Ask HN: What is your best advice for a junior software developer?

Learn about the business side of the company. It helps tremendously if you understand how management/sales/marketing/etc think.

Don't follow your passion. Passion will come if your work is meaningful, you are competent and respected for it. So instead work on your competency in whatever field. Leave if the environment will never respect you anyways.

All software problems can be solved if you work on it long enough. Do not give up just because StackOverflow does not have the answer.

A really good question to ask for a task is "How do you know you are done?" It might prompt to clarify requirements. It might prompt you to make things more measurable or testable. It makes you think about implicit things like following code guidelines. It makes you better at estimating time.

Never assume anybody is stupid. Instead, figure out how these intelligent, well-intentioned and experienced people have come to a decision which is stupid now.

Do not just fix symptoms but (at least try to) fix the root problem.

Participate in discussions instead of just listening. If you are wrong, then you learned something at least.

Sit together with experienced developers. Watch how they use their tools.

Don't self-destruct. This may seem obvious, but surprisingly many people get this wrong. There will be moments where you have incomplete data on some situation, yet feel strongly about it, and have a strong urge to do some symbolical career-limiting step as a reaction -- for example, threatening to quit over some minor technical decision made by someone more senior that even turns out to be correct a few years down the line, or leaving a product that's on an exponential growth curve because you don't like to see the team changing as it grows (this is valid concern, but there's also significant upside to being an early member of a successful product). If you're in a situation like this, it's usually a good idea to wait a month or two before doing anything; usually the urge is over by then.

How does one actually do this? I have a hard enough time finding close friends of any kind. And mentorship is a pretty big thing to ask of someone.

Pretty much this. Get hold of your ego and be humble enough to take lessons from experienced people who have track record of delivering successful projects. It is imperative to get the basics right before being able to take on more responsibility later.

    "We don't rise to the level of our expectations, we fall to the level of our training."

Make sure you get as much training as possible before raising your expectations. It will be easier for you later when business expects senior output from you but you are under constant pressure on both personal and professional fields.

Practice ..practice.. practice.