A Life of Ongoing Discovery and Learning
It was almost a decade ago when I first came across the concept of blog, specifically Google’s Blogger platform. I believe that was my first encounter with the world of web technology. It all started when I felt the urge to customize my Blog to my liking. Fonts, colors, even the basic themes offered by Blogger. I wanted it to feel personal.
As a college dropout, I had prior experience with coding, but it was limited to C and C++. I had no idea how these programming knowledge would be useful in the real world. But even then, I was always excited during lab sessions. There was something deeply satisfying about writing code and executing it without errors.
When I started to personalize my blog, I realized how deep the rabbit hole went. It started with tweaking HTML & CSS but I had no clue what I was doing. At that point, I didn’t understand how to use them. My attempts to edit the code broke the design hideously. But I was committed to making the blog look the way I wanted. That meant learning not just one but three new languages.
So I began my journey. I spent hours on W3Schools learning how to structure a web document using HTML. The first thing I learned was how a document’s structure is built through hierarchy, with various tags playing crucial roles in its organization. Eventually, When I came across HTML attributes like class and id, it opened the door to CSS. Slowly, I started incorporating visual styles into the HTML. I absolutely fell in love with CSS. Finally, I could make the page look colorful according to my preference.
It took me a month just to understand the basics of HTML and CSS and how they could be used in different scenarios. At first, I hated CSS because I couldn’t get elements aligned and place UI elements the way I wanted. It took me almost a year to really get comfortable with it.
Even though it took time, what kept me going was curiosity. I was always eager to experiment, and I made a lot of mistakes along the way. But when something finally worked, it was the best feeling in the world. That dopamine rush kept me coming back, eager to try the next idea. It became a loop of experimentation and learning. What I want to share through this story is that I didn’t set out to learn HTML, CSS, or JavaScript for the sake of learning them. I had a goal. I wanted to personalize my blog. My passion drove me to acquire the needed skills.
Fast forward to today, and I still have that habit. Except now it’s focused on something completely different like setting up a Homelab. I love the idea of self-hosting application I prefer to run on my home network. These days, I’m working with a Raspberry Pi as a network-wide ad-blocker for my family. I run a bunch of Docker containers to try out cool GitHub projects that shows up in the Trending section. I’ve set up a home automation tool that proxies my CCTV cameras to Apple Home for motion sensor based recordings.
Is this something I use in my work? Absolutely not. Is it something that keeps my brain in a constant state of learning? Hell yeah!
What will I do once all of this is set up and running? I’m sure I’ll find the next project that will keep me busy and learning.
Everyone has their own way of learning new things. This is mine. I imagine the cool things I could build or automate if I learned something, and then I work backward. That’s how I start. It’s like reverse engineering my own curiosity.
Through my journey, I’ve come to realize that the most important aspects of learning are curiosity and persistence. It’s easy to get discouraged when we face obstacles. If something you are learning or working on isn’t going well, shift your focus to something else. Refresh yourself, and comeback when you feel ready. Learning isn’t a race, it’s a slow journey filled with mistakes and lessons learned. As Thomas Edison once said,
I have not failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work.
Failing is also a learning experience. It teaches you how to solve something without repeating the same mistakes.
Based on my life experiences, I would say Discovery isn’t a straight path, it’s filled with detours, dead ends, and doubts. What keeps it going isn’t brilliance, but persistence. The ability to stay curious and push forward, even when things don’t make sense, is what turns learning into a lifelong habit rather than a temporary phase.
Over the years, I’ve learned that it’s not about knowing everything, it’s about staying open-minded to what you don’t know yet. There’s always something new to explore, and often it’s the small, unexpected discoveries that spark the biggest shifts. Whether it’s stumbling upon a new command-line tool or figuring out why a block of code doesn’t work the way you expected, Each moment of confusion becomes an invitation to learn.
This is what a life of ongoing discovery looks like for me. It’s not always efficient or focused, but it’s deeply fulfilling. I’m not chasing certificates or perfection. I’m chasing that spark, that moment when something clicks. And as long as that spark keeps showing up, I’ll keep following it. If there’s one thing I’ve learned, as long as you are curious, you’ll always be learning something worthwhile.
