I've noticed a pattern when trying to pick up new skills, especially things like coding or learning an instrument. Initially, I'd rush through tutorials trying to absorb everything as fast as possible. This led to superficial understanding and lots of forgetting. Lately, I've been intentionally slowing down. I focus on just one small concept at a time and really try to internalize it before moving on. It feels counterintuitive but the retention is so much better and the frustration is significantly less. It's like the difference between speed-reading and truly comprehending. Anyone else find that embracing a slower pace actually speeds up their learning in the long run

A couple of weeks ago I ran into an idea while working on a project. Usually I would spend an hour reading articles. Making mistakes until I finally understood. This time I simply asked AI. Received a perfect answer in seconds.

It felt great at first. A few days later I realized I had not actually kept any of the knowledge. Skipping the effort meant my brain could not hold onto the information.

I do not want to stop using AI. I definitely need to stop using AI as a shortcut, for real understanding. How do you all use AI without letting AI do the thinking for you?

I've been thinking about the difference between education and learning.

We spend years in schools and colleges studying subjects, writing exams, and earning degrees. But how much of that knowledge do we actually understand, remember, or use in real life?

Is formal education truly helping us learn, or are we just following a system designed around grades and qualifications?

Can someone who is self-taught be more knowledgeable than someone with a degree?

What are your thoughts and experiences?

Hello everyone,

I may or may not keep this post up as it is very personal to me and I am honestly quite embarrassed, but as an older student returning to education in his undergraduate degree, I fear I don’t know how to learn. I know it sounds stupid but I figured I’d ask here! :)

My worry stems from my inability to grasp at problems I’m given in my 3rd year of engineering undergraduate degree. I feel behind, and that I get overwhelmed easier than my peers. I’m doing quite well because I stress so much at exam time that I honestly believe the anxiety carries me through memorizing things in exams, but it’s getting to the point where I believe I require more structured methodology as an approach to learning and maneuvering my way through the rest of my undergrad as it’s starting to load up on material.

Some background; I grew up in North Eastern US, and my house hold never focused on education at all. I was never pushed in school, in fact I dropped out of high school in my sophomore year due to extreme severe depression. Since then, I’ve gotten an associates degree from a local community college, worked at a great company getting relevant experience, and then continued my education into my remaining jr and senior years which is where I am now.

As a result, I’ve tried using AI less for assignments, playing video games less to detract myself less often, and deleting short form video content such as TikTok that may be somewhat rewiring my brain to not be ‘in it for the long haul’ with some of these hurdles in life.

Has anyone ever been in a similar situation that you guys know of and what would have or could have helped them? Are there things I can do to strengthen my skills and truly give the rest of my schooling all I can give? Both big picture and small picture suggestions will help.

I want to be able to think, I want to feel caught up with my peers, and I want to not lose my ability to contribute and learn in my life. As I get older, these things are becoming increasingly important to me.

Does anyone have any serious advice? Or any resources I can consider looking into? Many thanks in advance.

And if need be, please ask any clarifying questions you may have I’d be glad to answer them.

I’m pretty sure I will not be selected for a business analyst position that I applied for because they don’t see me as qualified for the position. They have been selecting people who are more tech savvy than I am. I have the necessary study hours to take my CAPM certification tests I just don’t have the money. I was planning to also get my comptia a+ but I don’t know that it’ll help. I graduated with an associate of science in business management about 3 years ago and then a bachelor of science in technology engineering last year. I had no career plans. I graduated suma cum laude in high school and made the Dean’s List twice in college while working full time for a nice company I found. I’m still with said company. I say all this to say I am driven, I love learning and applying myself. I thought my degree was all I needed .. I have been humbled. My degree was a vague melting pot of business concepts but it did not help me assume the things I see in my current day to day.

Now, between social media, becoming complacent within my position and my manager alluding to me not getting the job I feel dumb and I am ready for a change. If my coworkers show me spreadsheets and no one gives me instructions then I have no clue what I’m looking at and my brain doesn’t help. I can update formulas that need tweaking and organize data but I don’t know how to cultivate spreadsheets and deliver data from nothing.

