay to feel like a noob and totally clueless, it's sign that you're learning. Learn often, embrace being a noob often.
> the more of a noob you are locally, the less of a noob you are globally.
> if you stay in your home country, you'll feel less of a noob
> And yet you'll know more if you move.
I experienced this in the US when I was scheduling interviews for an internship with a US company. I had waited for the interviewer for half an hour and shoot them an email asking for rescheduling after they did not show up.
Turns out I forgot the timezone difference. In all my (quarter-century)life, I had never needed to check timezone in the same country. Felt like the biggest noob. I know more in general now but, even for a simple thing like scheduling an interview, I became "locally" noob.
That one has caught me out, too, and I've spent most of my life frequently crossing time zone boundaries (Central/Mountain and lately Central/Eastern).
I too think of myself as a noob. I believe it has to do about knowledge and experience. You know the old adage "The more you know, the more you know you don't know." To me this is very true.
I was reprimanded the other day, by management because I said in a presentation "I don't know" when discussing how to solve a particular problem. When having a discussion there is a few rules that must be followed in order for you to have a meaningful exchange of opinions that brings you closer to some sort of consensus. One of these is principle of charity: "interpreting a speaker's statements in the most rational way possible and, in the case of any argument, considering its best, strongest possible interpretation." My manager did the the opposite of this principle and assumed that when I said "I don't know" that that meant that I was going to find out on my own and disregard his opinion and directive. What I meant was that "I don't know, let's gather a group of experts, let them gather information and interpret this in such a way that he can take a proper decision on what to do next."
I regret that I wasn't this clear when communicating with him to begin with.
To me, in IT nothing is more worse than someone who claim they know everything, have all the answers and don't want to listen.
Recently on I recently read the quote "The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance; it is the illusion of knowledge." I think this complements the above quote very well, and is something important that we all need to be aware of. To be a noob means at least you have the self-insight to understand that you have much more to learn, and that you are willing to collaborate with your colleagues to achieve more wisdom.
> I was reprimanded the other day, by management because I said in a presentation "I don't know"
Maybe it's because I'm still in the junior / recent-grad mindset, but my experience has been the opposite.
The most striking difference for me between academia and industry is that now it's okay to not know things. In academia you're expected to have the answers and be able to reproduce them on tests and things; in industry it seems much more acceptable to admit ignorance so long as you plan on eventually getting an answer.
I'm a bit suspicious of people who call me a noob when I'm learning something. Its too often a pejorative as if from on high. As if they were never a beginner. But its a lie. They were once a beginner. And they themselves have probably plateaued. To me its as bad as them bragging about their being a perfectionist. I don't appreciate perfectionism either because they tend to never finish anything.
If being a noob is shameful then becoming good and then later an expert is made much more difficult than it should be. Mistakes and failures are also seen as shameful and must be hidden. If you can't be open about making mistakes and learning from them then you're more likely surrounded by idiots or jerks.
Failure is part of learning. So if you aren't failing at what you're doing right now in some way, to some degree, then its not challenging enough for you. That is fine because sometimes the job needs to be done right because you're doing the performance. But if you aren't pushing hard into a space where mistakes and failures are actually possible then your goals aren't big enough. Likely stagnating.
A stagnating expert is someone who is afraid of the next level. They are afraid of becoming a beginner again. Afraid perhaps to even get into the practice nets and practice batting or throwing. Afraid to practice scales or try some hard piece they've never played.
"the more you feel like a noob, the better."
I am not convinced.
With experience it should become rarer and rarer to encounter some things that makes so little sense that you feel like a noob, and you certainly shouldn't feel aimless.
The more systems you explore, the bigger the toolbox you acquire. And there are not infinitely many existing tools because they once have been invented. And often these tools can be categorized by their operating principles which are even fewer. Because most disciplines overlap, the more you explore the faster the exploration goes.
Sure, when you encounter something new you will need to gather some info before you are operational, but when you are enough of a generalist, you will have picked up enough heuristics to know who, where, and what to look for, and it shouldn't take long.
