Reflection Reboot

In my last coding reflection post I spoke about how awesome the reflection process was and how much it was becoming a habit. Seeing as that was over 2 months ago… I guess I spoke too soon.

I did do my reflections for a week or so after that, but didn’t post them. The reasons for stopping were two-fold:

1) I was running out of “easy” reflections and had to dig deeper to get there.

2) I started Taekwondo. While Taekwondo is awesome (I’m happier and fitter than I have been in a long time) it means that instead of coding till I can’t anymore, then reflecting for a bit and going home, I now work up until practice starts (my Dojang is a block away from Red Rover HQ making it easy to work until the last possible minute). Practice then clears my head of the code (which is great… it stops the nightmares) but it also clears my head of reflective thoughts on that code.

So noting that in the time that I was reflecting my skill level went through the roof, I need to change the system so that reflection once again becomes easy.

The plan is:

1) Instead of reflecting at the end of the day, I will do it at 5pm every day.

2) Instead of making the expectation: “think of all the things you have learnt today” I’m going to reduce the load to: “think of one thing you’ve learnt” and “create shortcut that you could have taken” (taking a cue from Yan).

3) Posts aren’t going to be numbered anymore, but themed. That way I can make each one more self-contained and coherent, while again reducing the pressure to put in too much.

4) I’m going to keep a page of “rules” that I can edit and update as I learn things, to make it easier to quickly review and scan my most importnat learning in the morning.