Things to remind ourselves while coding.

I should have this printed out and put on my wall.

On health & wellness

• Exercise
• Take a break (7x)
• Don’t burn out
• Make sure to eat
• Your body position

Pep talk & self-encouragement

• I can do this
• It’s ok to fail
• You can do it
• You’ll figure it out
• The solution is probably simple
• Everyone has the same struggles
• There’s got to be a way to do this
• I’m not stupid—this just takes time
• There IS a solution, just have to find it
• Writing failing code is not a personality trait
• It’s going to be difficult before it gets easier

Following best practices

• Keep it simple (8x)
• Verify, don’t trust
• Don’t DRY too soon
• Add sensible comments
• Good commit messages
• Simple is better than smart
• Don’t forget to do that side refactor

Focus

• Not to drift off
• Don’t surf the web
• One thing at a time
• Read docs properly
• What am I working on?
• Read the documentation
• Read (and reread) the error message
• Finish committing before pushing (seriously)
• You don’t have time to try that new thing out
• (distracted) What was I supposed to be doing?
• Don’t spend an hour on tiny things that don’t matter

Slowing down vs going faster

• Slow down
• Ship sooner
• Optimize it later
• It’s good enough
• Stop overthinking it
• Don’t over-optimize
• Don’t over-engineer
• Slow down and think
• Just get something working
• Don’t let perfect be the enemy of the good
• There’s no single perfect solution, there are always drawbacks
• Better to get something out than sitting analyzing the problem