Thoughts From a Perfectionist

Note: This is the appendix to the Project Euler Tier List, but it can be read on its own.

Man, it feels great to not have to stare at tiny little gray text boxes anymore.

I've split this up into a series of vignettes. They may or may not be connected, and they may or may not be relevant to Project Euler.

As always, enjoy.

Snapshots

This blog has been around for quite a while now, and in that time, many things have inevitably changed in my life. To quote the intro section of the All Posts page, which I've kept relatively intact since its creation:

Really, the only takeaway is that posts written months apart reflect different versions of me. That's the main thing I care about anyway: to see how I've changed over time.

And, unsurprisingly, I have changed.

I want to be more specific here though. These posts, including the one you're reading right now, were written by a certain someone. That someone had emotions, interests, personal matters, all that jazz. Naturally, those factors spill over into the writing itself.

Sometimes I write because I'm excited. Sometimes I write because I'm just bored. Sometimes I write after having a bad day. And, well, sometimes I write while being incredibly sleep-deprived.

Essentially, the moment I hit "Publish" (or git push, I guess), I'm preserving a snapshot of myself at that particular moment in time. Very philosophical and original, I know, but that's really how it is if you think about it.

So let's do something a bit different. In subsequent sections, I'll pick apart some "questionable" things I've said in older posts, all while laughing and cringing at myself. Maybe my takes are better now, or maybe they're worse. That's for you to decide. But I really hope they're better now.

Diagnostics

Let me just get to the point. I'll say it once on this site, and once only.

I was officially diagnosed with ADHD at the beginning of this year, and I've received some much-needed treatment since then.

It's not exactly something I'd like to be "public" about. Like, I'm not one of those people who'll proudly wave this flag around. With all due respect, that's just not my thing.

However, it sure as hell is something that should be normalized. So there you go.

It's pretty funny rereading my older posts and being able to tell that something was "up". In fact, you can probably figure out the exact cut-off between pre- and post- diagnosis from the contents of the posts alone.

Now, I am not a psychiatrist. This will not be a comprehensive psychoanalysis disguised as an appendix. No no. This is just me going on the record to say: yes, many of my past takes are hella outdated now, and many of them can be explained by… well, you know.

Dopamine levels are high and I'm feeling it, so let's just dive right in.

…After I do the laundry. It's been over two weeks. Nothing's perfect, lol.

Be right back.

Grinder

No, not that one.

PE = CF? is a masterpiece in angst, and includes some banger lines such as:

I wanted to solve everything. Had to solve everything.

I convinced myself I was doing The Right Thing.

Surely, it would be worth it, of course.

Now, if that doesn't reek of hyperfixation, I dunno what does.

Look, is it objectively impressive that I managed to complete all 965 then-current Project Euler problems in just under two years? Yes.

Did Project Euler almost become my full-time job at some point? Also yes.

Would I do it again? Fuck no. Especially not post-diagnosis.

Barring the obvious "instant gratification" spiel, one of my strengths (and, unfortunately, weaknesses) is my ability to just drop everything, try-hard for a long period of time, and then, once all the "glory" is mine, immediately crash and burn.

We've also seen this happen before during you-know-what.

But just FYI, I only took my university's competitive programming course (CS3233) last semester, and I'll have you know that unc still got it, and unc still knows how to grind.

The main difference between now and then is that, during CS3233, I could genuinely tell I was getting upset near the end. I was actually aware of it while it was happening.

I'd say it's because I just get invested in things more easily than most people, which is both a blessing and a curse.

I also almost broke my wrist because of the adrenaline from winning a contest. That was certainly one of the moments of all time.

Nonetheless, CS3233's objective was clear. All of them were. IOI, Project Euler, what have you, they all had a fixed target that I could work toward.

So, you know, it's good that I have the athlete mentality. Train hard for a grueling marathon, run the marathon, eat your weight in pasta. Whatever athletes do, I dunno. I'm not remotely a sports guy.

However, life is obviously not so well-defined, and this sort of thinking can backfire pretty easily without the right precautions.

All that said, I think I'm done with the whole competitive jazz.

I know, I know, life's a rat race and whatnot (eugh), but it's important to be aware that, hey, this intense period, it too shall pass, you know? It's also equally important not to box yourself in and tunnel-vision on one goal and one goal only.

You need some variety in your life, yeah? Some colors and stuff. It's not all black-and-white or doom-and-gloom.

