Detailed Notes
As the Building Better Developers podcast wrapped up its season on habits, hosts Rob Broadhead and Michael Meloche reflected on why habits matter, how they shape our professional and personal lives, and how developers can leverage them for continuous improvement. This final episode, Why Habits Matter, serves as both a recap and a call to action for listeners to take charge of their growth by intentionally developing productive habits.
Read More: https://develpreneur.com/why-habits-matter-unlock-peak-productivity-and-success/
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*Additional Resources*
* Security Awareness: Protect Your Code, Your Career, and Your Future (https://develpreneur.com/security-awareness-protect-your-code-your-career-and-your-future/) * Pomodoro Technique: Boost Your Focus and Productivity with Time-Blocking (https://develpreneur.com/pomodoro-technique-boost-your-focus-and-productivity-with-time-blocking/) * Planning and Scheduling: Essential Habits for Building Better Developers (https://develpreneur.com/planning-and-scheduling-essential-habits-for-building-better-developers/) * Managing Anxiety and Stress: Insights and Strategies for Daily Life (https://develpreneur.com/managing-anxiety-and-stress-insights-and-strategies-for-daily-life/)
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Transcript Text
[Music] and we'll press record and we are back and we are doing the last episode for this season which is going to put us on notice because we're going to have to figure out the next season um I think do I do think we may into like building better businesses and figure out how to go that route um but we'll see I think for this one just talk about like why habits matter I think that's a pretty good one to to dive into and we'll just sort of have our closing thoughts on that so we'll do our little 3d2 well hello and welcome back we are continuing and coincidentally enough wrapping up this season of building better developers develop preneur podcast this season has been about building better habits hopefully we've built quite a few uh and by we I mean all of us I know I have um I know Michael has hopefully the rest of you guys have joined in and got some better habits along the way as well I'd like to introduce myself my name is Rob Broadhead one of the founders of develop andur also a founder of RB Consulting where we go go out there and help you Wrangle technology we help you take care of that you know figure out that technology sprawl when you're looking out over the wild wild west of what's out there in your business and you're wondering where should I spend money where did I spend money wrong where do I need to Leverage What I've already done through simplification automation Innovation integration we find ways with you we craft your special recipe for your business to take all that technology out there and leverage it so that you can best use it for your business it is a unique fit for everybody it's just like a custom suit I mean you can go out and you can get like you know low-end clothes that sort of fits everybody to some extent but not real well or you can spend a little bit more money and you can have something that is a you know tailor made custom fit and with technology you're already spending a lot of money so let's make sure that you're spending money in a way that gives you that custom fit instead of a you know an outfit that you throw in the closet and never want to be seen in enough of that analogy as we wrap up this season I just want to I I can't I have time and again mentioned how the Pomodoro habit has helped me I think another one that is like right up there with a 1A and a 1B is the doing what you love is going back and making sure that you regularly touch whatever that thing is that you do that it gives you Joy whether it is a little bit of exercise whether it is a specific type of project whether it you know whatever it is and you don't have to do a lot it's just a little and especially because I've actually been through a season of being very very busy having a lot of stuff going on but just that you know 10 15 minutes a day really does help like you know keep you sane basically good things bad things uh I'm going to take it on a little bit of a you know a higher level good thing is is that we are wrapping up another season that we have gotten through yet another season this thing is like this was originally just sort of a a you know one-off kind of thing way way back when I created the developer or website and then later it became something I was like hey this could probably be a good little you know podcast for a while and now we are actually approaching getting into the neighborhood of a thousand episodes out there and so you know it's good that we have just continued on that we're getting through another season but it's also bad because we are wrapping up this season and we're going to have to dive into the next one another thing that's good is that I have a co-host on the other side so I'm going to let Michael introduce himself hey everyone my name is Mike m I'm one of the co-founders of development Nur building better developers I'm also the founder of Envision QA where we take the focus and detailed approach of test driven development of testing code and apply it to building software and working with businesses and clinicians to really identify walk through what it is your software is doing for you and helping you curtail customize or find the right tool to help your business grow so this season as we wrap it up um I kind of want to skip the good and