Hey, what's up, John Sonmez from simpleprogrammer.com.
I got a question about how to spend your time.
I think this is probably a good one for a lot of you that are starting out in software
development.
You want to know how do you maximize your time, where do you spend the time.
This email is from Max.
He says, “Hello John, my name is Max and I’m 21.
I’m halfway through my software engineering degree and I’m currently doing a fulltime
internship as a system integrator at least for the next 3 months.
My fulltime internship leaves me a lot of free time at night and during weekends and
I’d like to spend that time working on personal projects or learning about new technologies
and frameworks.
However, I don’t know what’s the most valuable technology to learn and I find myself
spending a lot of time reading articles about various programming related things instead
of working on actual things.
How should I spend my free time to get the most benefit for my future software engineer
career?
Thank you for your time.
Max.”
This is a good question, Max.
There’re a few things I would think about this.
I mean first of all, I think your instincts are right in that it seems like you’re leaning
towards I should be making things, right?
And you should, you should be making things.
That’s going to be the most effective thing.
One of the things that I always try to do as much as possible is I try to get a double
value out of my time when I spend my time doing something.
For example, I just had a friend that was like, “Oh John, you got to be on Snapchat
man.
You got to do Snapchat.”
He’s like, “Gary V is doing Snapchat and Tai Lopez is doing Snapchat.”
I’m like, okay, look, here’s the thing.
This is why I’m not going to do Snapchat, this is why I’m not going to do Periscope
is because if I go and I’m on Snapchat and pull out oh, here’s my idea for now and
I’m answering questions on Snapchat so my audience they get that and then it disappears,
right?
What I’m doing right now is I’m shooting a video.
Now when I put this video on YouTube this is going to be out there for the next 50 years.
People will come across and say, “Oh yeah,” and subscribe to your channel.
I’m going to get some benefit from that.
I’m doubled using my time.
I’m spending the time answering your question, I’m answering an email.
So think about what I’m doing right now.
I’m answering an email by giving you a personal answer.
I’m recording a video and I’m creating something that will last for the future.
Let’s get back to your situation here.
What can you do that is similar to that in your particular situation?
It comes down to making things.
So can you make something, can you figure out a problem that you have right now that
you can take what you’re learning from your software development degree, apply it, build
some kind of an application and not only solve your problem but perhaps build a business
and make some money.
To me, that makes the most sense and you’ll be learning so you’ll be doing 4 things.
Try to figure out things like that.
Definitely making is—being a producer is important, of content.
Not a consumer, just reading the book, that’s consuming.
That only gets you one thing.
It just gets you knowledge.
It doesn’t get you understanding.
It doesn’t get you anything else.
It doesn’t get you money.
Instead, be a producer.
Figure out how can you produce.
Maybe it’s writing code, like I said, that’s one suggestion.
It could be creating tutorials or blog posts as you’re sharing what you’re learning
and making something out of it.
If you’ve heard of Pat Flynn, he’s kind of famous in the entrepreneur space.
He’s an affiliate marketer.
He started out as an architect here in San Diego.
What he did was he was practicing for this green exam, an architectural like—I can’t
remember exactly what it was, it’s a green exam or something.
What he did was when he was studying for this he started writing notes and making a web
page and he ended up building a book that he sold that actually ended up creating a
business.
He was multi purposing his time, again, by being a produce and not just a consumer.
As he was learning he was then sharing that information.
That would be my best advice for you is you always want to do things—you always want
to be looking at the future and saying, I only have so many hours in a day, everyone
has so many hours in a day, but people who leverage their time better, those are the
people that—I can get a 10x return on the same hour than someone who is just a consumer
gets when I’m producing.
So try to be a producer, try to figure out how to leverage your time and take advantage
of the situation, of that free time that you have.
It’s good that you want to, but definitely figure out those things.
Get something, build something, create something in the world.
You’re going to fail a few times.
That’s fine.
You’ve got to get past the failures in order to get to success.
Anyway, great question, I hope that helps you.
If you have a question for me, email me at john@simpleprogrammer.com.
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Take care.