Learning Go the Slow Way: Building Projects Instead of Following Tutorials.

Like a lot of beginners, I started learning Go the usual way: tutorials, courses, and coding along with someone who had already solved every problem. It felt productive. I finished lessons, learned the syntax, and everything seemed to make sense. Then I tried building something on my own.I had no idea where to start. That was the point where I changed my approach. Instead of following tutorials, I started building small, messy, imperfect projects. I still use AI, but not to generate the code for me. I use it as a guide that helps me think through the problem. Why tutorials stopped working for me Tutorials are great for introducing concepts and showing that something works. What they don't teach very well is how to make decisions when you're on your own. When you're following along, someone else has already decided how to organize the project, what to name things, how to structure the packages, and how to solve the tricky parts. You learn what to type, but you don't get much practice deciding why to do it that way. I could finish a tutorial and still struggle to build a simple API from scratch. That was a clear sign that I wasn't actually learning how to solve problems. My new approach: start with a real project Now I begin with a small project I actually want to build. Nothing huge—just something manageable, like: A URL shortener A simple job queue A CLI tool that automates something I find repetitive The goal isn't to build an impressive portfolio piece. It's to build something that's mine, where every design decision is one I have to make myself. The problem, of course, is that starting from a blank page can be overwhelming when you're still learning. That's where AI has become genuinely useful. How I use AI I don't ask AI to build the project. Instead, I ask it to break the project into small, testable milestones. For example: "I want to build a basic URL shortener in Go.Break this project into small steps, where each step is one feature I can build and test befo