You aren’t confused enough, and that’s a problem.
I spend a lot of my time these days really, really confused. The kind of confused where words start to lose meaning as I stare at them on the screen, trying to glean a meager morsel of insight that might finally make a problem budge. We’ve started to transition from the surface of Ruby down into its depths (from shallow puddle to kiddie pool), and understanding is becoming less about reading and knowing the words on the screen (vocabulary) and more about relationships, dependencies, and associations (grammar and tone).
Somehow it’s always the problems with the word ‘simple’ in the title that seem to bend my brain the furthest, probably due to our teacher’s unique sense of humor. Today while working on “Refactor SimpleCRM”, a very 'simple’ 33 line program, we came across the code below:
Line 14 calls 'each’, which iterates over a collection, on…nothing. This may seem trivial, but after 2 weeks developing eagle eye vision for any microscopic mistakes in our code that might throw an error, this line sticks out like a massive sore thumb. And we were confused.
And we still are! After a while, this particular use of 'each’ without an obvious collection became clear to us, but the rest of the code did not, at least not entirely. The gist above is not a passing solution, and after spending an hour and a half trying to successfully refactor the thing (so much for simple) we decided to let it rest and see if we can find some clarity tomorrow. But I’m enjoying the feeling of being confused. In fact, I’m relishing in it.
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Confusion gets a pretty bad rap. It’s defined as having a 'lack of understanding’, but the connotations imply shame and inadequacy. Confusion is scary, and like so many other 'scary’ emotions, we as a society have loaded confusion with enough negative implications to dissuade many of us from wanting to experience it, let alone wanting to seek it out.
I’d like to speak out in favor of confusion, and even suggest that a well-lived life is one spent in a semi-perpetual state of confusion. My thesis is that confusion precipitates learning, and that I shouldn’t have to explain why learning is good (at least not in this post).
Confusion precipitates learning by lighting a burning desire to understand in us. When I’m confused about a problem to the point where I think I’ve reached an impasse, I get a deep tension in my lower back that makes me so frustrated and uncomfortable as to almost lose focus and at the very least, make me readjust my sitting position every thirty seconds. That visceral, physiological manifestation of confusion gives me something to push back against and builds a sense of urgency that ultimately boosts the sense of accomplishment that comes with understanding once it’s finally relieved.
Confusion is nature’s complement to curiosity. Curiosity sucks you in, but confusion is the force that gets you from awe to understanding. And I would go so far as to guess that confusion, like so many of our behaviors, has evolved to keep you alive: confusion is intoxicating and possessive- for many of us, when we’re confused about something, finding an answer or explanation becomes all consuming. Being caught up in a spell of confusion forces you to find an answer, and that knowledge, which you’ve worked so hard to secure, gives you a better chance of surviving or thriving over someone without the capacity or drive to seek a solution out.
So why is confusion weighed down with negative implications, and not honored and respected as a sign that someone is learning? Confusion can be embarrassing, or indicate weakness, and in that regard, it takes courage to both openly admit to being confused and to have the courage to see a solution through rather than let the problem pass you by.
Like so many of our behaviors, the decision to find a solution to something that confuses you or to pass up the opportunity is habit forming, and in many respects it’s much, much easier to never admit to being confused and never forcing yourself to work through a problem than to risk the shame of confusion and the chance of 'not getting it’. There have been countless times in school where out of apathy or embarrassment I haven’t raised my hand to clarify a point of confusion, and it’s costly.
The learning environment at DBC is designed to keep us confused, and that confusion is a powerful catalyst for learning. I’ve come to recognize that confusion is critical- if i’m not confused about something, that means I’m not learning. Although feeling confused all the time can be frustrating and draining, the results of our progress in two and a half short weeks speak for itself.
In a video on Ruby I watched on the way to work this morning, the presenter encouraged his audience to take the hard way in approaching software architecture rather than relying on prebuilt structures they likely didn’t entirely understand. He said: “If you want everything to be familiar, you’ll never learn anything new”. I think those words are highly applicable to our lives, and I encourage anyone out there whose taken the time to read this rambling essay to think about how often you force yourself into a position where you’re confused, and what you might be missing if you solely stick to environments that are comfortable to you.