Point is, if you want me to grind, you'd better pay me good money for it.

Not like that.

Locality

Here's something interesting I said upon celebrating my PE completion:

I've never considered myself "good at math". The only things I'd say I'm good at are "Googling" and "wasting a whole afternoon trying to solve a problem".

If there is one thing that I am good at, it's being willing to learn.

To be able to discover a mathematical truth, to make an incredible observation, or even just dip my toes into a new field of math. I think that's what makes Project Euler fantastic.

I'll leave the symbol-shuffling and fancy notation to the real mathematicians.

While I still wholeheartedly agree with the sentiment, my presentation here was, for lack of a better word… shit?

Words mean things. Being abstract is unhelpful and pretentious, if anything.

Surely I can do better now, right? Here we go.

(I hope you forgive me for the half-assed computer analogy. I barely got upper quartile in my operating systems class. Not that the course was any good, but, meh.)

• Most things live in your long-term memory. This is the hard disk.

• Some things live in your short-term memory. This is the RAM, which we all know we can download more of.

• Your brain can only process things in RAM. If something isn't there, your brain needs to dig through the hard disk to load it into RAM.

• Digging through the hard disk is slow, so there's also a cache: a small place where your brain keeps track of what information is likely to be useful in the near future.

• The cache is limited in size, so sometimes your brain has to decide what stays and what goes. We'll call this process The Algorithm.

• If the right info is already in the cache, then congrats, we have a cache hit. If not, tough luck, that's a cache miss, and your brain needs to go digging again.

• Naturally, if The Algorithm is good, then more cache hits and life is great. On the other hand, if The Algorithm is bad, then more cache misses and life sucks.

So what about The Algorithm?

Well, no algorithm is perfect. Cache misses are inevitable.

However, The Algorithm is something that evolves over time. Your brain gradually learns what is and isn't worth keeping in the cache. It's an iterative process that spans pretty much your whole lifetime.

I think a large part of being "good at learning" is having a pretty darn good Algorithm. Crucially, it's more or less generalizable: a good Algorithm should be able to adapt to whatever field you throw at it.

Personally, my cache size is laughably small. Comes with the whole neurodivergent package, I suppose. Hell, I can't even remember what I ate for breakfast.

I don't think I'm innately "bad at calculus" or "bad at linear algebra" or whatever else you can think of. Doesn't even have to be STEM. It's just that my cache can't hold the relevant information all at once. My brain needs time to move the right bits in, and kick the wrong bits out. But with a good Algorithm, that time should be minimized.

So yeah, there's some latency involved. But once the context switch is successful, then oh boy am I locked in and ready to terrorize everyone with my skillz.

I can be good at anything. Just let me cook.

Be more confident in yourself, yeah?

Ten Thousand

Every now and then I'll receive a message from someone asking for advice on Project Euler or Codeforces or whatever. Usually, I just ghost these people unless they provide further context. Like, aside from the obvious "practice makes perfect" mantras, I don't think I have anything particularly innovative to bring to the table anyway.

That said, my personal views are mine and mine only, so I think there's value in putting them into actual words instead of leaving them as fuzzy, abstract thoughts.

Yes, neurodivergent buff/nerf aside, 2 years for Perfection on PE is ridiculous, especially considering that I never spent more than a couple dozen hours in total on even the hardest problems.

However, there's a lot of context underneath that achievement. Yes, I know I "humblebrag" about my IOI Gold on my About page, but that was genuinely 3 years of intensive, almost full-time training right there. Not to mention the studying in middle school before that. And even before that, my mom introduced me to programming when I was, like, 9.

Am I cooked? Maybe.

But anyway, all of this took a lot of effort, and I have a hard time internalizing that fact now that I'm standing at the top of my "Everest". And I don't mean this in an arrogant "oh haha I'm better than everyone" kind of way. If anything, I think I'm not appreciative enough of how fortunate I am to be in such a position. Really.

My point is: it really is just a lot of grinding. There's no way around it.

The Algorithm works in general, but it can only get you so far. If you want to be exceptionally strong in a particular field, you're gonna have to spend a lotta time fine-tuning it for that field.

However, I also don't think blind perseverance is the way to go. You also need to be sufficiently motivated.

Now, I don't just mean "Oh if I do X, I'll be rich!" or "Oh if I do Y, senpai will finally notice me!". I am (slowly) becoming an adult with adult responsibilities and adult needs, so I completely understand and sympathize with how easy it is to get muddled by these external factors.

