Thanks for your comment!
Regarding feeling like a phony: I still have to meet a developer that does not have some form of imposter syndrome.
I dealt with the fear of asking questions myself in the past and to fix it I created a checklist before asking a question:
- Can/Did I google it?
- Did I check the internal Wiki/knowledge bank?
- Is the answer to my question already described in the story I'm working on?
- Did I read the relevant comments in the code?
If I tried all those things and still do not know the answer, it is probably a valid question and I should not be afraid to ask someone. Hopefully, this helps you!
I'm often afraid of asking questions, because I feel this will make the devs around me realize that I'm a phony. I do note down things when someone explains something to me though, because I like to write down the explanation in my own words.
"Imagine signing up for a tennis course and then finding out it solely consists of lectures. Sure, you need to hear the rules of the game, but you can never learn to play a sport without actually playing it, right?"
True. This is true for the martial arts as well. You have to do contact sparring one day, just practicing forms and reading the theory won't make you win the fights.