Thinking??? Gregorcly thinking that is!
After further researching these thinking styles, it is incredible to me how similiar I found my learning styles to relate to how my personality is in reality (both from my own perception and what others have told me). At first I found it strange how I was both 'concrete random' as well as 'abstract random', made me feel like more of a random person that I am! In college one of my majors was psychology, even though I only attended for one year I was fascinated at how some of these tests seemed so vague, and categorized people so easily that of course anyone would fall into a category. However I found the 'Gregorc Thinking Style' test is very different from most and actually does a very good job of categorizing people very closely to how they actually think.
Randomly Concrete
So far in phase-0 I think that my 'concrete random' thinking style has both benefitted me very much as well as limited me at times. Some of the benefits that I have seen so far is my ability experiment to find the right answers, take risks when doing so, follow my intuition and work independently. Coding involves a lot of 'trial and error' from what I have noticed and I am not afraid to try different things over and over to get the correct answer. Obviously I would rather get it on the first try but I am not afraid of a challenge! When I get into my 'abstract random' it will show how I am ok with working indepentently, but conversely thrive in a group setting and truly enjoy establishing relationships with my group/class/etc.. Some of the limitations that I have noticed with my 'concrete random' thinking style so far is that I can tend to skip steps and get the correct answer but in programming it is so key to follow all necessary steps, especially in the learning stages. Keeping a solid work routine has always been a little difficult for me because of the freedom that snowboarding allowed me. Snowboarding has no set way-to-learn or mandatory skill requirements, it is very open and free to learn whatever tricks/skills that you want to learn. Sometimes I will have 25 different tabs open on my computer and it seems to most people that I have so much random stuff going on but I just tell them "there's a method to my madness"!
Abstractly Random
As I said about my 'concrete random' thinking style, I feel that my 'abstract random' thinking style has both benefitted me very much at times and caused some limitations as well. Beneficially speaking it has helped me because of my ability to listen and learn from others and work well in group situations. I love to give input and always 'pull my weight' but I would like to think that I am always ready to learn from others. Whether it is a one-time pairing assignment or a co-worker for years to come, I like to build relationships with whomever I am around, even if it is just a couple minutes of chatting before a session to feel more comfortable with whom I am working with. Some of the limitations that I have seen and can hopefully work on throughout phase-0 and DBC are very clear to me now and I will explain them further here. I have a very hard time working with people who don't seem 'friendly'. Friendly was in quotes because there is a big difference between people who are 'serious' and not as outgoing as myself, and people that just genuinly aren't friendly. In every job I have had in my life I had to decide boundaries with people based on these criteria. Some people have much different personalities than me but we can get along great because they are still very nice, genuine people. Others just seem to hate their job or situation and even as nice as you can be to them, still don't seem to want to build any kind of relationship with you. This also goes to add that I have a hard time working with 'authoritarian/dictatorial' personalities at times. A strong leader must possess the ability to be the 'boss', but also be able to relate with his team and empathize with them. A strong quality I find in leaders is to be able to remember that they may lead the team, but that they are still part of the team and not above them. Some last thoughts on 'abstract random' that I feel I deviate from the pack on, are that I am great with competition and am happy to see anyone with a great attitude succeed, and that I usually enjoy criticism as long as it is constructive and friendly.
Some strategies to move forward with!
This cultural blog was a great insight for myself to see some of the limitations that I can have and how to work on them. One of the big things that I have learned and will continue to work on is to re-do some of my work and remember that it usually gets better every time you rework the problem. I have already redone my index.html page several times and each time I can see the improvements that I have made through my learning and refactoring. Another strategy that I am going to impliment is to try and set more routines for myself thru time-blocking and organization. I can tend to be unorganized at times and this is no good for programming, the more oraganization that I use and routines that I get into, the more I feel like things happen on time and procrastination disappears. One of the last and more important strategies that I will be working on is to do things in order and not so 'randomly'. I have already seen the benefits of doing things in programming sequentially and in order so that you don't have to try and remember what you skipped over later on. This was just as true with snowboarding, sometimes you might just 'go for it' and get lucky and land it, but where I found the most success was to go through the motions and learn things properly with every step, so that when the time came you felt prepared and confident!
Growth! Why imagine more when you can stay as you are?
The ideas of the 'growth mindset' vs. the 'fixed mindest' I find absolutely fascinating. It is amazing how apparent they are with the people that you interact with on a daily basis. Some people are always seeking approval and can never show you when they are wrong, but instead will find an outside force to blame their shortcommings on. Others are never afraid to learn and fail! To me I cannot believe this is not an idea that is taught to children in school at a very young age because of it's importance and the way it can (and will) affect the rest of your life. To have a 'growth' mindset involves confidence and humility. I have seen these mindsets in my snowboarding as well as my carpentry and beyond. Some people are so worried about approval that they are afraid to follow their own path and find real success. The growth mindset involves the idea that success comes from within and doesn't take anyone elses judgement to feel successful. As far as DBC goes I feel that a lot of people at first didn't think I was smart enough or motivated enough to succeed in a program like this or with a career like this. I will admit that at times in the beginning I wasn't always sure either, after taking a short break I found that I could almost always come back and succeed: whether it was a coding excersize or an interview! Every day I remind myself how much I enjoy this program, programming in general and how I can be as successful with it as I choose to be! I think that everyone can reach the stars if that is where they are looking!