bad and kind of just jump into how this season has really helped me for habits you know as Rob said a lot of the things that we started out with uh were very kind of interesting and uh important to us and also helped us grow as well but the things that I've always had fun with that I never really thought of too much as a habit was like the kitchen sink app or things like the Pomodoro Technique which I still suck at but it's currently for me depends more upon my situation my daily situation because uh sometimes I can be headstand focused sometimes I can follow the pomodoro technique and other times I'm better off if I just stay head down for 2 to three hours and get it done you just slog through the problem you you just get it done uh other things you know that I got away from that this helped me uh kind of circle back on it's like the automation uh I found myself doing the same thing every day and it's like you know three lines of code in a script file just saved me 10 minutes a day which you know after 5 days is almost a full hour hour a week you get back and that hour actually allowed me to get more stuff done and then it kind of snowballed I got a little bit more time back so things like that were very helpful and the other thing that especially since our season kind of went through an election period as well uh it helped with building habits to help with anxiety uh and also you know taking breaks taking news breaks walking away from things how to talk to people how to you know work through meeting take criticism code reviews you know as we get anxious and um kind of frustrated we can get hostile with our co-workers we can take things the wrong way and a lot of the habits we talked about this season uh really by following the techniques we talked about and doing those challenges helped me get back on track and I hope that that's a story that a lot of you that resonates with a lot of you is that this has been helpful for to you for you [Music] as I get all choked up because of this um I I want to talk revisit a little bit like why do habits even matter why is it something that we care about and it is because it actually goes back to like survival Instinct and things like that it's actually it was a a show I watched it was now a couple years ago but they basically they were pitting adults versus children with solving problems and there were different styles of problems that they had them solve and in some cases the adults smoked the kids in some cases the kids smoked the adults and the interesting thing that came out of that when they were looking at some of the uh some of the problems that are out there is that as adults and actually just as human beings as we evolve we build shortcuts we see things and see them often enough that they allow us to do them automatically to skip through essentially the detailed process of analyzing it and instead just go straight to the end it's basically like when you look at for example like if you had to do long multiplication or Long Division versus just knowing what the answer is you can go through it however sometimes we we learn that there are shortcuts and that's what some of the are is they are they are building some of those shortcuts so it's things like in a physical sense it's often referred to as muscle memory so it's for example if there's a a golfer that's out there and they just swing and swing and swing and they hit a thousand balls a day they are building muscle memory so that they will when they you know pull their arms back and swing it through then it's going to be the same essentially the same motion the same level of effort and energy exert and stuff like that that's what we want out of our habits is we want to look at the things that we do on a regular basis which for us is it's things like writing code it is interacting with our co-workers it is designing systems it is solving problems and how do we find ways to do that better and the what we do is we build habits we say this thing will be beneficial to us and so we do it in a way that now it becomes automatic for us to do it we don't have to think about it and I think that's something that is on a on a meta level you can look back if you've gone through and picked even you know a handful of these challenges and these habits and tried to pick them up the first thing is that you have to remember to do it each day so it's a little it is a little bit clunky or whatever because you're like oh yeah I've got to put it on my to-do list I've got to remember to create a to-do list you know things like that but then what happens over time is that it becomes so natural that actually it becomes you feel uncomfortable not doing it there are things where you like get through the day and like oh I didn't do that and it won't feel you'll feel a little bit off because you're like oh yeah I didn't do that thing that is that habit that I have and so I think that's really where the value of the habits are is that it is us saying it's sort of us it is in effect fact automating our lives in a way it's saying that this thing is very useful and so I want to do it on a regular basis I want it to just happen I don't want I have to think about it because then all of the what it does is it reduces the cost of that you don't have to think about you don't have to switch into that mode you don't have to spend the extra time of documenting it or whatever it happens to be you just do it and that is where habits become highly valuable and I think I'm going to stop there and throw that over to you and see what what are your thoughts on some maybe you know