> trying to understand what's happening in code is even harder
It's different in Lisp because you basically program a thing from the inside out, meaning that you don't just read the code from top to bottom. Instead, you constantly evaluate expressions and expand macros while going through it. It's practically like playing a game, and there's a good amount of fun. People often dismiss Lisps (Clojure, CL, Fennel, Racket, etc.) after reading Lisp code without any connected REPL and often don't even grasp what makes it so awesome. It's like disliking food after seeing it for the first time in a cooking show on TV. Good talk of relevance: "Stop Writing Dead Programs by Jack Rusher" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Ab3ArE8W3s
It's different in Lisp because you basically program a thing from the inside out, meaning that you don't just read the code from top to bottom. Instead, you constantly evaluate expressions and expand macros while going through it. It's practically like playing a game, and there's a good amount of fun. People often dismiss Lisps (Clojure, CL, Fennel, Racket, etc.) after reading Lisp code without any connected REPL and often don't even grasp what makes it so awesome. It's like disliking food after seeing it for the first time in a cooking show on TV. Good talk of relevance: "Stop Writing Dead Programs by Jack Rusher" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Ab3ArE8W3s