5 steps to learn anything

PS: This text was written by me in April 2020 - I'm just bringing it now to my Linkedin newsletter

Today, I had a challenging discussion with some folks about study and professional development.

I expressed my frustration at witnessing individuals attributing their own lack of progress to external factors and blaming others for their stagnation.

"I don't have time" (and all its possible variations to justify the lack of time) is the most commonly used excuse. But my question is, why? Why do people have so much resistance to truly begin studying something new, to better themselves? Why is it always easier to find reasons to justify inertia?

Something I always say: You are solely responsible for being where you are. You are the only one who has the power to transform your life into whatever you want.

To illustrate what I am saying, I bring a word from Epictetus:

“How long are you going to wait before you demand the best for yourself and in no instance bypass the discriminations of reason? You have been given the principles that you ought to endorse, and you have endorsed them. What kind of teacher, then, are you still waiting for in order to refer your self-improvement to him? You are no longer a boy but a full-grown man. If you are careless and lazy now and keep putting things off and always deferring the day after which you will attend to yourself, you will notice that you are making no progress but you will live and die as someone quite ordinary "

The message above is almost 2,000 years old!

Here's my formula for learning.

5 steps to learn anything:

1. Define what you want to learn
2. Identify the sources of knowledge you will use (internet, books, courses)
3. Define your journey (For instance, if you aim to learn surfing, it's advisable to start with swimming lessons, acquire a surfboard, and likely seek out an instructor, etc.)
4. Define your routine (for instance, commit to studying daily or every other day, at a specific time, whether it's from home, in your car, or at the office.)
5. DO IT! Consistent execution (you won't get any results if you go to the gym once every 15 days. That's the same thing when we talk about study)

And if you are considering to say you don't have time, I also bring here a video of Josh Kaufamnnn, a writer who some years ago made a very famous TED presentation based on his best seller "The First 20 Hours: How to Learn Anything ... Fast". In this video, Kaufamnnn explains that you can learn anything that interests you with just 20 hours of practice. It's a slap in the face of procrastinators.

I don't fully agree with Kaufamnn. I don't believe I could learn how to speak Mandarin in 20 hours. But I understand that they are exceptions.

Something from the video that I would like to leave as a final message is::

"The major barrier to skill acquisition isn't intellectual; it's emotional"

Learn, learn, learn. You decide what will happen in your life!