a big lesson learned in going through this season yeah one of the biggest lessons learn and I've touched on this in a couple different episodes is habits are not something that happen overnight these are things we have to work towards to make even small improvements now the funny thing is some of these small improvements can be huge improvements like I said you know you automate three things and you get an hour back a week you know that adds up over the course of a year it's interesting though you know to me me personally why habits matter it's because it's kind of a checklist on am I doing things right am I doing things the right way am I able to keep moving that dial forward am I getting things done if you find yourself asking yourself that a lot or you get stressed and your head's down it's like I I'm buried under work I can't get through things habits really are the answer to that they're a way for you to focus and reset to dig yourself out of being buried under work being buried under life uh there's always light at the end of the tunnel it's not always that train but you know baby steps get you closer that like gets bigger you keep moving you keep moving you keep moving so as we've discussed the habits of season you know other topics that come to mind for developers starting out you know look at improving your coding skills you know I talked about drinking from the fire hose sometimes it's better to not take a habit that is too restrictive too early on maybe turn up the fire hose have more stuff thrown at you but use like uh Rob likes the Pomodoro Technique to spend maybe 15 minutes a day on like C 15 minutes a day on Java 15 minutes a day on python look at different languages if you're a coder if you're like me early on I read almost every single techbook I could get my hands on because uh you know spoiler or I was around before the internet uh so we had to read books we couldn't just turn on a computer and so Hey where's this information so I grabbed every single book I could get my hands on and found out very quickly there was things I did not understand or just really didn't FP my boat like I did not like networking routers switches totally confused the crap out of me didn't get it but I found out very quickly by okay I only found that out by reading uh different technical mans different uh books that were out there when it came to uh programming so a lot of the books out there at that time were like basic were Doss were uh uh like C C++ you know Java was not even really out yet it was still Elm it's still Oak and so it was a different world back then and it's it was funny because I found out I liked math but I didn't find that out till I made it to high school so it's like we don't really know what we are supposed to do until we find what we're supposed to do so the Journey of the Habit that I'm going to throw out there is you know by improving coding skills learn something new every day take one of these habits and apply it to trying something new and that's going to help you figure out what it is that you want to do so if you're struggling not just with your job but with life but just trying to figure out where your place is on this planet the best way to do it is to look at the habits we have and why the habits matter it's so that we can figure out what it is that we want where we belong in this world and what makes us happy habits will help you get there and it kind of gives you that road map it kind of gives you uh maybe not like here's a here's B here's how to get there but it gives you the incremental steps that you need to figure it out in a structured way so you're not scattered you're not overwhelmed and it will get you there you you you will find that just baby steps we've we we have overused the word getting it done but it's just you have to keep taking a step forward in order to reach your destination if you stand still and expect someone else to help you someone might but the world is going to pass you by and you're just going to be standing still nothing is going to change you have to be the kind of you have to be the uh take CH take charge of your own destiny and to do that you just have to start taking steps forward and use habits habits are the tools in your tool belt to get you there I cannot emphasize enough that that is that is the biggest value right there it is and we've talked about taking something huge something very big and then breaking it down into something that is you know something we can make progress on because you know winning the Super Bowl is a big thing it takes a long time to get there you may especially if you're a kid but then it's like okay well you start out and you practice and you do stuff and then you join a team and then you practice some more and you win a game and you win another game and you win another game blah blah blah you get there eventually with anything we do it's the same way there are steps that are made there is no such thing as an overnight success there were steps taken to get to that point and so the sort of the Big Challenge I have in moving forward is building your figure out what are your own challenges and habits that you want to build now one that is has been used in the past an idea that I I'm going to throw back out there again is the idea of taking something big like building a product starting a business starting a blog starting a podcast writing a book uh those things are in themselves pretty big uh getting a certification is there as well in a lot of cases and so these are big and they are rewarding and they are actually very nice things to