Ask HN: Have you picked up any new skill from scratch in your 40s or later?

After >30 years as a professional programmer I have finally learnt to touch type. While watching TV with the family I have been practising on typing programs. I am still fighting old habits and muscle memory, but I am getting there.

I got my pilot's license and instrument rating along with endorsements for mountain flying and high performance airplanes. I've now started studying for my commercial pilot's license and may pick up a multi-engine license, too. Took about 2 years to accomplish all of these tasks.

Studying for the license felt like I was back in university. So I treated it as a goal, studying ground materials consistently every day while blocking out 2 lessons every week. It was effectively a job on top of the work I was already doing.

Most shocking was how much longer it took me to absorb the materials vs. studying equivalently complicated topics 25 years ago. Not to understand what they were, but to be able to have instant recall with precision.

- Guitar, I think the benefits of learning a musical instrument are self evident by now. Keep it fun, and there's a lot of enjoyment to be had from each step forward. I started when I was 30ish through in-person lessons, one on one, in the early days.

- Unicycle, difficult to get started but well worth pushing through just for the moment when you're upright and somewhat stable. A colleague taught me in the office.

- Surfing, mid-thirties for this one. Learnt through friends, really pushes you as there's a lot to contend with and understand early on. Wind, tides, swell, fitness, skill, reading the waves, kit and more. 99% sitting around cold or underwater 1% actually on a wave for me.

- Walking, super accessible.

It’s definitely harder with kids, but I’ve actually used my kids as a catalyst for learning. There are loads of hobbies and activities I’ve taken up just as a way to expose them to the world.

I went from being able to do simple scripting tasks (like being vague as to what it means for a function to ‘return’ something) to self-teaching what I might call ‘actual coding’ (multiple projects with many thousands of lines of code, used daily by professionals, and managing activities of other developers simultaneously). And I’m still (I think) learning at a surprising rate.

I learned how to do a podcast starting in March and I believe my public speaking and interview skills have transformed. (I mean, I think.)

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC_KV4AjVDLLaeHrPw8b1dYg

I haven’t started yet, but surfing is next. I think my list might be a lot longer but I tend to forget what I’ve learned recently as I start to take it for granted.