Have you ever looked at your bookmarks, your saved playlists, your downloaded courses, and thought: I already have everything I need here, and I am not using any of it?
That is where I am.
I own one of the best React courses out there, Maximilian Schwarzmüller's. Seventy-one hours covering fundamentals, advanced hooks, Context, Redux, Next.js, TanStack Query, deployment. Structured, current, hands-on. I have done forty percent of it.
Meanwhile I have been jumping between random YouTube tutorials looking for something better, with the actual thing sitting right there unfinished.
Why We Do This
Partly it is just wanting the new thing. Curiosity is useful right up to the point where it becomes a way of avoiding the boring middle of something you already started. What is already in your hands stops feeling valuable simply because you already have it.
The roadmap in front of me is not unclear. It is this:
- React, Maximilian's course
- Backend, Jonas Schmedtmann's full-stack Node.js course
- React Native, Maximilian again
Everything is bought. Nothing is missing. There is no research left to do.
What Actually Pulls Me Away
Honestly? The projects in these courses do not look good. And I like things that look good. I get excited by a nice interface in a way I do not get excited by a form with default styling.
But the unglamorous projects are the ones teaching the skills that will eventually let me build the things I want to build. Fundamentals first. The nice UI is a reward, not a starting point.
The Rule I Am Setting
University exams are close, so nothing changes this month. After that:
No more switching between tutorials. No more chasing aesthetics over substance. Finish what I own.
React first, and building along with it rather than watching it. Then backend. Then React Native.
This connects to something I wrote about a few weeks ago, only retaining about half of what I learn. I think a good part of that problem is this problem. Half-finishing three courses gives you three sets of half-remembered concepts.
Where That Leaves Me
This is less a reflection and more a checkpoint I can be held to later. The best resources in the world do nothing while they sit unopened.
If you read this and recognised yourself, go look at what you already have before you buy the next thing.