Last year, I re-painted a picture that I had once drawn 10 years back. This picture, at that time, was something I was so proud of. It was one of my first good looking watercolor painting. When I completed redrawing the same picture 10 years later, I could see how far I had come as a hobbyist watercolor-painter.
Back in those days, when my parents were fed up with me and wanted me to study, I would lock myself in my room, pick up my watercolor brush, my sketchbook and start to paint. For me, painting was a way out of reality. I used to escape into my own world, leaving behind all the troubles, and anxieties of a teenager. Now it seems like all those years of misguided techniques, shakey strokes, and experimental mix of colors had made me more confident at the craft of watercolor painting.
These days as a full-time software developer, regrettably, I don’t get to paint that often. But every time I get stuck on some programming problem, I remember this specific piece of painting and what difference there was between the same picture painted at two different time frames. That success in life lies in the mix of practice, patience, and perseverance.
Perhaps, one day I will have a similar kind of epiphany regarding my career as a software developer. All the mistakes I made along the way, all obstacles I overcame to become a better problem solver will accumulate to making me a better programmer. Friedrich Nietzsche was spot on when he said fulfilling life requires embracing rather than running from difficulty.
Funny how making such a simple painting of rustic scenery taught me about life and how that journey made me who I am today.