Learn Better

1. “If you have a coach, mentor, or teacher who is trying to help you improve, their advice is a free opportunity to become your best self.”
2. One of the pillars of learning is feedback. Always be asking yourself of the mistakes you made and how you can learn from them.
3. Seek it out. Ask your friends and family about things you can do better.
4. Get familiar with it. Stop being afraid of feedback and start embracing it. This is how you grow–by adjusting your actions based off of criticism.

3. Mistakes are assets, not liabilities.

1. Stop seeing failure as a setback, and start seeing it as an opportunity. View your errors as chances to gain skills and knowledge. Ask yourself what you can learn from this mistake and how to prevent it in the future.
   • Boser mentions recording your mistakes for a period of time to track performance and patterns of behavior. You’ll recognize that a lot of your mistakes are preventable and can be easily avoided.
2. Think back to the last time you made a mistake. After the error, did you think to yourself: “Great. Let me think about how I can do better next time!” Or did you think to yourself: “Shoot, I’ve always been bad at that.”
   • Adopt a growth mindset. You aren’t born with a fixed set of abilities–your brain is plastic and capable of learning and adapting to new things. New scientific research continues to reveal the malleability of the brain.

4. Have discipline AND motivation.

1. Aristotle once said, “Learning is no amusement but is accompanied with pain.”
2. Learning isn’t always going to be easy. In fact, you are learning better and more efficiently if it’s UNCOMFORTABLE–if you’re pushing yourself outside your comfort zone.
3. However, it’s also important to keep up motivation. This will help you succeed in the long run. Remind yourself of your “why” factor.
4. Have discipline, but don’t hide from your feelings. You want to push yourself to do the uncomfortable, but you also want to listen to your emotions. Boser recommends labeling your feelings, so you can walk yourself through it. If you feel upset, identify if it’s anger, sadness, frustration, etc. Talk to yourself from the 3rd person and mentor yourself through this wave of emotion. Labeling your emotions allows you to walk yourself through them.

5. Stop overthinking.

1. “Instead of feeling or even thinking, people are relying on a type of habit, and that takes less emotional energy. Take the effort out of effortful control.”
2. Stop thinking and just do. You waste so much energy dreading a task or putting it off. Set clear rules to prevent yourself from overthinking. Turn these rules into habits: for example, you’re going to exercise every morning when you wake up. It’s a rule. You know you have do it–it’s not a choice. Make rules like this for yourself to prevent mental fatigue and discipline exhaustion.

6. Focus on the stairs, not the staircase.

1. Don’t look at the big picture, focus on the small steps. Break down you big goals and focus on individual actions you can take to get you closer to that goal. Micro before macro.
   • For example, if you’re leaning an instrument, instead of focusing on getting better, focus on the things that are going to get you there, like practicing with a metronome, using different exercises to improve finger dexterity, etc.

7. Learn efficiently with science-backed tools.

1. Here are the best proven tips and tools for learning:
   • Active recall/retrieval. Quiz yourself and let your brain dig up the information from its cellars.
   • Ask yourself “what if” questions to master the material. To gain true expertise, go beyond the textbook. Speculate about different scenarios and connect different concepts.
   • Block out distractions! You’ll learn so much faster if you’re in the proper environment. Set yourself up for success by optimizing your space.