How to learn fast

Disclaimer: This is all anecdotal, and by no means do I claim to be the fastest learner. Having said that, I developed a lot of techniques whilst gaming seriously that I actually used as a software developer to accelerate beyond my peers.

We all know children learn exceedingly quick, but just because we’re well into adulthood doesn’t mean we can’t use the same techniques children use. Coupling this with the wisdom of years of experience can actually work in ways that put you ahead of your peers.

First thing you should do when you enter any environment, whether it’s a working or even a gaming environment you need to be aware of the people around you.

You need to spend time getting to know everyone and pay attention to every detail that is relevant. The more details you can absorb, the better your observation and therefore the better your evaluation. If you can determine who is strong, who is not, you can quickly determine who you should begin modeling your learning from. And if you scrutinize well enough, you’ll be trying to enter into the right social circles so you can possibly find a mentor.

Don’t be afraid to ask stupid questions. The information you get from having an answer you need is worth way more than the disrespect you might earn temporarily. People’s opinion of you can change. And they will change when they see how rapidly you grow. I’ve asked how a switch statement worked in my first job as a developer. That shocked my senior developer but it was worth it because it really didn’t matter later.

You’ll note, smart people are great observers. They’re always watching and noting every single detail. And in turn they use these details to develop patterns of thought that allow them superior analysis. You can mimic this behavior by practicing and with time you should be able to increase your basic awareness.

Awareness is fundamental for intelligence. Great awareness will allow you to determine who you should listen to and who you shouldn’t. It will also allow you to maneuver around people’s bad moods or identify an opportunity you can seize. And finally you should be able to identify who to copy.

Copying someone who is better than you is the fastest way to progress. You’ll note that kids are really good at this given the opportunity. Kids copy and apply fast. That’s what you need to do. Don’t hesitate if someone is doing something that you’re uncomfortable doing. You should override that discomfort if you evaluate that the action is worth the practice. I copied from several people after observing them in the office. People who were fast at operating their computers, I would copy their methods, their programs they’ve installed and learn all their shortcuts. I would look for every advantage I could copy from every person I observed. I did this both when gaming seriously and when progressing in the office. And what I noticed was that the people who were scared of discomfort fell behind.

Which brings me to my next point. One of the best traits of children is that they typically have no fear of failure. Do you ever remember a time when you were able to completely fool around with a system? What about a situation where you’re afraid to use a new computer because you might do something irreversible. You need an environment where you can mess up so you can build the confidence to learn exactly what it takes to succeed.

So build an environment where you can fail. In software, we simply create a copy of a production environment and we go nuts on it. In gaming I would even buy multiple accounts to play against myself so I could test and determine the exact metrics for success. In a different profession you would either need to create or find an environment. If you’re a person who is afraid of technology go and buy yourself said technology and fool around with it.

Get curious and do stuff you might’ve been afraid to do. Do it until you are completely comfortable because there are 5 yr olds who I’ve observed who have become extremely comfortable at operating completely foreign pieces of technology and the way they figured it out was the same. Trial and error in an environment where they can fail.

That’s not to say that children are the best learners. There are things they can’t handle that a mature adult can. One such thing is handling criticism.

Be able to take criticism in any form. You cannot rely on people to give you constructive criticism all the time. People will get frustrated and say things they might regret but the feedback can still be useful all the same as long as you are hyper-aware. This is why I stress the importance of awareness. The more aware you are, the better you can utilize feedback from any source. In all the years of gaming, I took a lot of heat for doing things ‘wrong’ or just being ‘bad’ as per my team mate’s assessment. People online are much harsher than offline. But I learned a valuable lesson from taking harsh feedback. You can almost always find value in the feedback if it is true. And so you must practice objective analysis of feedback to deduce truth and then work hard to correct it. Don’t listen to people who want to shelter you from it. Your comfort is worth much less than the future benefit of correcting yourself. People who don’t understand this philosophy will deny criticism or deflect it. Don’t be that person. Own it. Override your discomfort and negative feelings, improve and you will most definitely benefit.

Foresight is another weakness of a child because they lack the life experience to see ahead.

Always measure the future impact vs short term impact. Investing in education is huge, like buying a book that your mentor recommends even if the price tag makes you hesitate. The same advice applies when you’re asked to do something you’re not comfortable with. Chances are, the short term discomfort is nothing compared to the long term gain from experience. If it means you spend more time figuring something out but you learn the ins and outs of something, that has to be worth a lot more than doing things the way you always do and missing out. I remember feeling embarrassed while learning something new because I was taking longer than the others but I would tell myself it’s ok to learn slower as long as I learn more thoroughly. I would spend more time failing while learning through trial and error because I knew that the future benefit of knowing something inside out was worth way more than the temporary embarrassment of appearing stupid. You should be seeing a pattern here. Emotions are typically short sighted reactions to current events. Use your rational mind to see ahead and measure the future benefit and then make the right decision.

One of the best life experiences I learned while playing Street Fighter III competitively was to never repeat your mistakes. I would get repeatedly punished for doing the same patterns and over time I realized how to handle this and apply it in all aspects of my life.

This is really obvious advice but so many people fail at actually avoiding this problem. Why? Because they don’t change anything to prevent it from happening again. The way I’ve beaten this problem is by constructing a new answer that forces me to behave differently in order to avoid the problem. When you make a mistake you don’t want to repeat, you should analyze why it happened. And what you can do to make sure it never happens again. And then commit to it. NO EXCUSES.

The next step, is to work harder than everyone else. You’re only going to do this if you have a belief that says your self improvement is more important than anything else. You need this belief in order to sustainably work as hard as you need to. Just picture where you would be if you spent every hour that you normally waste into progressing your skills. You should be able to see a bright future from that and be excited to think about that. Get obsessed with self improvement.

When you’ve improved enough and you can start judging your mentors and seeing the faults in their teachings, you can then hopefully start learning on your own. You should always critically think about the advice you’re given from people. Never assume that just because someone has 10 years more experience than you, that they always know better than you. If you are paying attention and thinking critically you should be able to dodge invalid beliefs. Installing the wrong values in your system can set you back so always be wary.

There’s a saying in gaming competition that applies to more than just the gaming arena.

‘You’re only as good as your competition‘. This is true for the work environment too. If you are aiming to be very skilled at what you do, you will need to jump to a place where you are surrounded by people who are at least better than you. It’s easy to get complacent and hit a plateau if you are not aware of this. In an environment with better peers, you will be exposed to better values, better ways of thinking and better feedback. You are only ever as good as the context that you are performing against. So connect to people better than you.

In summary you need these values to learn quicker than everyone else:

• Hyper awareness of context and environment
• Don’t be afraid to ask stupid questions
• Copy aspects of people better than you
• Build an environment where you can fail
• Be curious and learn from trial and error
• Take criticism in any form and value the benefit of improvement
• Always measure future impact vs short term impact – override negative emotions for future benefit
• Never repeat your mistakes. Create a new action that will avoid that mistake forever
• Self improvement value must be super important to you – more important than coming home and watching tv shows for example
• Critical thinking – don’t assume someone who has more experience than you is always right. Question anything that defies logic and reasoning
• Connect with people who are better than you

You also need these values as a prerequisite or else you won’t even be able to execute the above tips

• Have high self belief / esteem (the higher the better) – you’ll need it to get through negative feedback / feelings
• Social skills – don’t be afraid to talk to people – soft skills are super important even if you spend most of your job on your own
• Have some humility – else you won’t listen to people when they give you advice – plus no one really likes arrogance
• Don’t fear failure