In this crazy competitive world we’re told we need to learn new skills, adapt to new tech and stay ahead of the curve! But how do we actually do that, especially if formal education hasn’t given us the tools to be self directed learners?
That’s what Scott H. Young answers in his book, Ultralearning: Master Hard Skills, Outsmart the Competition, and Accelerate Your Career.
This isn’t about those quick fix “learn anything in 24 hours” schemes. It’s about intense self directed learning, about pushing past those comfort zones and mastering those hard skills that will set us apart in a world that’s obsessed with mediocrity!
Scott defines ultralearning as:
“A strategy for acquiring skills and knowledge that is both self-directed and intense.”
Here’s why this works:
It’s tailored to YOU and your goals. You’re not stuck with a one-size-fits-all curriculum; you get to choose what you learn, how you learn it and why!
It focuses on what matters. It’s not collecting degrees or credentials, it’s about mastery!
It uses the principles of accelerated learning. It’s being intentional, strategic and efficient in your efforts to become really good at something, really fast.
9 Principles of Ultralearning
Scott Young, who’s done crazy self-directed learning challenges, has identified nine principles that underlie any ultralearning project.
These aren’t just random hacks, okay? They’re based on years of research and experimentation, backed up by the science of learning!
Let’s get into it and see how we can apply these to our own learning journeys, whether it’s learning a new language, crushing a course at school, building a side hustle or even learning to play a musical instrument.
1. Metalearning: First, Draw a Map
“Metalearning is learning about learning.”
Imagine trying to navigate a new city without a map or even a destination in mind! You’d get lost right? Same thing when we try to learn something without first figuring out how we’re going to learn it.
Metalearning is the process of creating a roadmap for your learning journey. It’s about:
Your motivation (the why): Why do you want to learn this? What’s your end goal?
Breaking down the skill (the what): What specific knowledge, facts and procedures do you need to master?
Choosing the right methods (the how): What resources, strategies and environments will work best for you?
2. Focus: Sharpen Your Knife
"Learning hard things requires a lot of concentration. Distraction is the enemy of learning. You’ll struggle to acquire any skill if your mind is constantly bouncing around from email to Twitter to Facebook to cat videos."
This is the hardest part of ultralearning (and the most important!). Our brains are wired to get distracted! So creating an environment for deep work is essential.
Here are a few ideas from the book:
Create a distraction free environment: Put your phone away, close those tabs, find a quiet spot and focus.
Schedule dedicated time for learning: Treat it like an appointment, not something you fit in when you have a few spare minutes.
Practice mindfulness and meditation: Strengthen those focus muscles!
Embrace boredom: Don’t reach for the distraction! Train yourself to sit with discomfort, focus on the task at hand.
3. Directness: Go Straight Ahead
“Directness means, you are learning the thing you want to be able to do.”
The best way to learn is to do the thing! Practicing the skill itself, not just learning about it in theory.
Here’s an example from the book:
Scott’s friend Vatsal Jaiswal wanted to be an architect. He graduated but couldn’t find a job. Employers wanted someone with practical skills, not just theoretical knowledge. So what did Vatsal do? He took a job at a print shop, printing architectural drawings! He learned the software architects used, he absorbed the details of real blueprints and he built a portfolio of his own designs. Not glamorous but direct and it worked for him.
This can be scary especially for us perfectionists who want to feel like we know what we’re doing before we start. But the key is to embrace the discomfort, to accept those inevitable mistakes and to learn from those experiences.
Here are a few things I’ve learned about direct practice:
It’s the fastest path to mastery: When we’re in the process we learn so much faster!
It helps us overcome the “illusion of explanatory depth”: We think we understand something until we try to do it!
It makes us more resilient: When we accept those early mistakes and keep going it builds our confidence and makes us less afraid to take risks.
4. Drill: Attack Your Weakest Point
"If you want to improve, you must identify the things you don't do well and then improve your ability to do them."
Think of a basketball player who can shoot threes all day but can’t dribble to save their life. They’ll struggle, right? Or a musician who can play all the notes but has terrible rhythm.
It’s not enough to just focus on what we’re good at; we need to attack our weaknesses! This is where drills come in.
Drills are about breaking down a skill into its parts, identifying where we’re struggling and practicing those specific sub skills with laser focus.
It’s like finding the “rate limiting step”—that one part of the process that’s holding you back. Remove that and you’ll fly!
5. Retrieval: Test to Learn
"Testing isn’t simply a way of assessing knowledge, but a way of creating it."
