A new beginning

If you go to my Github you would find that I created it on the 30th of october 2021. But when you check the activity chart you would see it empty up till the 24th of December of 2025.

Well that’s because while I have experimented with programming since 2021 I only decided to take it seriously on the 23rd of December 2025.

Why?

Ever since I started writing code, I have always known that my projects were comparatively trash. It was mostly just lazy, not well thought through modifications to tutorials and I wanted to improve. But I didn’t know what the changing process would look like and I had a massive ego because I did not want to look unserious in front of the people I was interacted with so I constantly put off relearning and pushed through terribly written projects and consoling myself that I am just a beginner.

October 20th 2023, I moved to Ireland from Nigeria. In that period I realized that a new class of opportunities were open to me. I wasn’t in school or working, just at home with the programming skills from Nigeria so I cleared my Github and decided to re-do the tutorials in some kind of “new location, new Micah” move. It felt good to do so. I had time, electricity and fast internet and I was breezing through the tutorials.

But the underlying lack of knowledge, lack of curiosity, fear of the unknown, was still there and once again my projects were modifications of the tutorials. I could not think of anything new or I stopped myself from thinking of anything new or ambitious. I wanted to change that.

In mid 2024, I was informed that I would be able to start college in September of 2025. I chose to study Computer Science but I knew that I had math skills that didn’t belong even in a high school classroom and I needed to improve or I would be struggling from day one.

So I paused programming, picked up OpenStax Prealgebra and took a deep dive. I had nobody to prove anything to. I was in a new country, new continent, no friends so motion was easy. When I got into my first college mathematics in October of 2025 and I found myself being able to say “I know this topic” I felt proud of myself. Extremely proud.

I wanted to immediately do the same for my programming. But I paused to get used to the pacing of college. It is fast. I made a few friends.

On the 23rd of December, I randomly started thinking of my life. I am 19. The work I do in the next 5 years would probably dictate where I would spend my 20s. Where I spend my 20s would determine to a not-so-minor extent the direction of my life. I want a life that I would be happy to look back at when I am old.

My current goal is to intern at a company in San Francisco or New York in 2028.

I am starting over from scratch and rebuilding my programming skills just like I did my maths skills so that one summer day in 2028 I would stand in Times Square or the Golden Gate Bridge and feel just I felt in my first college mathematics class.

I have beng seeing Zig and Bun and I love the idea of very fast + very easy to use tools so I want to build mine. A statically typed language that can be a substitute for pseudocode. It would great for following books like Introduction to Algorithms.

I am currently in chapter 4 of Programming -- Principles and Practice Using C++ (3rd Edition) by Bjarne Stroustrup. After it I would move to The Algorithm Design Manual, 3rd Edition by Steven Skiena. Then I am going to dive into Robert Nystrom’s Crafting Interpreters.

It’s hard work but I am going to do it.