Nothing in this world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not: nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not: the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent.
Calvin Coolidge from BrainyQuote’s “Persistence Quotes“
Finally! A success!
I was able to pass this challenge without having to look at freeCodeCamp’s video or their Hint page, which means I can look at the next challenge when I return.
My process was pretty simple:
- Staring blindly at the challenge for a few minutes.
- Stepping away from my screen.
- Repeating Steps 1 and 2 for a majority of the hour.
I believe around the half-hour mark, I remembered an earlier YouTube video freeCodeCamp had released where their founder, Quincy Larson, had mentioned how important it was to look at MDN’s pages for extensive documentation. After I originally tried a different method in two or three different ways with no success (based on their hasOwnProperty article and studying previous freeCodeCamp problems and notes), and getting close to the end, I was getting frustrated. I had already spent close to a week without trying to figure out what to do. But I decided to push myself a little more.
I studied the notes provided and realized based on previous solutions that it had to be a simple answer. Combined with my initial thoughts of how to complete this task along with a realization I had made in a previous post, I tried one method previously introduced. All of the tests failed. I tried again, making one small change with a previous lesson… and lo and behold, I got the blessed quote and percentage sign of completion that appears whenever you complete it.
I’m still trying to wrap my head around how I was inspired to take that route just because I wanted to see if I could get it done tonight. I can’t take all of the credit, though. In the back of my head, a YouTube comment from the freeCodeCamp JavaScript video stuck with me about forcing yourself to sit and really think about the problem and a potential solution, something I want to become better at.
The lesson here I hope whoever reads this finds (and l myself want to stick with) is to keep being persistent. Even if it takes you time to find a solution, take the problem at your own pace.
Photo by StockSnap on Pixabay.