Sure, we can dig and make any subject arbitrarily deep so there are infinitely many new things to explore and be amazed by. Staying humble, curious, honest and acknowledging that there are plenty of things that you have explored yet is also necessary.
But if you disperse by being contempt of being a noob you risk becoming lost in a senseless experiencing of a chaotic mess, and not gather experience by seeing the order things could be arranged into.
> With experience it should become rarer and rarer to encounter some things that makes so little sense that you feel like a noob, and you certainly shouldn't feel aimless.
Then you're not pushing yourself or trying new things. Noob == newbie, so it applies even to experts who are learning things in an unfamiliar area.
I felt like a noob when I learned about functional programming. Then I felt like a noob again when I started learning Haskell.
I read about Coq yesterday and felt like a total and utter noob.
I read about the `nom` lexing crate for Rust recently and felt like a noob getting up to speed.
I still am a noob when it comes to using every unix utility: I recently learned about gnu parallel and read about xargs more finely.
I never want to be in a situation where I never feel like a noob, because in computing alone that's basically impossible unless I'm not challenging myself.
I feel like this is exactly the point he's making: if you're not putting yourself in positions where you feel like a noob, you'er not engaging your skills to their fullest potential, because the 'sorting it out' part is the thing that's really good for you. Nowhere here does he say 'feel like a noob and stay that way."
I'm pretty good at keeping up with the SOTA in subjects like crypto, AI. But it's because I make an effort. And they interest me immensely. And it's easy with the wealth of information online.
Where I find it harder to keep up is that esoteric knowledge of "the culture". What is current in music and movies and art. Even interacting with young people a lot. The velocity of relevance seems to have altered significantly.
Another interesting take is returning to childhood passions. I used to be into sailing and thought if I have some free time I'll take it up as a hobby again. Maybe book a class in Annapolis MD. Or charter a small yacht for a day trip in Florida during spring break.
But the world of sailing has just metastasized into a massive industrialized complex! Lexus has a concept luxury yacht. You can control the helm 100% using a Garmin Smart Marine Watch. There exist software platforms for archival wind data.
Don't get me wrong, it's awesome. But there is an activation energy. And I am sure there are still single person Hobie Cats available. But it does make you feel as if you need to be all-in or else exist in a perpetual state of n00b-ishness ;)
>>But it does make you feel as if you need to be all-in
Hmm, this is a bigger point than I think you make it out to be. (?)
It's something that's pained me for a long time too.
I'll ramble a bit...
I think part of the problem, in my case at least, is that the world programmed me to think that I need to be all-in.
"All-in" to me means I have to get the Lexus yacht and the Garmin smart marine watch, and all the _stuff_ that comes with that, if I want to partake in this activity. If I want to enjoy its pleasures.
"All-in" to me also means that this activity (in this modern form) and its ecosystem and community has been structured (by that massive industrialized complex) such that if I don't go all-in, then it wouldn't work. The real action happens when you go all-in.
From another angle, if I had the luck of realizing that I can do sailing with a simple Hobie Cat, with a friend, on the local lake. I'd still have to overcome this very difficult impression left on me by the marketers of the Lexus + Garmin + Goodies that a simple Hobie Cat wouldn't be good enough to bring a very broad smile to my face. They would want me to sit with the all-in image in my head. They would want to suppress the simple option.
--
which then is where we can look at your other statement:
>>>The velocity of relevance seems to have altered significantly.
You cannot just go all-in today and be set. you need to do it every year, "new" updates, upgrades, all sold by the same marketers in such a way that the previous models just seem not usable anymore.
--
Reading again, I also see
>>>it does make you feel
you see, thats what they want!
>>>it does make you feel as if you need to be all-in
so they want to create the idea that being behind, being a noob (the "perpetual state" as you put it) is a bad thing. Or maybe rather, they know humans (as PG says were in the old days required to overcome noobness to survive) so it's built into us. marketers exploit this to get you to buy again and again.