have on your resume so if there's one of those that you haven't done pick it if it sounds in if it hasn't appealed to you you know if you don't want to write a book then don't say I'm going to write a book but if it is like ah it would be sort of cool to try then try and by try I mean start a habit do five minutes of writing a day or 10 minutes of writing a day or 15 minutes there are whatever your product is whatever your goal is there are going to be obstacles but there are also a lot of people out there that have done it and they will talk about you can go find ways that you can incrementally get your way to that learning a new language it may be as simple as like I'm going to learn this command or that command or I'm going to solve this problem in the language or that problem in the language or I'm going to you know read on this for a little bit or I'm going to write this do this Automation in this new language whatever it happens to be there are essentially baby steps to everything there are little steps that you can take towards anything that you want to do and that is where I think this season will give you the the biggest boost is take a look at what we've done we just sort of literally in almost every episode write and we're like hey here's a habit let's go talk about it that kind of stuff you can do this we're not some you know we're not magicians that are out there you know somehow magically doing all this stuff all you need to do is take a look at maybe your road map what is your career road map where do you want to be like Michael said you're at a figure out a b that you would like to be at and then spend a little time saying well what would it look like to be a little closer to that destination tomorrow and a little closer to the day after that and now suddenly you've got something you've got some incremental steps and then what you want to do is maybe the only habit is just taking a step each day but maybe there's something around that that is going to help you and that is where you're going to go that's where I want to leave you with the you know the final challenge for this for this season is the next challenge is for the next seven days create a habit and spend seven days working towards that habit and then of course at the end of that time shoot us an email and let us know how it went for you because we would love to hear we love feedback even when it's from you know episodes that haven't you know that were posted years ago we still want to hear the you know the feedback what do you like what don't you like where would you like us to go next because we will be diving into another season I believe it's 24 is now our upcoming season which is just insane most EP podcast don't make it to 24 episodes much less 24 seasons particularly when we've got a season or two out there that are a lot of EP I think we've got two seasons that are you know 60 plus episodes per season uh one maybe double that so our seasons are a little bit off sometimes that being said I know we're a little bit off but thank you so much for your time thank you for spending time with us in this season we look forward to seeing you right around the corner when we start the next season there's no break or anything like that going on we're going to dive right into the next one we're as excited as you are and we are wondering as much as you are what is it that we are going to do in that next season go out there and have yourself a great day a great week and we will talk to you next time closing thoughts so if you are new just starting out or struggling to figure out where it is you're wanting to go one of the interesting things you mentioned in your closing thoughts there Rob was you know do what you like to do uh one of the things we did years ago and I think this was maybe at the start of development or this may have been it for recruiters or somewhere in between we came up with the idea for launching an internet business it was not launching an internet business at the time it was just kind of learning software Technologies kind of learning Tech learning tools and one of the things out of that we both kind of did was we built websites around Hobbies you did blessing not stressing I did Doctor Who and at the time Doctor Who was really popular I'm still a huge Doctor Who fan but there's been so many pauses between Seasons I got kind of got away from it kind of got out of it so uh due to time and cost I had to shut the site down but if you are into like Game of Thrones or video games and you just love talking to people about it create a medium for yourself uh our launching internet business little uh video series we have will show you how to stand up a website how you can set up a Blog and you can just start playing with technology and just talking to people centralize your thoughts build a site and get started you know that could be one of your habits hey just set up a website where I can talk talk about my hobbies talk about things I like to do and go from there um I know that's self-promoting you know Bill you may not want to do that but the funny part is we didn't really necessarily want to do that at the beginning but it was like Hey what if we did this and then we found out we like doing it and it kind of blossomed into this so small habits small decisions have lasting impact and you also find out if you like it or don't like it because there were some other things I stood up during the time that I found out very quickly weren't going to work for me I didn't like them and it felt like I was forcing it like I was being a you know being fake about so I turned it off I got rid of it these habits this season will help you figure it out I think that's a good place to wrap it up uh I I cannot emphasize enough yeah take a look at what some of our material a lot of it is broken into like you know 10 minutes 15 minutes a day uh if you don't like exactly what we're doing it hopefully at least gives you a template to do it yourself again appreciate so much your time and investing in us and we look forward to giving you something Val you know some value for your time as we step into the next season as well go out there and have yourself a great one and we will talk to you next season [Music]
