Life as a student at Galvanize is incredibly rewarding and truly challenging. Each day we’re tasked with much more than the day before, and somehow we keep moving along.

Tuesday was totally defeating for me. For my quarter 1 project, I decided to make a web app using React for my frontend and Firebase for my backend — two technologies I knew nothing about. I spent several days deep in documentation. I was too busy to notice that somewhere along the way, I became convinced I could learn anything. Galvanize gave me this confidence, by the way.

The other students in my class were wrestling with code and working towards their project goals. I know they were really in the thick of it, too; but they were doing it! They’d share their frustrations and wins (which is a lovely part about coding). At this point, everyone around me is basically killing it. As for me, I was still reading. I had yet to commit one line of code, while the other students were approaching their MVPs.

I didn’t want to abandon my goal of using React for this project; but I wondered who I thought I was. I’d essentially learned to make delicious code bread, yet I was attempting to make code puff pastry for my project. My whole philosophy used to be know what you do well and do just that. That’s all out the window now. This felt super uncomfortable.

I spent the rest of that night watching tutorials, reading docs, playing with the components from Material-ui. I put all of my energy into setting up my project — and it finally began to take shape! I felt like a completely different person the next day. I was able to make even more progress on my project at school. My MVP is finally within reach.

I am loving React so much. Firebase is amazing. Material-ui is saving me right now. I really adore my project concept, and I can’t wait to have this beauty in my portfolio.