-------
which brings us to philosophy. The stuff I've come to realize sit even underneath the above statements.
See, philosophers tells us that happiness already exists inside us. Right now. Right here. Inside.
If you could be made to believe it is outside, then you could be told 'one of the things' out there might be the one for you. Which implies, you'd have to try out a lot of stuff to hopefully find it between the options. Which gives you the idea that if you get something, and it doesn't work, you just gotta try something else. But what you don't know, the trick, is that none of it will fulfill.
Also, problem for a capitalist world is that, if you know happiness is inside, then you have no reason to seek it outside of you.
If you're not seeking it outside, and you feel it inside, you won't be open to suggestions of products that might fulfill this suggested feeling of emptiness.
Which means they can't sell you anything, and thus not take your money.
So, ask yourself then, how much of how our society is built, its structures, how we're educated, deliberately avoids helping you to find the happiness inside, and deliberately pushes you to seek for it outside of yourself.
-
being a noob i think then is not something we should seek in all cases. when learning , yes definately.
but ito happiness, being in the moment and enjoying it as it is, is all you need. no noobness attitude.
----
ok, ramble done. I may've gone way beyond your comment, but you triggered something, and I enjoyed it , thanks!
I like this post. There are Socratic echoes here: "I know that I know nothing", though pg is making a different point. It seems cliche and low effort but often times deep truths ARE cliched. The older I get, the more okay I am with embracing my lack of knowledge in a domain. Now I see it more as a potential first step in future mastery.
lol literally the opposite of his twitter feed in which he revels in telling people what to think and do. that's the opposite of noob mentality. pg jumped the shark.
Huh this essay seems really confusing. I can't figure out what pg is actually trying to say - it is short but talks about being a noob in roundabout ways. If this is so popular, perhaps I should get back to blogging again.
I get a joyous, almost dreamlike experience out of being a noob, I love to try things for that feeling of difficulty. There is this rapt appreciation that comes with it, even if I don't personally get good at the thing.
Ambling about like a dunce myself, trying to gain some knowledge or skill, and watching professionals do it makes me feel in awe. I am overcome with love for humans reaching for the divine, like Faust pondering future human goodness and joy of participation in human life (as he dies).
I can't say I share the feelings that PG is describing.
I don't really mind being a noob at something I see as useful to learn. The feeling that I get in that case is a drive to find out what is up with that thing. In programming it is not always clear, though, that the new thing is that great or even that it should exist in the first place. This makes me then feel not to great. But it is more of a feeling of irritation at the thing that I suspect of not needing to exist.
[+] [-] munificent|6 years ago|reply
Maybe I'm projecting from my own social anxiety, but I believe most of the negative sensation of feeling like a noob is being seen to not know something.
People want to come across as valuable to others and one way we do that is by offerring expertise. If we are seen to be noobs, it implies we may be less valuable to others because we don't know a thing.
Unfortunately, being a noob is a necessary precondition to actually learning a thing. It's very hard to learn without putting yourself out there in some way and trying. So there is this tension between wanting to be comfortable with looking like an amateur so that you can immerse yourself in the kind of environments where rapid learning happens, while also wanting to come across as an expert at other times.
[+] [-] jsonne|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Davertron|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mfkp|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] MivLives|6 years ago|reply
The only noobs people care about are the perpetual ones who need to be instructed on how to do things again and again.
[+] [-] grawprog|6 years ago|reply
I've found the trick to getting over this is realizing no matter how good you are at something, there's always someone better and when you find yourself as the noob, you get to ask all the questions and learn and everbody will be ok with this. You also get to make mistakes, and everybody will be ok with this.
I've recently found myself going from being the expert to bottom of the barrel noob again and honestly it's refreshing, there's no pressure on you, somebody else makes the decisions, you just kinda do what you're told and absorb knowledge, and when something goes wrong you don't need to figure it out. It does make a nice change, though it can be frustrating, especially when it's a situation when you know what to do, but nobody listens because you're the noob.
