Once upon a time, I decided to make coding a great passion of mine. A big question I get asked a lot is why and how that happened. If you are interested in knowing the "how", check out this blog I wrote years ago.

The "why"

One reason I would say is that I was curious. It was fascinating to see what the computer could do when you pressed buttons and clicked icons on the screen. It felt like magic. I always wondered how the computer is doing all these things. I think that's one reason that got me hooked on these computer things. I never knew coding, though. I heard some of my friends "programming" some Arduino stuff with their computer. I wasn't interested in that aspect at that point.

All I did was play around with the computer. Tried to do random things with it. I remember at one point I made a little game with Microsoft PowerPoint. It was a maze game. The goal was to reach a goal inside the maze by moving your cursor. It had actual "collision detection," and you will be kicked out of the game if you hit a wall. I felt proud, and I taught my friends who were coding how to do the same thing. At that point, I got a feeling that maybe I can do something great with computers with my skills.

I was introduced to coding later through a computer club in my school. I was hooked on it. Some stuff just didn't make sense. So I kept questioning until it made sense. That way, I got a great understanding of all syntaxes and language choices.

After spending some time learning these languages, I started doing some coding challenges. I think that's where I got into this coding thing. I am a person who always loves challenges, especially if they involve a lot of thinking. I felt these coding challenges were a great outlet to showcase my brain power. It always felt good after I solved a challenge. That's why I kept doing it, for a long time.

The current situation

Recently, I wrote a blog post addressing the AI hype. That's what really got me thinking about why I started doing all these things. Does coding by hand even matter anymore? Some "programmers" raise their eyes at me when I say I still love coding everything by hand.

That's where I realized I would not love coding anymore if I just did it for the sake of making a product. I do it for the challenge it offers. So I'll keep doing what I enjoy.

Guess what? I don't really enjoy making apps or websites either. I feel like it's too repetitive. There's not much thinking involved. Most of the time, you'll end up doing the same thing over and over. People can keep using AI to make their products in under one minute. I don't really care. The only thing that matters to me right now is solving real problems that offer a real challenge.