Let me start with giving some background about myself.

I have been in the field for a while, got 10+ years experience. But I was primarly working on procedural languages and ETL/data engineering. Around 3 years ago, I switched to Object oriented programming, and switched to full stack engineering in my company. That was a big switch for me, as I have not done any UI stuff, or any object oriented programming at all.

Cut to 2020, I decide I might want to explore things outside. I started doing LC in late September last year, but probably spent like one hour every day. There were few weeks where I had spend more time.

When I started, it was really overwhelming for me. I did a couple of udemy courses on data structures and algorithms, watched some you tube videos etc. Then, gained some confidence and started doing problems. I have to admit that I did have to look at solutions for most of the problems.

I have again started active prep from last month, though I do feel that i have improved a lot. There have been instances where I just feel completely lost. When I think I got the sliding window technique, or the subarray problems or any stack related solutions, there are new variants which throw me off, and also I have noticed that I have not been able to go back and solve problems which I had previously done. Sometimes easy problems feel too hard.

Am I just not cut out for this? I am not smart enough, or does it just take more practise, or am I doing it the wrong way. Looking for advise and suggestions. Sometimes I feel depressed and lost.