You just have to remember, at some point you won't be the noob again and someone else will be, might as well enjoy it while you can.
It's also kind of an interesting situation, I started my new job just after a younger guy who's only had one or two other jobs before. There's a big difference between the way the two of us learn and work just because of our gap in life experience. It made me realize there's different levels between even noobs based on a bunch of different factors.
In the end though, i've found it best when you're the noob to just learn whatever you can as fast as you can, bring whatever knowledge and experience you can, but do it unspokenly through actions rather than words and eventually, without realizing it, you're not the noob any more.
[+] [-] AmericanChopper|6 years ago|reply
I can anecdotally agree with this. In general, I don’t care at all what people think about me (I still care if people think I’ve wronged them, it’s more what they judgementally think of me), and I have never felt bad about being a noob, or being seen as a noob.
I’ve learnt two languages through immersion, and I’ve been told I pick them up very quickly. Learning languages like that is basically repeating things you’ve heard, and then figuring out what everything really means through asking questions and a huge amount of trial and error... with lots and lots of error. Really I’m not any better at learning things than anybody else is, but because I didn’t ever feel bad about making those errors, I’d wake up in the morning, and spend the whole day happily making “embarrassing” language mistakes. Which over time quickly became less and less common.
[+] [-] SquishyPanda23|6 years ago|reply
Along similar lines, it's not just that you can't offer expertise. It's also that you're participating in a community defined by knowledge of a particular topic. And relative to that community, you're an outsider since you don't have that knowledge. So all of your primate fears about approaching a community as an outsider kick in.
There's also generally the uncomfortable feeling of confronting your ignorance when being informed, or skilled, or intelligent is a major part of your self image.
[+] [-] Polylactic_acid|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] aswanson|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Kuiper|6 years ago|reply
New city? There's a bunch of cool/fun things to do that you haven't tried yet. New hobby? Hop onto Youtube and there's hundreds of hours of "explainer" videos made by passionate hobbyists looking to share their favorite parts of that hobby with you. New to a particular field? Other people have probably already done the work of curating the 1% most interesting, important, and fascinating things to learn about. It's easy to feel like you're making progress when you're starting from zero.
I recently bought a guitar and started playing Rocksmith -- think Guitar Hero, but with a real guitar hooked up to your computer, with learning tools designed to help you learn how to play songs of your choosing, along with lessons covering everything from how to play power chords to the very basics of how to hold your guitar when sitting vs standing. I'm a total noob when it comes to playing guitar, but I've enjoyed every part of my time with Rocksmith, from the very first moment I plugged in my guitar and let the software step me through the process of tuning it.
I've found it incredibly edifying largely because the experience of picking up an instrument and learning how to play it has reminded me of what it's like to learn a completely new skill from scratch -- I think spending a week with Rocksmith has not only taught me guitar basics, but also given me a refresher course on how to learn a new skill.
In fact, I wonder if this can lead to its own problem -- someone who gets too much pleasure from the experience of being a noob and may turn into a dilettante, moving from hobby to hobby without ever taking the time to spend years cultivating a deep expertise. Which, I suppose, is fine on a certain level, but there are definitely times when I've procrastinated and hidden from the intimidating prospect of achieving mastery in a field where I already have a lot of experience, and instead spent that time venturing into new fields where there's still low-hanging fruit for me to pick.
[+] [-] pigscantfly|6 years ago|reply
In the end, I think the learning process for almost any skill follows an S-curve, and that initial takeoff is always the most intoxicating period for me. That said, I've spoken about this with others in my classes, and most of them find this early period more daunting and relish later stages, when their footing has become solid.
[+] [-] porknubbins|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] auggierose|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bonestamp2|6 years ago|reply
I got angry recently when I asked a question on amazon about a home improvement hardware item and one of the responses I got was something like, "This job is better left to a professional." They completely dismissed my question like everyone who works in that profession was born with this knowledge.
I just wanted to know if it was possible to disconnect two of the pieces (and someone else confirmed it was possible, so it wasn't a dumb question after all). Not to mention, it was for an art project, so the "professional" quality/safety advice doesn't apply. That's when being a noob feels bad.