Transcript Segments
[Music]
and we'll press record and we are back
and we are
doing the last episode for this season
which is going to put us on notice
because we're going to have to figure
out the next season um I think do I do
think we may into like building better
businesses and figure out how to go that
route um but we'll see I think for this
one just talk about like why habits
matter I think that's a pretty good one
to to dive into and we'll just sort of
have our closing thoughts on that so
we'll do our little
3d2 well hello and welcome back we are
continuing and coincidentally enough
wrapping up this season of building
better developers develop preneur
podcast this season has been about
building better habits hopefully we've
built quite a few uh and by we I mean
all of us I know I have um I know
Michael has hopefully the rest of you
guys have joined in and got some better
habits along the way as well I'd like to
introduce myself my name is Rob
Broadhead one of the founders of develop
andur also a founder of RB Consulting
where we go go out there and help you
Wrangle technology we help you take care
of that you know figure out that
technology sprawl when you're looking
out over the wild wild west of what's
out there in your business and you're
wondering where should I spend money
where did I spend money wrong where do I
need to Leverage What I've already done
through simplification automation
Innovation integration we find ways with
you we craft your special recipe for
your business to take all that
technology out there and leverage it so
that you can best use it for your
business it is a unique fit for
everybody it's just like a custom suit I
mean you can go out and you can get like
you know low-end clothes that sort of
fits everybody to some extent but not
real well or you can spend a little bit
more money and you can have something
that is a you know tailor made custom
fit and with technology you're already
spending a lot of money so let's make
sure that you're spending money in a way
that gives you that custom fit instead
of a you know an outfit that you throw
in the closet and never want to be seen
in enough of that analogy as we wrap up
this
season I just want to I I can't I have
time and again mentioned how the
Pomodoro habit has helped me I think
another one that is like right up there
with a 1A and a 1B is the doing what you
love is going back and making sure that
you regularly touch whatever that thing
is that you do that it gives you Joy
whether it is a little bit of exercise
whether it is a specific type of project
whether it you know whatever it is and
you don't have to do a lot it's just a
little and especially because I've
actually been through a season of being
very very busy having a lot of stuff
going on but just that you know 10 15
minutes a day really does help like you
know keep you sane basically good things
bad things uh I'm going to take it on a
little bit of a you know a higher level
good thing is is that we are wrapping up
another season that we have gotten
through yet another season this thing is
like this was originally just sort of
a a you know one-off kind of thing way
way back when I created the developer or
website and then later it became
something I was like hey this could
probably be a good little you know
podcast for a while and now we are
actually approaching getting into the
neighborhood of a thousand episodes out
there and so you know it's good that we
have just continued on that we're
getting through another season but it's
also bad because we are wrapping up this
season and we're going to have to dive
into the next one another thing that's
good is that I have a co-host on the
other side so I'm going to let Michael
introduce
himself hey everyone my name is Mike m
I'm one of the co-founders of
development Nur building better
developers I'm also the founder of
Envision QA where we take the focus
and detailed approach of test driven
development of testing code and apply it
to building software and working with
businesses and clinicians to really
identify walk through what it is your
software is doing for you and helping
you curtail customize or find the right
tool to help your business grow so this
season as we wrap it up um I kind of
want to skip the good and bad and kind
of just jump into how this season has
really helped me for habits you know as
Rob said a lot of the things that we
started out with uh were very kind of
interesting and uh important to us and
also helped us grow as well but the
things that I've always had fun with
that I never really thought of too much
as a habit was like the kitchen sink app
or things like the Pomodoro Technique
which I still suck at but it's
currently for me depends more upon my
situation my daily situation because uh
sometimes I can be headstand focused
sometimes I can follow the pomodoro
technique and other times I'm better off
if I just stay head down for 2 to three
hours and get it done you just slog
