5 Strategies to Become a More Efficient Learner

Use these strategies to improve at the skill of learning itself

One will learn about a wide variety of subjects on their journey through the education system and into post-secondary, but unless they specialize specifically in the skill of learning, they may never spend any time learning how to learn.

Learning efficiently is far more than mere rote memorization and willpower. There is an art to learning, and everyone can benefit from intentionally cultivating their approach.

Based on what I’ve heard from prominent polymaths, high achievers, and on my own experience of acquiring multiple skill sets that have allowed me to work in different industries, I’ve identified several strategies to efficient learning that stand out to me.

The details of how these strategies will apply to different learning endeavors will vary, but as principles, these strategies will benefit any learning situation.

Don’t learn too much at the same time

One can learn a lot over the course of a lifetime — just look at what Elon Musk has accomplished!

But you can’t learn it all at once.

If you try to learn too much at the same time, you’re not going to internalize anything properly and you’ll end up just wasting your time.

To mitigate this, create a learning schedule, or a learning time frame.

Plan your learning in phases and ensure that you’re focusing on one thing at a time during a phase.

The length of phases will vary on how dense what you’re attempting to learn is.

You could learn a new software program in a few days to a week if it’s not overly complex, but deep skills such as learning how to program or learning a new language will take much longer.

Be realistic about the density and difficulty of what you want to learn, and adjust your learning schedule accordingly.

Deconstruct the challenge

The idea of learning a complex new skill can seem like an insurmountable challenge at first. This leads us to feel overwhelmed, and this is often the cause of procrastination: We haven’t broken down the challenge into digestible pieces that have a clear next action step.

An overwhelming “complete skill”, such as programming or learning an instrument, is going to consist of dozens if not hundreds of “mini-skills”. It is essential that you deconstruct difficult endeavors into the mini-skills that they consist of.

Deconstruction involves a roadmap — you should establish a series of exercises that allow you to improve at these mini-skills that increase in difficulty and complexity, allowing you to get closer to mastering the complete skill.

For example, before you build your first application as a budding computer programmer, coding tutorials will have you complete a series of coding challenges that enforce the problem-solving abilities necessary to build a functioning application.

Athletes will practice basic body movements before graduating to more difficult, complex movements. In calisthenics, one must master pull-ups before they move on to more challenging movements like the muscle-up and the front lever.

Musicians spend hours practicing scales and pattern-based exercises before they take on difficult songs or études.

Analyze what you’re learning, and think about how you can deconstruct it.

What are the fundamental skills required to be efficient at what you’re aspiring toward, and how can you isolate them?

Create an efficient capture system

Your system for observing and planning your learning is incredibly important and deserving of a fancy term like “capture system”.

Too often people rely on messy and disorganized notes to attempt to reinforce what they’ve learned.

Whether you use software or you go old-school with a pen and paper, make sure that your notes are diligent and organized. They should include things like definitions of terms, a list of relevant techniques or approaches, insights, challenges, and summarizations.

A good capture system should be easy to navigate so you can go through it consistently to reinforce the information (this is an advantage to using software like Evernote).

When your capture system is organized, the reinforcement process becomes a lot easier. You can use the evenings to go over what you learned that day and review definitions of terms or difficult concepts in the morning.

This process is pretty difficult if your notes are all over the place.

The time you spend learning is essentially wasted if you don’t retain it. Your efforts are only as good as your capture system!

Embrace The Suck

An efficient learner knows that becoming good at something takes time and effort. Even Elon Musk can’t pick up a new thing and be instantly good at it.

One of the differences between great learners and average learners is that great learners embrace this period and are unphased by sucking at something for a while, whereas lesser learners are more easily dismayed at difficulty.

Sucking at something is an inevitable part of the process of becoming good. Everyone great sucked at first.

Don’t be too hard on yourself when learning something difficult. Understand that you’ll be terrible at it for a while and that’s completely okay — it’s the only way to get better.

Being overly concerned with how you may not be good enough yet can really stall progress and prevent you from pursuing those opportunities that will truly test you and create the most growth.

If you have your ego in check, you’ll go for these opportunities even if you’re not quite ready. These situations usually result in the most growth and learning potential, even if they are a bit uncomfortable at the time.

Put it into practice

Efficient learners know that they need to get real-world experience with what they’re learning as soon as possible.

There is a certain pressure that comes with putting your stuff out there that can’t be replicated with any type of practice.

Don’t just write code in your bedroom, attend a hackathon!

Don’t just practice ukulele at home, go to a jam session!

Practice your public speaking at your local toastmasters, not just in front of the mirror.

Put your videos, articles, photos, sketches, songs out on the internet for the world to see.

This is the step that many people struggle with; it’s easy to keep learning or practicing something within our comfort zone because we’re waiting until we’re ready.

This is valid up until a certain point, but it has the potential to become infinite. At some point, you have to take the leap.

In conclusion:

Efficient learners don’t take on too much at once. They understand that to learn efficiently, something will require all of your focus and attention for a period of time.

Efficient learners always deconstruct the skills they’re learning. If you don’t do this, you’ll be overwhelmed by the amount of content that you’re trying to digest. Establish what fundamental basic skills are needed to accomplish your goal, and work out how you can isolate them into smaller chunks that can be focused on.

Efficient learners have a capture system. They don’t just take notes in a random way: they have a system that is consistent and organized.

Efficient learners embrace the suck. They know that it takes a lot of time and effort to become good at something, and they don’t allow themselves to be discouraged by this. They keep moving forward.

Efficient learners take their skills into the world. You can’t continue practicing in private forever. You can’t simulate the difference between practicing something in private and putting it out there for the world to see, and that difference is crucial.

I hope these strategies provide you with value towards whatever you’re trying to learn and improve at.

Good luck!