We think of tests as something to be avoided, a way to prove what we know (or don’t know!), but testing is actually a powerful learning tool!
This is where the “testing effect” comes in. Research has shown we remember more when we have to actively retrieve that information from our brains. It’s about making our brains work harder, which creates stronger neural connections!
Here are a few ways to incorporate retrieval into your learning:
Flashcards: Good for memorizing facts, vocabulary or even those tricky equations!
Free Recall: After reading a chapter or listening to a lecture, try to write down as much as you can remember without looking back.
Self-Testing: Create your own quizzes and tests! The internet is a treasure trove of practice questions, even for weird subjects.
Teach What You’ve Learned: Explain it to someone else! This makes you organize your thoughts, clarify your understanding and find the gaps in your knowledge!
6. Feedback: Don’t Dodge the Punches
“Feedback is harsh and uncomfortable. Know how to use it without letting your ego get in the way.”
We all want validation, right? But too much positive feedback can actually hinder our learning! It’s nice to hear “You’re awesome!” but it doesn’t help us get better.
The best feedback is constructive criticism—the kind that points out our mistakes and tells us how to fix them. It’s not always easy to hear but it’s necessary for growth!
Here’s the challenge: to learn how to use feedback effectively!
Don’t Be Defensive!: We get defensive when our work is criticized but remember feedback is about the work not about you personally.
Be a “Noise Canceller”: Not all feedback is equal! Some is helpful, some is irrelevant and some is just plain wrong! Learn to filter out which critiques will actually help you get better and which are just distractions!
Embrace the Discomfort: The most powerful feedback is often the hardest to hear! It’s that feedback that pushes us out of our comfort zones and makes us rethink our approach!
7. Retention: Don’t Fill a Leaky Bucket
"Forgetting is human nature, so it is not enough to learn, you also need to make the information stick!"
That’s why forgetting everything we learn in school is so easy—it’s like trying to fill a bucket with holes in it!
We need strategies for making those new skills and knowledge stick, for encoding them into our long-term memory, so we don’t have to relearn them later.
Here are a few retention strategies:
Spacing: Don’t cram! We retain information better when we space out our learning sessions over time, even if it feels less efficient.
Spaced-Repetition Systems (SRS): These are like flashcards on steroids! SRS software like Anki uses algorithms to optimally schedule your reviews based on your individual forgetting curve. This makes learning new vocabulary or memorizing facts way more efficient.
Proceduralization: Turn those new skills into habits, into automatic responses that you can access without conscious effort.
Overlearning: Practice beyond the point of mastery. It’s like building muscle memory, making those skills second nature.
8. Intuition: Dig Deep Before Building Up
"Understanding works, and don’t recourse to cheap tricks of memorization to avoid deeply knowing things."
This is cool! Intuition is that almost magical ability we develop to “know” the answer, to see the solution to a problem before we even think about it. Like amazing athletes, those skilled musicians, even those experienced teachers or doctors who can seemingly predict what’s going to happen or what the solution is.
Cal says true intuition comes from a deep understanding of our field. It’s not about memorizing facts; it’s about seeing those patterns, those underlying principles that connect everything together.
Here are a few ways to build that deep understanding:
Don’t avoid hard problems: Make your brain work.
Prove it to yourself: Don’t just accept things as true. Derive those formulas, explain those concepts in your own words.
Start with a concrete example: This helps to ground abstract ideas and make them real.
9. Experimentation: Explore Outside Your Comfort Zone
“All of these principles are only starting points. True mastery comes not just from following the path trodden by others but from exploring possibilities they haven’t yet imagined.”
As we get better the more opportunities to learn open up! We start to see new connections, we question established methods and we’re more comfortable taking risks and going off the beaten track. This is where experimentation comes in.
Experimentation is about:
Trying new things: Just because it works for someone else doesn’t mean it’ll work for you!
Challenging the assumptions: Why do we do it this way? Is there a better way?
Embracing the "failures": We learn as much from our mistakes as we do from our successes!
It’s Your Time to Learn: The Ultralearner Ethos
Ultralearning isn’t following a set of steps; it’s taking control of your learning journey. It’s about:
What you want to learn.
How you want to learn it.
Creating your own plan.
This might mean finding mentors who inspire you, trying out different learning techniques, even designing your own self-directed projects that challenge you and push you beyond your comfort zone!
It's about embracing this truth:
"You’re the one in charge, and you’re the one who’s ultimately responsible for the results you generate.”
So, what will you ultra learn? What skills are waiting to be unlocked?
Share your thoughts and learning goals in the comments!
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