[+] [-] chrisseaton|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ChrisMarshallNY|6 years ago|reply
It's not always a bad thing, as it is used as a carrot to bond teams and push for excellence (Think "Semper Fi").
But it is quite grating. The main thing that gets me, is when folks being superior either withhold information, or deliberately try to interfere with my learning.
On StackOverflow, I have almost twice as many questions as I have answers. This doesn't really get me any respect.
But boy oh boy, have I learned a lot.
[+] [-] james-imitative|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bambax|6 years ago|reply
Being a noob is neither pleasant nor unpleasant. We are learning machines and curiosity is one of our main drives in life.
Appearing as a noob can probably rub some people the wrong way. People who are, how should we put it? Ego sensitive?
[+] [-] kharak|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] madsbuch|6 years ago|reply
When you do not feel like a noob anymore, you might become complacent. That, I think is the main problem.
[+] [-] pattisapu|6 years ago|reply
Well put!
[+] [-] flyGuyOnTheSly|6 years ago|reply
A paradigm shift, if you will.
I used to look at challenging poses with dread. "Oh god, that's going to be uncomfortable..." or perhaps "There is no way I am strong enough to do that..." and I am always right. It is going to be uncomfortable and I am usually too weak to perform the asana with grace.
But what really excited me upon learning recently... and what helps me pull through it every single time now is this:
I am about to be able to move my body in a way that was never before possible... at least not possible since I was 6 years old or so most likely...
If I can just bear through it...
In a few weeks time I know I'll be able to move my body in ways that I never even thought was possible... and that's really exciting for a yogi!
Trying new things is exhilarating!
I feel sorry for my former self who dreaded them for far too long.
[+] [-] stanferder|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] duxup|6 years ago|reply
It can be frustrating not knowing and I'll go down the path of analysis paralysis and procrastination sometimes. I'm a bit prone to that as in my previous career I kinda had things down pretty solidly.
But I try to embrace it. Is this the right code here? No better way to find out than try things and see what happens....if it doesn't work, well I'm a noob, that is going to happen. (obviously these are somewhat educated / calculated risks, not just random)
I like it. There's a freedom in not worrying if you're doing it right all the time and recognizing that doing it wrong is ok provided you learn.
[+] [-] lsaferite|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] segmondy|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] eralps|6 years ago|reply
> if you stay in your home country, you'll feel less of a noob
> And yet you'll know more if you move.
I experienced this in the US when I was scheduling interviews for an internship with a US company. I had waited for the interviewer for half an hour and shoot them an email asking for rescheduling after they did not show up.
Turns out I forgot the timezone difference. In all my (quarter-century)life, I had never needed to check timezone in the same country. Felt like the biggest noob. I know more in general now but, even for a simple thing like scheduling an interview, I became "locally" noob.
[+] [-] mcguire|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] makach|6 years ago|reply
I too think of myself as a noob. I believe it has to do about knowledge and experience. You know the old adage "The more you know, the more you know you don't know." To me this is very true.
I was reprimanded the other day, by management because I said in a presentation "I don't know" when discussing how to solve a particular problem. When having a discussion there is a few rules that must be followed in order for you to have a meaningful exchange of opinions that brings you closer to some sort of consensus. One of these is principle of charity: "interpreting a speaker's statements in the most rational way possible and, in the case of any argument, considering its best, strongest possible interpretation." My manager did the the opposite of this principle and assumed that when I said "I don't know" that that meant that I was going to find out on my own and disregard his opinion and directive. What I meant was that "I don't know, let's gather a group of experts, let them gather information and interpret this in such a way that he can take a proper decision on what to do next."
I regret that I wasn't this clear when communicating with him to begin with.
To me, in IT nothing is more worse than someone who claim they know everything, have all the answers and don't want to listen.