through the problem you you just get it
done uh other things you know that I got
away from that this helped me uh kind of
circle back on it's like the
automation
uh I found myself doing the same thing
every day and it's like you know three
lines of code in a script file just
saved me 10 minutes a day which you know
after 5 days is almost a full hour hour
a week you get back and that hour
actually allowed me to get more stuff
done and then it kind of snowballed I
got a little bit more time back so
things like that were very helpful and
the other thing that especially since
our season kind of went through an
election period as well uh it helped
with building habits to help with
anxiety uh and also you know taking
breaks taking news breaks walking away
from things how to talk to people how to
you know work through meeting take
criticism code reviews you know as we
get anxious and um kind of frustrated we
can get hostile with our co-workers we
can take things the wrong way and a lot
of the habits we talked about this
season uh really by following the
techniques we talked about and doing
those challenges helped me get back on
track and I hope that that's a story
that a lot of you that resonates with a
lot of you is that this has been helpful
for to you for you
[Music]
as I get all choked up because of this
um I I want to talk revisit a little bit
like why do habits even matter why is it
something that we care
about and it is
because it actually goes back to like
survival Instinct and things like that
it's actually it was a a show I watched
it was now a couple years ago but they
basically they were pitting adults
versus children with solving problems
and there were different styles of
problems that they had them solve and in
some cases the adults smoked the kids in
some cases the kids smoked the
adults and the interesting thing that
came out of that when they were looking
at some of the uh some of the problems
that are out there is that as adults and
actually just as human beings as we
evolve we build shortcuts we see things
and see them often enough that they
allow us to do them automatically to
skip through essentially the detailed
process of analyzing it and instead just
go straight to the end it's basically
like when you look at for example like
if you had to do long multiplication or
Long Division versus just knowing what
the answer is you can go through it
however sometimes we we learn that there
are shortcuts and that's what some of
the are is they are they are building
some of those shortcuts so it's things
like in a physical sense it's often
referred to as muscle memory so it's for
example if there's a a golfer that's out
there and they just swing and swing and
swing and they hit a thousand balls a
day they are building muscle memory so
that they will when they you know pull
their arms back and swing it through
then it's going to be the same
essentially the same motion the same
level of effort and energy exert and
stuff like that that's what we want out
of our habits is we want to look at the
things that we do on a regular basis
which for us is it's things like writing
code it is interacting with our
co-workers it is designing systems it is
solving
problems and how do we find ways to do
that better and the what we do is we
build habits we say this thing will be
beneficial to us and so we do it in a
way that now it becomes automatic for us
to do it we don't have to think about it
and I think that's something that is on
a on a meta level you can look back if
you've gone through and picked even you
know a handful of these challenges and
these habits and tried to pick them up
the first thing is that you have to
remember to do it each day so it's a
little it is a little bit clunky or
whatever because you're like oh yeah
I've got to put it on my to-do list I've
got to remember to create a to-do list
you know things like that but then what
happens over time is that it becomes so
natural that actually it becomes you
feel uncomfortable not doing it there
are things where you like get through
the day and like oh I didn't do that and
it won't feel you'll feel a little bit
off because you're like oh yeah I didn't
do that thing that is that habit that I
have and so I think that's really where
the value of the habits are is that it
is us saying it's sort of us it is in
effect fact automating our lives in a
way it's saying that this thing is very
useful and so I want to do it on a
regular basis I want it to just happen I
don't want I have to think about it
because then all of the what it does is
it reduces the cost of that you don't
have to think about you don't have to
switch into that mode you don't have to
spend the extra time of documenting it
or whatever it happens to be you just do
it and that is where habits become
highly valuable and I think I'm going to
stop there and throw that over to you
and see what what are your thoughts on
some maybe you know a big lesson learned
in going through this
season yeah one of the biggest lessons
learn and I've touched on this in a
couple different episodes
is habits are not something that happen
overnight these are things we have to
work towards to make even small
improvements now the funny thing is some
of these small improvements can be huge
improvements like I said you know you
automate three things and you get an
hour back a week you know that adds up
over the course of a
year it's interesting though you know to
me me personally why habits matter it's
because it's kind of a
checklist on am I doing things right am
I doing things the right way am I able
to keep moving that dial forward am I
