Every act of conscious learning requires the willingness to suffer an injury to one’s self-esteem. That is why young children, before they are aware of their own self-importance, learn so easily. 

Thomas Szasz  

Learning to learn is something that usually flies over so many heads. School never gives us the tools to help us learn. School gives us information and tells us to parrot it. Critical thinking is fixed in school and the grading system is completely useless for preparing children to mature.  The only effective way of learning to learn comes from experience. To better explain that, following science and managing emotion is a great balance of critical thinking and emotional association.

Key Points

• Don’t cling to ideas as if they’re set in stone
• Set goals and learn the scientific method for approaching common issues
• Always be willing to accept being wrong
• Build a structure used to solve problems based on the scientific method
• Realize that some things can never be learned without hands on experience
• Memorizing information is not learning
• Control yourself under emotions and maintain your structure
• If you don’t know, admit it, don’t guess.

Learning to Learn

The First Step

Being able to hold yourself up and follow a structure of principles while dealing with emotions is the best way to learn. Learning to learn takes practice. Listening to information is not learning. Memorizing information makes you nothing more than a sophisticated parrot. The first step is to hack away at ideology. Begin to break any loyalty to ideas that you feel define you. In order to truly learn, nothing can be set in stone. Take a deep breath and don’t try to rationalize a behavior based on an emotional reflex. Guessing is not consistent or efficient enough to base decisions.

Education is learning what you didn’t even know you didn’t know.

Daniel J. Boorstin 

Working Around Emotions

Emotions can’t be controlled. They are subconscious reflexes to our experiences. What we can do is practice dictating our behavior under intense emotion. The only way to learn that is to practice. A very intense emotion to improve is embarrassment. Put yourself in an embarrassing or stressful situation often and figure out how to effectively tackle your goals under those conditions. Learning to learn has to do with adaptability as well as critical thinking.

Gaining the Tools of Knowledge

When science and the reflexive unconscious are under control, now it’s time for the subconscious to train associations. They say the first million is the hardest for people who seek to become rich. The same goes for gaining the tools for learning. The first few things are the hardest to learn, but once you grasp the concept, it will become muscle memory or subconscious.

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