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Learn Faster and Remember More

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Learn Faster and Remember More

Seliria
Sep 21, 2022
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Learn Faster and Remember More

superorganizers.substack.com

Learning is the act of incorporating new facts, concepts, and abilities into our brains

The greatest enemy of learning is what you think you know. Being willing to admit when you’re wrong and adjust your thinking is the thing that will help you learn the most.

Why we're bad at learning

  • We bring baggage to learning - baggage we often pick up early in life and then struggle to let go of later

  • The modern world erodes our attention spans by training us to be in a constant state of distraction

  • Learning requires deep focus

  • Focusing is an art-through experimentation and creativity, you can build systems that let you give your full attention to whatever you're learning

There are two main sources of learning we can learn from:

  • Our own experience and history

  • The experiences of others

  • Learning from history - studying history and applying its lessons to the present

  • Direct experience - learning from experience and reflection

  • Reflection allows you to distill experience into learning

  • High performers make adjustments based on both their successes and failures

Two proven techniques for improving your learning

  • The Feynman Technique

  • Pretend you are teaching a concept to a child.

  • Try to rephrase it in your own language without using its actual name

  • Spaced repetition

  • In order to learn something, you need to retrieve it from memory again and again

A Guide to Accelerated Learning

  • Effective learning requires building your own understanding, with the guidance of an expert teacher.

  • Charles Darwin may not have had an unusually high IQ, but he was able to outpace other thinkers by learning how to balance out his deficiencies

  • Ken Iverson, the former CEO of Nucor Steel, believed MBAs should focus on teaching students how to understand and lead people above all else

The Best Books on Learning

  • The Art of Learning: An Inner Journey to Optimal Performance, Joshua Waitzkin

  • Make It Stick: The Science of Successful Learning, Peter C. Brown, Henry L. Roediger III, and Mark A. McDaniel

  • Mindshift: Break Through Obstacles to Learning and Discover Your Hidden Potential, Barbara Oakley

  • Ultralearning: Master Hard Skills, Outsmart the Competition, and Accelerate Your Career, Scott H. Young

  • Brain Rules: 12 Principles for Surviving and Thriving at Work, Home, and School, John Medina

  • Deep Work: Rules for Focuses Success in a Distracted World, Cal Newport

  • A Mindset: The New Psychology of Success, Carol S. Dweck The Talent Code, Daniel Coyle

Conclusions

  • Learning isn’t something you do at the behest of someone else. You’re responsible for it. Take charge of it.

Accelerated Learning

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