getting things done if you find yourself
asking yourself that a lot or you get
stressed and your head's down it's like
I I'm buried under work I can't get
through things habits really are the
answer to that they're a way for you to
focus and reset to dig yourself out of
being buried under work being buried
under life uh there's always light at
the end of the tunnel it's not always
that train but you know baby steps get
you closer that like gets bigger you
keep moving you keep moving you keep
moving so as we've discussed the habits
of season you know other topics that
come to mind for developers starting out
you know look at improving your coding
skills you know I talked about drinking
from the fire hose
sometimes it's better to not take a
habit that is too restrictive too early
on maybe turn up the fire hose have more
stuff thrown at you but use like uh Rob
likes the Pomodoro Technique to spend
maybe 15 minutes a day on like C 15
minutes a day on Java 15 minutes a day
on python look at different languages if
you're a coder if you're like me early
on I read almost every single techbook I
could get my hands on because uh you
know spoiler or I was around before the
internet uh so we had to read books we
couldn't just turn on a computer and so
Hey where's this information so I
grabbed every single book I could get my
hands on and found out very quickly
there was things I did not understand or
just really didn't FP my boat like I did
not like
networking routers switches totally
confused the crap out of me didn't get
it but I found out very quickly by okay
I only found that out by reading uh
different technical mans different uh
books that were out there when it came
to uh programming so a lot of the books
out there at that time were like basic
were Doss were uh uh like C C++ you know
Java was not even really out yet it was
still Elm it's still Oak and so it was a
different world back then and it's it
was funny because I found out I liked
math but I didn't find that out till I
made it to high school so it's like we
don't really know what we are supposed
to do until we find what we're supposed
to do so the Journey of the Habit that
I'm going to throw out there is you know
by improving coding skills learn
something new every day take one of
these habits and apply it to trying
something new and that's going to help
you figure out what it is that you want
to do so if you're struggling not just
with your job but with life but just
trying to figure out where your place is
on this planet the best way to do it is
to look at the habits we have and why
the habits matter it's so that we can
figure out what it is that we want where
we belong in this world and what makes
us happy habits will help you get there
and it kind of gives you that road map
it kind of gives you uh maybe not like
here's a here's B here's how to get
there but it gives you the incremental
steps that you need to figure it out in
a structured way so you're not scattered
you're not overwhelmed and it will get
you there you you you will find that
just baby steps we've we we have
overused the word getting it done but
it's just you have to keep taking a step
forward in order to reach your
destination if you stand still and
expect someone else to help you someone
might but the world is going to pass you
by and you're just going to be standing
still nothing is going to change you
have to be the kind of you have to be
the uh take CH take charge of your own
destiny and to do that you just have to
start taking steps forward and use
habits habits are the tools in your tool
belt to get you
there I cannot emphasize enough that
that is that is the biggest value right
there it is and we've talked about
taking something huge something very big
and then breaking it down into something
that is you know something we can make
progress on because you know winning the
Super Bowl is a big thing it takes a
long time to get there you may
especially if you're a kid but then it's
like okay well you start out and you
practice and you do stuff and then you
join a team and then you practice some
more and you win a game and you win
another game and you win another game
blah blah blah you get there eventually
with anything we do it's the same way
there are steps that are made there is
no such thing as an overnight success
there were steps taken to get to that
point and so the sort of the Big
Challenge I have in moving forward is
building your figure out what are your
own challenges and habits that you want
to build now one that is has been used
in the past an idea that I I'm going to
throw back out there again is the idea
of taking something big like building a
product starting a business starting a
blog starting a podcast writing a book
uh those things are in themselves pretty
big uh getting a certification is there
as well in a lot of cases and so these
are big and they are rewarding and they
are actually very nice things to have on
your resume so if there's one of those
that you haven't done pick it if it
sounds in if it hasn't appealed to you
you know if you don't want to write a
book then don't say I'm going to write a
book but if it is like ah it would be
sort of cool to try then try and by try
I mean start a habit do five minutes of
writing a day or 10 minutes of writing a
day or 15 minutes there are whatever
your product is whatever your goal
is there are going to be obstacles but
there are also a lot of people out there
that have done it and they will talk
about you can go find ways that you can
incrementally get your way to that
learning a new language it may be as
simple as like I'm going to learn this
