The Dictionary definition of frustration is, “the feeling of being upset or annoyed, especially because of inability to change or achieve something.”
No matter how hard I've worked to understand and write clean code to the best of my ability, there will always be time where my code just won't render correctly. This is probably the most annoying frustrations that all developers deal with, and if we don't learn to manage our emotions, then we won't be able to perform our jobs efficiently, which is to be the great problem solvers that we are.
Throughout my journey of coding, there have been many times when I've hit walls and frustration would come. I can recall on one of my homework assignments when I couldn't figure out how too use Floats in CSS and I honestly wanted to quit. Don't worry I'm still here, and I wanted to share some strategies that has helped me manage frustration.
1. Walk Away!!!
Yes!!! Whenever I would spend more than 20mins on a code that I cannot debug, I would literally stop what I'm doing and walk away from the computer. I can recall a day when my boyfriend & I were both working on projects and we both ended up stuck on code that wasn't working and for the life of us could not figure out why it wouldn't work. After much time passed, we decided it was best to call it a day, pray about it, come back at it tomorrow. I kid you not, the next day we both to fixed our codes within the first hour of our session. So I can attest that next time you get stuck, WALK AWAY and go for a walk.
2. Exercise
One of my favorite forms of distressing is going to the gym and lifting heavy weights. There are studies that prove that exercise improves your overall health and sense of well being. I personally have seen a drastic improvement on my mood when I workout early in the morning before attacking my day and it helps my problem solving abilities tremendously.
Lately, due to my new work schedule I can't workout in the early mornings but I have picked up long-boarding recently and that has been really cool new hobby!
3. Community
I think community is the most important support system we all need to succeed in software engineering. For me, if it wasn't for my 100Devs community helping me whenever I got stuck on my code, I probably would have failed and quit two months ago. I encourage you reading this to join a Dev community that you can lean on in times when you get frustrated. You'd be surprised how many fellow engineers are willing to help you solve your coding bugs.
Comment below on methods that help you when you are faced in frustration?