November 20 2025 1 min Jonas Rehfeld

Learning by Breaking Things on Purpose

Sometimes the fastest way to understand how something works is to take it apart, push it too far, or let it fall apart in your hands.

There’s a quiet honesty in experimentation — especially the kind that isn’t afraid of failure. Most of us grow up trying to avoid breaking things. We want our work to look polished, our ideas well-defined, our attempts successful on the first try. But real learning often hides behind the mistakes we’re too cautious to make.

Recently, I found myself pushing a small project beyond what it was designed for. I added features it wasn’t ready to handle, removed parts that probably shouldn’t have been touched, and basically dismantled its structure just to see what would happen. The result? It broke — spectacularly.