Hiding from the challenge

It is remarkable how often we try to hide from the challenges that we have set up for ourselves. One might think that you do not pick a goal and determine a target completion date unless you have weighed the options and decided that the goal makes sense and is attainable within your means. And yet, it is very common that the task is set up, fairly well defined, all the materials might be already procured as well, but the work never finds the right time to start. Or even worse, the work went well for a limited amount of time and then, without any clear reason, the work stops and stays on hold for days or weeks.

Photo: Seriously Equestrian

In my case, I had a problem with the programming assignment of my online course. As I mentioned on Friday, I spent a number of hours trying to follow the instructions to complete the job but, no matter how many different ways I tried, I could not find a way to move ahead. As a general rule, I am not one for refusing a good challenge; on the contrary I can be meticulous and patient, corralling the problem until I finally crack it out. In the case of the programming assignment, it was unfortunately opaque, so that the program either worked or didn't, but it was rather difficult to run it step-wise to find out what was going wrong. So, in the end, I did not finish it on Friday and I did not even approach it during the weekend: I was afraid. I had set up this challenge for myself and I was not going to be able to crack it, so the temptation of letting it be, sticking with a draw instead of cashing in a defeat, was strong.

But in the end I decided that the problem should be solvable, tens of other students had already turned in their assignments so I should only try once more, even more carefully, to succeed. And indeed, today shortly before lunch I managed to complete the task. The key to the solution, of course, was finding a way to piece down the problem: programming is nothing but taking a number of steps, and when you take several steps without looking in between you can never be sure which one of the steps failed. But if you can peek halfway you can immediately seek if the error is in the first or the second half. Repeat the process and you can quickly narrow it down to the single step that took you off-track.

This afternoon has been a bit busy with errands, I went to donate blood and get a haircut, and also went to buy a new A-string for Jason's guitar, so that his spare set is again complete. Tomorrow I will have meetings in the morning (for work) and in the afternoon (for the PhD), so I do not know how much work I will manage to get done. Stay healthy.