But it's nice to step back and channel that young kid inside me, who got interested in programming in the first place simply because it seemed kind of cool.

That young kid might be a lunatic, but he's my lunatic.

Artificial

So there's this newfangled thing called a calculator. It basically does arithmetic for you. Just push some buttons, press the equals sign, and voilà, there's your result.

People are kind of freaking out over it. Teachers are concerned that kids will get lazy. Accountants are especially worried about losing their jobs. I'll spare you the other details, but it's a real mess.

Now, have I bought a calculator for myself? Yeah, I have. I used to be hesitant about openly admitting this, but now I fully endorse them.

I use mine at work. I use it for my personal projects. Hell, I even used it to help with writing this post. It has saved me countless hours, and I think I'd be a fool not to use it.

It is quite strange to think about, huh? A device that's easily capable of performing calculations an order of magnitude faster than I can. Something whose inner workings I don't even understand. It just magically gives the right answer every time.

Yes, I know there are many ethical and existential implications that I'm not even remotely qualified to talk about. They should obviously be ironed out as soon as possible. But I ultimately think that calculators will be a net positive for the world. Maybe I'm just naïve, but I really think it's a risk worth taking, you know?

Apparently, they're working on a more advanced model that can even handle algebraic manipulation. How exciting!

Intelligence

"Yeah, I actually enjoy doing arithmetic by hand."

...

"Kinda weird, I know, and honestly I'm not sure why I like it either."

...

"I guess I just like methodically working things out? No idea."

"Meh, it's good practice for my brain, anyway."

"Especially long division. Ugh."

...

"Oh, speaking of which, have you heard of this organization?"

...

"So every weekend, they release a new math expression to solve."

"It's probably my favorite thing about Sundays, heh."

...

"Some expressions are pretty easy, some are nightmarishly hard."

"Some are just the right difficulty for me. There's nice variety."

...

"Mhmm. There used to be a fastest solvers table."

...

"Yeah, they removed it now, sadly."

"It was due to the rise in cheating. Darn cheaters with their calculators."

...

"Hmm? Yeah, I have a calculator. Why?"

...

"No? Why would I ever do that?"

...

"They're meant to be solved by hand, you know that, right?"

...

"That's what makes it fun! Solving it without a calculator."

...

"Okay, look, I bet you use a forklift at your job a lot, right?"

...

"Would you use a forklift at the gym? To lift your weights?"

...

"So why do you even go to the gym in the first place?"

...

"Exactly. Point proven."

Understand

Last but not least, the most angstiest of angst posts, Nobody Will Ever Understand:

Nobody will ever understand why I love Project Euler.

Nobody will ever understand the joy I get from solving a hard problem.

If you're even remotely involved with Project Euler in any way, you can just feel the passion and/or hyperfixation oozing from the Tier List and this appendix alone.

Nobody will ever understand why I like standing at the BL section of a bookstore without buying anything.

Nobody will ever understand why I get all happy and giggly over a stupidly fluffy fanfic.

The kudos on my AO3 fics would beg to differ.

Nobody will ever understand why I don't have other interests.

Because I have a finite amount of time left?

Nobody will ever understand why I find small talk excruciatingly boring and difficult.

Neurodivergent nerf. Small talk is way too easy for me now.

I will never understand why people skip lectures because they're too early.

You are guilty of this too.

I will never understand why people study just for the sake of getting good grades.

You are guilty of this too!!

I will never understand why people dislike mathematics.

I will never understand why people like watching sports.

I will never understand why some people are extroverts.

Because people have… different preferences and personalities?

There is no such thing as being weird, because there is no such thing as being normal.

There is no such thing as not fitting in, because there is no such thing as fitting in.

There is no such thing as being misunderstood, because there is no such thing as being understood.

Oof, uh, that's some real psychic damage right there.

Yeah, I'm pretty sure I wrote this while I was "overstimulated". This is stinky.

All jokes aside, while "younger" me (this was like 9 months ago lol) was possibly cooking, he also kinda had a doomer mentality. Seems like he didn't have enough chemicals in his brain.

You just gotta find your people, man.

Sometimes that means changing elementary schools.

Sometimes that means going to university abroad.

And, well, sometimes that just means putting yourself out there, yeah?

The grind never stops.

Keep going, kiddo.