---
title: 'Best Coding Habits to Adopt Now (that I wish I did earlier)'
source: 'https://youtube.com/watch?v=-npmitrAklk'
video_id: '-npmitrAklk'
date: 2026-08-02
duration_sec: 289
---

# Best Coding Habits to Adopt Now (that I wish I did earlier)

> Source: [Best Coding Habits to Adopt Now (that I wish I did earlier)](https://youtube.com/watch?v=-npmitrAklk)

## Summary

The video discusses common bad habits developers pick up when self-teaching coding, which can limit career growth. The speaker shares five key habits to adopt early: understanding problems before coding, using templates, leveraging existing libraries, explaining issues to others, and keeping a developer journal.

### Key Points

- **Bad habits stick** [00:00] — Self-taught skills often develop bad habits that persist, leading to a ceiling in abilities. Example: typing without proper technique caps at 60-80 WPM.
- **Understand the problem first** [00:42] — Developers often jump into VS Code without fully understanding the problem. It's crucial to analyze the problem, ask why it exists, and plan the solution before coding.
- **Make code templates** [01:40] — Building many similar APIs or Lambda functions, the speaker suggests creating templates to save time and increase efficiency. Ideally, a template generates the entire project structure.
- **Don't reinvent the wheel** [02:37] — Use existing libraries and solutions from others. Many problems have been solved before; using libraries like password hashing saves time and avoids errors.
- **Explain it to a friend or colleague** [03:05] — When stuck, ask someone for 15 minutes. Explaining the problem often leads to a solution, even if the listener doesn't know the answer. This is a key difference between junior and senior developers.
- **Keep a developer journal** [03:48] — Document problems and solutions to refer back to later. A simple note of the problem and solution is enough. Use a physical notebook or apps like Notion for searchability.

### Conclusion

Adopting these five habits early—understanding problems, using templates, leveraging libraries, explaining issues, and journaling—can prevent common pitfalls and accelerate career growth as a developer.

## Transcript

When you teach yourself a new skill, we all have a tendency to pick up bad habits. wrong, those bad habits tend to stick. reaching a ceiling in your abilities and you won't be able to regress
For example, I have been using a computer with a keyboard since I Over time my fingers have learnt where the keys are, so I don't need to look
Because I didn't start with the correct technique I'm now stuck in the 60 to 80 words per minute range, and the only The same is true for coding, and in this video I'm gonna be covering
yourself in your career later on. I've seen this time and time again from both junior and even senior developers. When given a problem, their first instinct is to open up VS Code
I get it, we became software developers because we like However, it's very rare that we fully understand a problem It's important to look at the problem properly first and make sure you
It might be that the problem is really just a symptom of another issue. It is much better to ask yourself why the problem exists first, so you can solve Once you understand the problem, then plan out your solution using
Think about how your application is going to need to change in the future so you Every time a developer jumps straight into coding, there's often a lot of
Number two is to make code templates. outside, but it's actually quite boring. single application that you build.
well as all the infrastructure. I've lost count of the number of APIs or Lambda functions I've built over time. the application pretty much looked the same in each case.
You can save yourself a lot of time and be a more efficient developer if you build In an ideal world, you will type in the name of your api, select the ahead and build out everything that you need so you can just focus on the
But at the very least, you should be using templates so that you don't have to write Number three is don't reinvent the wheel. You can also use the work of others when building out your application.
probably solved it before you. your application to save you from having to write the code yourself. I see a lot of developers waste time trying to reinvent the wheel because
And use an existing library. There are some things like password hashing that you should Number four is to explain it to a friend or colleague.
We all get stuck from time to time. The difference is that senior developers know when to ask for help rather than In most cases, the person you ask won't know the answer, but if you
come up with a solution yourself. She isn't a developer, she hasn't got a clue what I'm But to be able to explain something to someone else, I need to think about
So next time you're stuck, ask someone for 15 minutes of their time so you If you're lucky, they might know the answer, but chances are Lastly, it's important to keep a developer journal.
You might think that when you have a problem, you'll remember how to do it next time, but chances are it's gonna be in six months time, and all you'll remember By keeping a journal of everything you're learning, you can go back and
You don't need to write down masses and masses of detail of what you're doing. solved it, that's usually enough to remind yourself how you did something.
I usually keep a notebook on my desk so I can just jot down The downside of this is you're gonna fill up a lot of notebooks over your The other option is to use applications such as Notion or
And this is really useful because you can search through them as well. do that and you need to watch this video on how I take and organize my notes. Make sure you hit like and subscribe and I'll see you in the next video.