The capacity to learn is a gift; the ability to learn is a skill; the willingness to learn is a choice.
—Brian Herbert, Author
When I was 10, my parents bought me a Sinclair ZX81. The slim plastic-encased computer had a stick-on keyboard and a precariously attached memory pack. Programs were saved on cassette tapes. This fragile piece of technology opened my mind to the world of computing. It was an exciting time but also frustrating and disappointing, as learning often is. My first program was a database that stored addresses, coded one holiday with an uncle. It wasn’t particularly useful, but it taught me about structured data.
I had become a builder, someone who wanted to explore, learn, and try new approaches. Little did I know this would lead to a career. My pride in this memory isn’t for the nascent technical skills I developed but for my curiosity and desire to …