HOW TO LEARN SOMETHING NEW WITHOUT BECOMING INFORMATION-FATIGUED

There are only so many hours in the day. We encounter new information everyday - through books, through the news, through social media, through podcasts, and through the people around us. It is impossible to learn everything at once, but you may find yourself trying. Find it hard to retain large chunks of information at a time? Here are some tips that will help you absorb information without becoming fatigued.

Break it Down:

You may have a study topic or area of research in mind. This would be a broad category. Break this concept down into relevant groups - these should be aspects of your topic that you would like to focus on. These aspects will have their own details. Create a structured plan and allot a certain amount of time to learning about what you have outlined.

Identify Your Personal Learning Style:

There are different types of personal learning styles. You may even be a combination. Visual learners need their information presented in graphs, charts and diagrams. Auditory listeners tend to favor lectures and podcasts. Reading and Writing learners prefer text heavy research, and don't mind spending hours looking through essays and academic journals. Kinesthetic learners are hands-on. They have to do something to understand it.

Spend An Hour reading:

It happens - life just gets in the way. Have a shelf full of books you've been meaning to get around to? Or a dozen unread news articles bookmarked on your computer? If this is you, setting the small goal of reading an hour per day may help you feel more comfortable taking on new learning subjects. Many people have their preferred mode of reading. You may choose to visit your personal book collection if you collect physical media. If you are more digital, you may use an E-Reader or download EPUBs and PDFs. Reading should be comfortable. Your devices should reflect that.

Set out to learn one new thing:

Even the most infinitesimal piece of knowledge can be built on. Test yourself. Learn something new each day and see how that knowledge accumulates after a week, a month, a few months. Learning something isn't cramming as much information as possible. It's learning something, engaging with it, discussing it, taking it in piece by piece. The quicker you try and learn something the less likely you are to retain it.

Step Back From Discourse:

With the state of the world, you may feel a constant pressure to stay on top of relevant conversations. This pressure may come from peers, from strangers, from family members, and even from friends. It is okay to not always be able to throw your two cents in. When you are inundated with discussion and debate you may feel shame about being undereducated on a certain topic and overcompensate by learning as much information as you can. Your learning process should be motivated by positive feelings like inspiration and a genuine desire to learn - not negative emotions like shame and anxiety.

Teach it to Someone else:

You may forget fifty percent of what you learned an hour after learning it. Teaching what you learned to someone else allows you to retain what you learned quicker. Sometimes your explanation will be flawed - that's what you're going for. There will always be deficits in what we learn, and we can overcome them by having them be challenged or picked up on. This is similar to the Feynman technique. Giving a simple explanation to another person forces you to refine and simplify what you learned.

Learning should be intentional. Pace yourself and make little goals. Find out how to get the most out of your learning style. You have the entirety of your life to learn things. With these tips, you can take pleasure in the learning process without burning yourself out.

Sources: Psycho Tactics, "How To Retain 90% Of Everything You Learn" via Sean D'Souza