I agree. The right teacher can prune dead-end paths, quickly identify your weaknesses, provide you with tools and (importantly) explain their reasoning. They mi

I agree. The right teacher can prune dead-end paths, quickly identify your weaknesses, provide you with tools and (importantly) explain their reasoning. They might also introduce you to more “meta” concepts and connections that you otherwise might have missed (which personally helps me stay interested and gain better mastery). If they can’t do that last bit, they’ll certainly help get you up to speed quickly, but you’ll be missing out on larger contextual understanding. That said, I’ve seen these types of teachers favor people who have shown themselves capable of learning and reasoning about what they’re doing. And finding these teachers often requires either luck, connections, or already having a certain level of knowledge. So, I’d say grab a hold of such a teacher if you can, but in the context of the article, just finding a teacher isn’t necessarily a net benefit; you should do everything you can do to learn outside of a teacher. (And I’d say that’s true even if you get a teacher.) Edit: I also meant to say, if you don’t know what you don’t know, finding a teacher isn’t necessarily easy. Getting started solo can really help you get an idea of what you don’t know and can aid in finding someone who knows those things.