command or that command or I'm going to
solve this problem in the language or
that problem in the language or I'm
going to you know read on this for a
little bit or I'm going to write this do
this Automation in this new language
whatever it happens to be there are
essentially baby steps to everything
there are little steps that you can take
towards anything that you want to do
and that is where I think this season
will give you the the biggest boost is
take a look at what we've done we just
sort of literally in almost every
episode write and we're like hey here's
a habit let's go talk about it that kind
of stuff you can do this we're not some
you know we're not magicians that are
out there you know somehow magically
doing all this stuff all you need to do
is take a look at maybe your road map
what is your career road map where do
you want to be like Michael said you're
at a figure out a b that you would like
to be at and then spend a little time
saying well what would it look like to
be a little closer to that destination
tomorrow and a little closer to the day
after that and now suddenly you've got
something you've got some incremental
steps and then what you want to do is
maybe the only habit is just taking a
step each day but maybe there's
something around that that is going to
help you and that is where you're going
to go that's where I want to leave you
with the you know the final challenge
for this for this season is the next
challenge is for the next seven days
create a habit and spend seven days
working towards that habit and then of
course at the end of that time shoot us
an email and let us know how it went for
you because we would love to hear we
love
feedback even when it's from you know
episodes that haven't you know that were
posted years ago we still want to hear
the you know the feedback what do you
like what don't you like where would you
like us to go next because we will be
diving into another season I believe
it's 24 is now our upcoming season which
is just insane most EP podcast don't
make it to 24 episodes much less 24
seasons particularly when we've got a
season or two out there that are a lot
of EP I think we've got two seasons that
are you know 60 plus episodes per season
uh one maybe double that so our seasons
are a little bit off sometimes that
being said I know we're a little bit off
but thank you so much for your time
thank you for spending time with us in
this season we look forward to seeing
you right around the corner when we
start the next season there's no break
or anything like that going on we're
going to dive right into the next one
we're as excited as you are and we are
wondering as much as you are what is it
that we are going to do in that next
season go out there and have yourself a
great day a great week and we will talk
to you next
time closing
thoughts so if you are new just starting
out or struggling to figure out where it
is you're wanting to go one of the
interesting things you mentioned in your
closing thoughts there Rob
was you know do what you like to do uh
one of the things we did years ago and I
think this was maybe at the start of
development or this may have been it for
recruiters or somewhere in
between we came up with the idea for
launching an internet business it was
not launching an internet business at
the time it was just kind of learning
software Technologies kind of learning
Tech learning tools and one of the
things out of that we both kind of did
was we built websites around Hobbies you
did blessing not stressing I did Doctor
Who and at the time Doctor Who was
really popular I'm still a huge Doctor
Who fan but there's been so many pauses
between Seasons I got kind of got away
from it kind of got out of it so uh due
to time and cost I had to shut the site
down but if you are into like Game of
Thrones or video games and you just love
talking to people about it create a
medium for yourself uh our launching
internet business little uh video series
we have will show you how to stand up a
website how you can set up a Blog and
you can just start playing with
technology and just talking to people
centralize your thoughts build a site
and get started you know that could be
one of your habits hey just set up a
website where I can talk talk about my
hobbies talk about things I like to do
and go from there um I know that's
self-promoting you know Bill you may not
want to do that but the funny part
is we didn't really necessarily want to
do that at the beginning but it was like
Hey what if we did this and then we
found out we like doing it and it kind
of blossomed into this so small habits
small decisions have lasting impact and
you also find out if you like it or
don't like it because there were some
other things I stood up during the time
that I found out very quickly weren't
going to work for me I didn't like them
and it felt like I was forcing it like I
was being a you know being fake about so
I turned it off I got rid of it these
habits this season will help you figure
it
out I think that's a good place to wrap
it up uh I I cannot emphasize enough
yeah take a look at what some of our
material a lot of it is broken into like
you know 10 minutes 15 minutes a day uh
if you don't like exactly what we're
doing it hopefully at least gives you a
template to do it
yourself again appreciate so much your
time and investing in us and we look
forward to giving you something Val you
know some value for your time as we step
into the next season as well go out
there and have yourself a great one and
we will talk to you next season
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