Recently on I recently read the quote "The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance; it is the illusion of knowledge." I think this complements the above quote very well, and is something important that we all need to be aware of. To be a noob means at least you have the self-insight to understand that you have much more to learn, and that you are willing to collaborate with your colleagues to achieve more wisdom.
[+] [-] zro|6 years ago|reply
Maybe it's because I'm still in the junior / recent-grad mindset, but my experience has been the opposite.
The most striking difference for me between academia and industry is that now it's okay to not know things. In academia you're expected to have the answers and be able to reproduce them on tests and things; in industry it seems much more acceptable to admit ignorance so long as you plan on eventually getting an answer.
[+] [-] rs23296008n1|6 years ago|reply
If being a noob is shameful then becoming good and then later an expert is made much more difficult than it should be. Mistakes and failures are also seen as shameful and must be hidden. If you can't be open about making mistakes and learning from them then you're more likely surrounded by idiots or jerks.
Failure is part of learning. So if you aren't failing at what you're doing right now in some way, to some degree, then its not challenging enough for you. That is fine because sometimes the job needs to be done right because you're doing the performance. But if you aren't pushing hard into a space where mistakes and failures are actually possible then your goals aren't big enough. Likely stagnating.
A stagnating expert is someone who is afraid of the next level. They are afraid of becoming a beginner again. Afraid perhaps to even get into the practice nets and practice batting or throwing. Afraid to practice scales or try some hard piece they've never played.
[+] [-] polishdude20|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] piinbinary|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] blueyes|6 years ago|reply
Which influenced Steve Jobs, among others. It's a great read.
[+] [-] GistNoesis|6 years ago|reply
With experience it should become rarer and rarer to encounter some things that makes so little sense that you feel like a noob, and you certainly shouldn't feel aimless.
The more systems you explore, the bigger the toolbox you acquire. And there are not infinitely many existing tools because they once have been invented. And often these tools can be categorized by their operating principles which are even fewer. Because most disciplines overlap, the more you explore the faster the exploration goes.
Sure, when you encounter something new you will need to gather some info before you are operational, but when you are enough of a generalist, you will have picked up enough heuristics to know who, where, and what to look for, and it shouldn't take long.
Sure, we can dig and make any subject arbitrarily deep so there are infinitely many new things to explore and be amazed by. Staying humble, curious, honest and acknowledging that there are plenty of things that you have explored yet is also necessary.
But if you disperse by being contempt of being a noob you risk becoming lost in a senseless experiencing of a chaotic mess, and not gather experience by seeing the order things could be arranged into.
So when you feel like a noob, sort it out.
[+] [-] andrewzah|6 years ago|reply
Then you're not pushing yourself or trying new things. Noob == newbie, so it applies even to experts who are learning things in an unfamiliar area.
I felt like a noob when I learned about functional programming. Then I felt like a noob again when I started learning Haskell.
I read about Coq yesterday and felt like a total and utter noob.
I read about the `nom` lexing crate for Rust recently and felt like a noob getting up to speed.
I still am a noob when it comes to using every unix utility: I recently learned about gnu parallel and read about xargs more finely.
I never want to be in a situation where I never feel like a noob, because in computing alone that's basically impossible unless I'm not challenging myself.
[+] [-] cirgue|6 years ago|reply
I feel like this is exactly the point he's making: if you're not putting yourself in positions where you feel like a noob, you'er not engaging your skills to their fullest potential, because the 'sorting it out' part is the thing that's really good for you. Nowhere here does he say 'feel like a noob and stay that way."
[+] [-] ArtWomb|6 years ago|reply
Where I find it harder to keep up is that esoteric knowledge of "the culture". What is current in music and movies and art. Even interacting with young people a lot. The velocity of relevance seems to have altered significantly.
Another interesting take is returning to childhood passions. I used to be into sailing and thought if I have some free time I'll take it up as a hobby again. Maybe book a class in Annapolis MD. Or charter a small yacht for a day trip in Florida during spring break.
But the world of sailing has just metastasized into a massive industrialized complex! Lexus has a concept luxury yacht. You can control the helm 100% using a Garmin Smart Marine Watch. There exist software platforms for archival wind data.
