“The future belongs to those who learn more skills and combine them in creative ways.” — Robert Greene.
The demand for learning new skills has been on an uprise in recent times. The intention of learning a new subject or skill is pure and should be appreciated, but the implementation and practices of learning need a severe check. Every other person is facing a shortage of time to learn and implement the skills to use. The most basic need of the hour is changing the ideology of learning and start learning how to learn.
You have been following the age-old techniques of learning new things, but it seems like time has taken its toll. The methods that used to work like a charm are now facing the consequences of not evolving and improving with time.
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Practices Helpful in learning New Skills
Practice Focused Study Periods
According to research, you need 10,000 hours of learning and practicing to become an expert in the subject. The 10,000 hours would account for practicing for 8-9 hours for straight five years. This technique is quite dangerous as, till the time we finish off learning a new skill, there are already many things onboard, which require further time for practicing.
Instead of following the strategy of giving in 10k hours of learning and practicing, one can learn the subject in much less time and start putting the skill to use. The basic idea is to give the skill dedicated and focused hours of learning. Learn about the skill only to the extent that you can start practicing and improve the skill as the time passes. The performance in a particular subject increases to the degree of the time spent in practicing the subject.
Avoid Procrastination
Procrastination is the biggest hurdle that comes in between the student willing to learn a new subject and actually learn a new subject. Procrastination is such an evil thing which continues to put pressure on us to do things in a said amount of time and doesn’t even let us complete the work within the deadline. The best possible solution to avoid procrastination is to get organized, prepare a schedule or timetable, and get rid of distractions. Practice Meditation as frequently as you can to enjoy peace of mind to develop an interest in learning new things.
Take a Break
To achieve the hours of focused and determined learning, one needs to have breaks at regular intervals. The machinery of the human mind is set up in such a manner that we get 60,000 thoughts in a day and can’t focus on a single thing for a longer duration of time. Taking a break every 30-40 minutes would help us stay mentally and physically present at the same place at the time of learning and practicing the subject.
Celebrate every Accomplishment
All the students work hard to learn a new skill and celebrate after the achievement. But, the moment you learn a new skill, the priorities shift to a new and more significant goal. Motivation levels drop over time in individuals who don’t spend time in a few recreational things. Celebrations and recreational things are equally important as giving in focused hours of learning and practicing. The human systems need all the things in balance to have a flow of fresh thoughts and ideas.
Know Thyself
Every student should understand that people learn in different ways. All people have different types of Brains, which adopt different styles of learning. Recognizing the nature of the brain and their learning capacities is the first step in learning how to approach unfamiliar materials before learning.
Teach what you learn
One of the most surprising and effective ways you can learn a new subject is to teach it to someone else and improve the clarity in the subject. This is the most effective technique because when we learn with the intention of teaching, we break the study material down into simple, understandable chunks for ourselves. Additionally, we test ourselves thoroughly whenever the aim is to teach somebody else after teaching.
How to Ditch the Ill Practices of Learning?
We have used the harmful practices of learning from a very long duration of time. Breaking ill-practice requires a hard amount of determination and focused hours of learning and adapting new practices. The better practices can replace all the flawed techniques just by taking a few small steps in the right direction daily. The time has come to drop the patterns of studying just for the exams and forgetting each and everything after the exams. To make use of the learnings for lifelong in more essential and crucial stages, adopt improvised learning strategies. Better learning strategies help us to remember the topics for life and beyond.
