How I Learned More from a Side Project Than a Semester of College

How I Learned More from a Side Project Than a Semester of College

When I first got into college, I thought I had it all figured out: attend lectures, take notes, study hard, get good grades. That was the system—and it worked, sort of.

But somewhere between my 8 a.m. classes and late-night assignment marathons, I realized something strange: I wasn’t actually learning. I was completing things. Tasks. Credits. Requirements. It felt efficient, but also empty.

That’s when I started a side project—no deadlines, no syllabus, no one to impress. Just me and an idea I couldn’t stop thinking about.

The Shift

In my case, it started with animation. I’d always been curious about how moving pictures worked—how a character came alive from keyframes and timing. One day, instead of watching another lecture replay at 2x speed, I downloaded Blender. I fumbled with it for days, broke things, got stuck—and weirdly, loved it.

I spent nights trying to make a bouncing ball look right. I wasn’t getting credits or grades, but I was learning at a speed that surprised me. And more importantly, I was finally enjoying learning.

College Teaches You Many Things, But...

Here’s the truth no one told me in orientation week:

"College is full of structure, but your biggest growth might come from what you do outside it."

Don’t get me wrong—classes matter. I’ve had professors who blew my mind. But some of the most important lessons came from:

• Debugging broken code at 1 a.m.
• Making mistakes that no TA would have caught
• Working on something because I wanted to, not because I had to

That’s a different kind of learning. And it lasts.

A Message to My Fellow Students

If you’re in college and feeling stuck, here’s my honest advice:

Start something. Anything.

It doesn’t have to be “productive” or impressive. Just something you care about.

It could be:

• Writing blogs like this one
• Recording a podcast
• Learning 3D modelling
• Building a weird tool that no one need
• Trying to animate your favourite anime scene

Whatever it is, let it be yours