I agree with you about how everything blends together, and that you don't necessarily have to focus only on "improving as a developer", however, expert beginner

I agree with you about how everything blends together, and that you don't necessarily have to focus only on "improving as a developer", however, expert beginners are absolutely a thing and something I have had to deal with multiple times in my career. I just got done wit a brutal job search. I call this attitude "losing the fear." I would not be so sure the next 100k job is waiting for you if you are not improving yourself.