Don't get me wrong, it's awesome. But there is an activation energy. And I am sure there are still single person Hobie Cats available. But it does make you feel as if you need to be all-in or else exist in a perpetual state of n00b-ishness ;)
[+] [-] qwertygerty|6 years ago|reply
Hmm, this is a bigger point than I think you make it out to be. (?)
It's something that's pained me for a long time too. I'll ramble a bit...
I think part of the problem, in my case at least, is that the world programmed me to think that I need to be all-in.
"All-in" to me means I have to get the Lexus yacht and the Garmin smart marine watch, and all the _stuff_ that comes with that, if I want to partake in this activity. If I want to enjoy its pleasures.
"All-in" to me also means that this activity (in this modern form) and its ecosystem and community has been structured (by that massive industrialized complex) such that if I don't go all-in, then it wouldn't work. The real action happens when you go all-in.
From another angle, if I had the luck of realizing that I can do sailing with a simple Hobie Cat, with a friend, on the local lake. I'd still have to overcome this very difficult impression left on me by the marketers of the Lexus + Garmin + Goodies that a simple Hobie Cat wouldn't be good enough to bring a very broad smile to my face. They would want me to sit with the all-in image in my head. They would want to suppress the simple option.
-- which then is where we can look at your other statement: >>>The velocity of relevance seems to have altered significantly.
You cannot just go all-in today and be set. you need to do it every year, "new" updates, upgrades, all sold by the same marketers in such a way that the previous models just seem not usable anymore.
-- Reading again, I also see >>>it does make you feel you see, thats what they want!
>>>it does make you feel as if you need to be all-in
so they want to create the idea that being behind, being a noob (the "perpetual state" as you put it) is a bad thing. Or maybe rather, they know humans (as PG says were in the old days required to overcome noobness to survive) so it's built into us. marketers exploit this to get you to buy again and again.
------- which brings us to philosophy. The stuff I've come to realize sit even underneath the above statements.
See, philosophers tells us that happiness already exists inside us. Right now. Right here. Inside.
If you could be made to believe it is outside, then you could be told 'one of the things' out there might be the one for you. Which implies, you'd have to try out a lot of stuff to hopefully find it between the options. Which gives you the idea that if you get something, and it doesn't work, you just gotta try something else. But what you don't know, the trick, is that none of it will fulfill.
Also, problem for a capitalist world is that, if you know happiness is inside, then you have no reason to seek it outside of you. If you're not seeking it outside, and you feel it inside, you won't be open to suggestions of products that might fulfill this suggested feeling of emptiness. Which means they can't sell you anything, and thus not take your money.
So, ask yourself then, how much of how our society is built, its structures, how we're educated, deliberately avoids helping you to find the happiness inside, and deliberately pushes you to seek for it outside of yourself.
- being a noob i think then is not something we should seek in all cases. when learning , yes definately.
but ito happiness, being in the moment and enjoying it as it is, is all you need. no noobness attitude.
---- ok, ramble done. I may've gone way beyond your comment, but you triggered something, and I enjoyed it , thanks!
[+] [-] lordleft|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] louisswiss|6 years ago|reply
I very much doubt that being stupid correlates with feeling like a noob. In fact, my own experience of 'stupid' people suggests the very opposite.
[+] [-] sbilstein|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lappet|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] simonsarris|6 years ago|reply
Ambling about like a dunce myself, trying to gain some knowledge or skill, and watching professionals do it makes me feel in awe. I am overcome with love for humans reaching for the divine, like Faust pondering future human goodness and joy of participation in human life (as he dies).
[+] [-] cjfd|6 years ago|reply
I don't really mind being a noob at something I see as useful to learn. The feeling that I get in that case is a drive to find out what is up with that thing. In programming it is not always clear, though, that the new thing is that great or even that it should exist in the first place. This makes me then feel not to great. But it is more of a feeling of irritation at the thing that I suspect of not needing to exist.