In this part of Master Your Mind series, we're diving into the world of learning.

Everything in life is a skill, yes…, even breathing, eating, making your parents think you are a disappointment, and learning.

However learning is not just a skill, it's a meta-skill. Now, you might be wondering, what on earth is a meta-skill? Well, it's a skill that helps you acquire more skills faster. Learning how to learn is the ultimate meta-skill, allowing you to grasp anything faster and better. That sounds good, doesn't it?

Today I am gonna teach you 1 concept (useful stuff) and 3 tips (gibberish), enjoy :)

Deliberate practice

Deliberate practice can significantly enhance the performance of a specific skill. It's important to emphasize that deliberate practice is the key, and it exclusively contributes to the improvement of the targeted skill. Now, I'll provide you with 2 examples:

1. Driving your car every day to work won't make you a F1 racist (I mean racer).

2. There are people who train in the gym for 10+ years, but they still lift the weights wrong.

The first example illustrates that even though you are engaging in the "same" skill (driving), it won't make you that much better in it. This is because they are not the same skills, it's a different level of driving. You driving to work at a normal speed, won't improve your ability to take 90-degree corners at maxed-out 2nd gear. It will only make you better at the normal circumstances. You become a better normal driver (and that's not always the case).

Now, I'm not suggesting you should speed, but… we all have that one friend who drives like an F1 racer. In most cases, they excel at taking corners, speeding, and avoiding obstacles (hopefully). They engage in learning the skill of racing by driving at high speeds, while you focus on driving normally. These are two different skills, even if they appear similar.

The same principle applies to coding, auditing, business, or any other field, different levels of a particular skill must be treated as different skills.

The second example suggests that there is a difference between practice and deliberate practice. Even though there are individuals who train for years, it doesn't necessarily mean they are training correctly.

If you are into the gym, you will probably know the basics (hopefully) and notice that some people, despite being jacked, still make fundamental mistakes, especially in compound movements.

These individuals are merely practicing, they don't know how to lift, so they lift the weight and hope for gains. This is not the recommended approach in any pursuit. You may achieve some results, however there are better ways.

First, understand your goal and how to achieve it (check this article if you are curious).

Only then should you strive to achieve it, and that is through deliberate practice - with the intent of improvement and conscientiousness in the task.

Drill everything

Now that we've covered how to practice, we will also need to cover the fact that you need to practice. Regardless of how well you perform your job or how deliberately you practice, if it's done only once a month you will see zero progress.

The most effective way to acquire a new skill is to turn it into a habit. Habits are made by consistently performing the task as frequently as possible, ideally on a daily basis. A downside is that you'll only realize a habit has formed once it's firmly in place. Pinpointing the exact time it takes varies, it could be as short as a few weeks or as long as a few months, depending on the complexity of the habit.

"But what if the skill I need to acquire is suuuuuuuuper boring?"

Well, to that, I would say that with time, it'll become more interesting and easy. Surprisingly, the more you do a specific task, the more enjoyable it becomes. If you're someone who hits the gym regularly, you get what I mean. Initially, you might not always feel like going, but after some time (a few months or a year), it starts becoming the best part of your day.

To summarize it, when aiming to pick up a new skill, choose a consistent time each day when you're typically free, be it morning before work, or late evening after the kids are asleep. Eliminate all distractions during this time and focus on what you need to do.

Retrieval

Knowing how memory retrieval works is absolutely essential for learning faster. Retrieval, for those unfamiliar with the term, is a method used to improve storing a given memory into your long-term memory. It increases the chance that your brain will actually remember what you are learning.

Certainly, the best way to remember what you are learning is for the subject to be interesting to you. However, in life, the things you must learn are often boring. Even with a few techniques, we can make your brain remember even the most boring subjects.

Retrieval or recall is simply done by closing the source of information and trying to explain what you just read. It's that simple. However, you will notice that you can't retrieve everything. Don't worry, open the source again and read what you missed. If you want to recall again, you can, and it will increase the benefits even more, but generally, once or twice is enough to remember most of the stuff.

Now, I know that after reading this article, your behavior when learning won't change, so I challenge you to try it now. Minimize the tab, close your eyes, and take 1-2 minutes to summarize the parts that you've read. Use your own words. Even if you can't summarize everything, continue thinking, and the explanations will pop into your mind. Trust me.

Did you do it? If not, here is a second chance...

As you can see this will increase your time spent when learning. However, it will also increase the number of things you learn, help you connect the dots between different parts, and store this memory for longer. If that's not a good deal, I don't know what is!

Like every other tip on the list, the more you do it, the better it becomes. If you do it with everything important that you must know, over time you will get really proficient at it. It will also force your brain to remember the stuff when reading them, in order to retrieve them later.

Don't take notes on the same day

This might sound strange, but hear me out. Your brain is like a computer (very powerful, yet stupid) and like a computer, it has RAM and storage memory. When you read stuff, your RAM fills up, and when you sleep, your brain processes this RAM and decides what is "important" (memes, cat videos, embarrassing moments) and stores it. During this time, your brain also "deletes" what it deems "unimportant" (i.e., what you studied today). Learn more here.

Writing is a form of relief. It's a great way to express what's on your mind, break it down, and judge it from a logical standpoint.

It gets stuff off your mind.

Now your two brain cells are making the connection. When you write, you "offload" your RAM onto a piece of paper. It's no longer in your head, and thus your brain doesn't need to process it.

All of this processing happens during the fancy sleep you have all heard about - REM sleep. That is why if your girlfriend breaks up with you and you go to bed instead of crying, it's going to be more beneficial. You will still be single and stressed, but a tiny bit less stressed than the night before.

Your brain determines which things are important, and it typically does so in the following order (just remember, this field is complex and I am here teaching BRO science, so take it with a grain of salt ):

1. Fix emotions. If you are learning something and your girlfriend breaks up with you, the next day you will remember almost nothing, as your brain is prioritizing fixing your well-being first. Because if you hug a tree at 160km/h it won't matter that you scored a C on the final exam.

2. Remember important (aka repeated) stuff. You hopefully know how to learn correctly by now wink.

3. Remember emotions and motor skills. I don't know which of these is first, so I put them together ( ¯\(ツ)/¯ ).

"So, what should I do, never write notes?"

No kind reader... , I would suggest writing them in the morning. This way, you have remembered most of the things, you will have your note, and you have done a retrieval on the information. Everything in one!

This "exercise" is great and all, however, it may not work for everyone or with every subject. I have noticed that for me, math doesn't work this way. I need to write the formulas, break them down, and understand them in order to remember anything.

This should be all for today. If you have enjoyed reading this article, you will probably enjoy reading the rest.