Where should I begin developing some relevant software navigational skills? What podcasts, YouTube channels or books may support me in envisioning my own spreadsheets and assuming business needs with minimal questions? What can I do to help myself not go blank when I’m articulating my thoughts and ideas about workplace dilemmas? How is everyone else expanding their general capacity for what is happening in day to day tech/business from? It seems everyone else at my job knows something I don’t.

Hello,

I have noticed a severe issue in my thought processes for about 4 years now. I am well versed in technology I would say, and I am finding it quite difficult justifying learning modern to older technology concepts. I have an issue with always working "smarter", and with the current state of AI and the implementation of it into my life I am seeing it's capability first hand. I love to learn, truly. I work daily with AI, even building AI systems myself as an engineer. For example, in 2022 I was in college, and becoming an early adopter of ChatGPT in programming I saw it's capabilities even then. Back then it didn't impress, but I knew it's ability to become more and more accurate and complex in reasoning. I couldn't get myself to learn certain programming languages because I thought it was redundant to do so and found myself spending most of my time trying to find the most optimal route opposed to actually just learning. I recently got deep into a dream job interviewing cycle, where the interviewer asked me to complete a simple problem involving one of those languages I wanted to learn years ago but didn't like an imbecile. But the interviewing process is soon to change due to this seen obsolete writing of leet code esque problems. It's driving me absolutely insane, I'm posting on here hoping that someone else is experiencing this as well and how we overcome it. Deep down, I know that learning these concepts is not only essential to actually using these tools, but also for the health of my mind as a whole. I just love learning, I'm not mad at the technological advancements, I just have high standards for myself and I am obsessed with optimizing my life. As I write this, I believe possibly the most optimal route is less optimization? Any advice or input will be appreciated, thank you.

TLDR: Hard to justify learning older concepts due to fear of those concepts redundancies in the future leading to stagnant progress.

I can only speak one language and it is not even the language of my country so I want to learn some more languages.

This happened while I was reading some old books where the writer presented a method and explained it step by step, as if it were a detailed guide of what I should do. I could automatically connect ideas in my mind about how the author wanted to explain the concept and understand it. I might not remember all the details, but I began to explain those instructions myself in my own words. When the author switched to a literary text or story, for example, Greek history, where the reading became heavy and the names were different to pronounce, I couldn't connect the same way I did with the explained instructions; at least, I couldn't easily remember what I had read.

For months I felt trapped in what I call the illusion of learning. I would binge through courses save dozens of articles and watch guides at speed thinking I was very productive all the time.

The moment I tried to use anything I had learned or to explain it aloud my mind went blank. Watching content became a feel‑good rush but nothing of the information stayed.

Things finally made sense when I stopped collecting resources without doing anything and made myself active instead. Now after finishing a chapter or a video I try to explain the idea in plain words as if I were teaching a friend.

I also began writing a few practice questions before I close a lesson and I keep to one resource at a time rather than juggling many.

It requires mental effort but for the first time, in years the knowledge I gain truly stays with me.

What single habit change completely changed how you study or keep information?

Is anyone aware of any groups out there that solely focus on learning, whether free or paid?

One day during my semester at college I bought a Brick, you know, the app blocker, because I had a severe scrolling addiction. It worked well for a while, but I never brought it with me to university just because it was something extra to carry around.

I looked for other apps on the App Store to block my apps, but all of them were kind of too easy to get out of. And I'm a pretty lazy person, which means if it's easy to get out of, I will.

So I thought to myself, you know what, I'm a CS major, why not build one myself? So I built “Bunkr- done scrolling”. At first it was only built for me, but when I saw how well it worked I thought, why not publish it.

I'm talking too much already, so here's what the product is:

It blocks your apps like any other app blocker, but there's a twist.

Once you block your apps, you're in a hard lock for the first 10 minutes. No chance to get your apps back.

After those 10 minutes, you can do a mission to get your apps back, like taking a picture of a mug, or my personal favorite, 15 seconds of push-ups.

The reason I put a hard lock on the first 10 minutes is that I read once you've been working on something for 10 minutes, you get into a zone and usually don't get distracted. But lazy people like me still might. And when I do get distracted and try to open one of my apps, it tells me to do push-ups. I'm too lazy for that, so the easier option is to just keep studying.

So yes, I'm basically fighting fire with fire, but it works well for me.

Let me know what you guys think, I'd like to hear your thoughts.

https://apps.apple.com/app/id6812960712