34 | The Most Efficient Way to Learn
Why learning with no end-goal is a waste of time, cloud computing changes the world, why developing habits is better than setting goals and how to develop self-discipline
Good morning,
Two England wins this week have both raised my mood and lost me my voice. And that is what sport is about. There is nothing else that you can watch as a spectator that lifts emotions greater than sport can.
This week on Future Talk, Sam and I talked about what technology excites us most in the future. For Sam, it’s VR and what it means for gaming. And for me, APIs. I promise it’s not as boring as it sounds.
You can catch up with episodes on iTunes, Spotify, Google Podcasts and more.
Learning is important; it doesn’t end at school or university. It keeps the brain active, and with an ever-changing world, it keeps skills relevant in the marketplace. But I’ve had to reduce how much learning I do.
I’d learn ‘just-in-case’. Even if I had no reason to pick up the skill, one day I might need it, I’d tell myself. For example learning a language, but not visiting the country that speaks it. The issue with that mindset is it causes a time sink. Learning for learning’s sake typically means forgetting because there’s little application. After spending time going over the theory and getting mediocre, I’m moving onto the next thing. Mastery comes from practice.
That’s just-in-case learning. I’ve switched to just in time learning.
For Hack Africa, a hackathon I’m doing, I’m learning Solidity. While learning, I’m able to put into practice what I’ve learned by building a decentralized application. Instead of wasting time for something that may happen down the line, I’m developing skills that I know I’ll use. By building something for myself after doing a dummy project and theory, I’m getting valuable feedback that reinforces my learning.
I’m reminded of what my driving instructor said after I passed my test, “now the real learning begins”.
Learning just in time means I’m expecting to put my learning into practice. And that practice is where the real learning begins.
👀 Recommendations 👀
🌕☁️ Going to the Moon via the Cloud - New York Times. An informative piece by the NYT on what cloud computing is doing for small aerospace companies. What Amazon Web Services and Azure are doing for the world cannot be understated. Cost-effective, high-performance computing not only powers world-changing activities, it democratizes them too.
🧠📈 Habits vs Goals - Farnam Street. An old post from Farnam Street, but important nonetheless. Shane at FS breaks down why it’s better to develop habits than set goals. Habits are consistent, more productive and compound. The habit of saving money is better than saying “I want to save x” because it sticks with you. I enjoyed Shane’s clever description of habits:
“Habits are algorithms operating in the background that power our lives.”
🎥💪 The 5 Levels of Self-Discipline - Thomas Frank. Thomas Frank breaks down different levels of self-discipline in this video. All levels are based on accountability and finding somebody to hold you accountable. Being held accountable is the silver bullet, I can speak from experience. At 6 am most days before work, my friend Rob and I would train at the gym together. I’d never miss a session because I knew he was there. But when we stopped training together, it became easier for me to skip sessions. Now, I rely on Apple Watch Fitness competitions instead.
That’s all for this week.
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