With every electronic build there is inevitable troubleshooting. Electronics by nature need to be perfect. Every process includes some kind troubleshooting and/or mental pain/anger/suffering depending on how you look at it. Sometimes you learn something new, most of the time it’s something dumb, and in the worst case sometimes the issue fixes itself. Depending on the complexity of the issue, finding the solution may takes minutes, hours, days, or go unsolved. Most of the time finding the solution is not fun. What’s fun to me is making something and having it work first try. With electronics, most of the time this just isn’t the case.
The pain that comes with the troubleshooting process which I alluded to above can sometimes get emotional. As I get older and more polished my emotional reaction to problem solving has lessened, but it has shifted from what used to be frustration into some kind of depressing mental defeat. This mental defeat spirals into thoughts of: wasting time, quitting, disappointment, discouragement…. and an alone feeling. The alone feeling is real in the sense that’s it’s just me and the circuit, no one else. But, its not true in the sense that there is a unique group of people who go through the same process and don’t give up.
I had an old calculus teacher who had a rant where he explained to us how thinking was hard and intrinsically not all that much fun. But, thinking can be addicting. So what am I, some kind of mental masochist? Call it what you may. As a way to combat the dark thoughts of defeat, I have decided to start logging my hours and documenting my troubleshooting techniques. Additionally, I hope this encourages and teaches others; and, most importantly, keeps me from going crazy.