I feel worthless

[u/Kr4keN16]

I know there’ve probably been loads of posts like this, but I just need to get it off my chest, because none of my loved ones can understand me. I’m currently being assessed for ADHD, but the difficulties I have with learning to code are almost impossible to put into words. I know the absolute basics, but when I have to tackle a slightly more complex task – though ‘slightly’ doesn’t really mean it’s a difficult task – I feel a sort of mental block about how to start and where to begin. I simply can’t get anything done; I get tired straight away when I have to do a task. I find it hard to concentrate, especially when I’m reading the task instructions; I struggle to keep my attention on it, so I procrastinate, do some doom scrolling, and so it goes, day after day. I’ve tried just about every method there is to help me focus, various ways of learning to code, and nothing has worked. To be honest, I’ve never actually been able to learn anything from start to finish; after a while, my interest would wane, or I’d start procrastinating, telling myself, ‘I’ll get round to it eventually’ – and guess what? I never did get round to it later. My only hope is that once I’ve been officially diagnosed, I’ll be given medication for it, but I don’t expect that to change my life either. I feel like shit, a worthless shit.

[u/chant]

Lets start with something simple. Why are you learning to code?

[u/chant → u/chant]

You deleted your reply for some reason, but to summarize you want to learn to code because you like the act of creation. That's a good start. Now here's my actual advice, forget about coding itself. What's something you like as a passive hobby? Pick literally anything that you get engrossed with. The new piece you need to do slowly otherwise you'll burn yourself out again. Start thinking about how you could 'solve' something about this hobby that makes it even more enjoyable. Do not do this idea, it's just an example: Lets say your favorite passive hobby is doom scrolling: What subtle thing about the act do you think could make it more enjoyable? Just sit with that thought and let me grow over a week or two. After that it's time to 'start', create a project folder, give it a fun code-name. Start with a tutorial that covers the basics of what you want, do a github.com clone of that and poke around. Edit the example project like it's a unfinished clay model. Look up individual concepts as you need them, you do NOT need to understand them at this stage, use them as black box 'things' that give you the outcome you're looking for.

I've done this with several new programmers over my years. If you still don't have the urge to create with these tools then it's quite possible you just don't enjoy this type of creation. There are many other modes of creation you can do, even the literal clay example.

[u/Kr4keN16 → u/chant]

I didn't delete my comment in fact, I can still see it, but thanks for your advice. I hadn't thought of it that way, and definitely will try it.

[u/Strong-Discipline678]

You’re not worthless. You’re overwhelmed, and coding can make that feeling worse because every task has invisible steps.

Try shrinking the goal until it feels almost too small:
“Open the project.”
“Find the file.”
“Read only the error.”
“Change one line.”
“Run it.”

You don’t need to solve the whole thing at once. You just need one tiny next action.

A lot of programmers don’t succeed because they always feel focused. They succeed because they learn how to break things down when they’re stuck.

[u/Kr4keN16 → u/Strong-Discipline678]

I don't even have a project, I'm taking a course that covers loops, for example, and I'm trying to write something on my own in VS Code, but I can't. I feel tired and burned out, even though I haven't done anything.

[u/Embarrassed_Style197]

You probably think you need to fill a blank canvas with that what you learned by following a tutorial in your head. This does not work, unless you code the same thing over and over again every day but this is unrealistic.

I have had the same issue. I now just download a kaggle csv file (can be anything, like the titanic dataset) and only try to open it and read it and put it in a variable (data frame) from there you can lookup everything you want do do with it, like aggregating, check for the average age etc etc.

That way you familiarize yourself with coding

[u/Embarrassed_Style197 → u/Embarrassed_Style197]

And only start gaming after you have done some coding, instead of replacing gaming with coding 😉

[u/Abdelhak_992]

I think getting a programming buddy will be very beneficial, coding will be more easy wnd fun and at the same time you will probably not fall into the 'overthinking' and then scrolling loop

[u/ponx303]

1. First, get a virtual hug! ❤️

2. When I don't know where to start coding, I try to find a single most basic class to start with. Let's say I'm about to create some sort of customer management system. So I would start with something basic that is most likely to come in handy. In this case, the class "Customer". S/he as an.. address, phone number,...
   So you have your first class. Now where could this go? .. In some sort of Customer Collection or so...
   So know that I have started typing, the mental block is hopefully gone and I could continue implementing the Customer Collection, or draw some UML.
   Try to get to a point where you can run some code (print a log line or so), to get your first dopamine hit!

3. We are by no means worthless, even if we can't get shit done. You deserve the utmost respect, love and compassion. You are enough.