[2022-10-15] Making a habit of learning
In her article How to Make Learning More Automatic, author Gretchen Rubin shares several tips for making learning habitual, including this one:
Recognize that working is one of the most dangerous forms of procrastination. When you schedule time to do certain work, you should do that work, and nothing else. No filing, no cleaning, no checking emails. Do the scheduled work, or stare at the ceiling. Otherwise, you may work and work and work, and never get around to doing the very thing you set out to do.
Ah yes, the virtue of work. It's easy to procrastinate on something important when you tell yourself, "But I'm working, and this is urgent."
Sometimes when I sit down at night to write my daily post, I'm stumped. I stare at my screen, wondering what interesting thing I could possibly come up with to say. In those moments, it's tempting to check social media or to answer emails or to tidy up my work area. Even though none of this could be considered urgent work, it does nevertheless allow me to put off the much harder task of reflecting, writing, editing and publishing.
I especially like Rubin's advice to "Do the scheduled work, or stare at the ceiling." It wouldn't take me long to conclude that writing my post—as challenging as that might be—is better than staring at the ceiling, which is my definition of dull.
To make sustained progress on a goal such as lifelong learning, says Rubin, you have to turn it into a habit. To do so:
- Schedule time for your habit. It could be a daily goal (e.g., listen to a podcast while on a morning walk) or a weekly one (e.g., watch one TED talk on Saturday evenings).
- Be specific about what you’re asking of yourself. It isn't enough to say, "I want to read more." Instead, try something like, "Spend one hour on Sunday morning reading articles that I've bookmarked during the week."
- Set an initial goal that's easy to achieve. You might start by committing to, for example, doing one lesson per day in Duolingo, working up to 15 or 30 minutes per day.
- Monitor your habit. Note somewhere how you did in meeting your goal of doing a learning activity at a specific time. You could keep track of your progress privately in an accomplishments log, share it with a friend or colleague who has a similar learning objective, or go public by reporting what you did and what you learned through a social platform.
- Spend time with people who have the learning habits you want to emulate. "Studies show that we tend to pick up habits from the people around us, so choose your company wisely," says Rubin. Found a podcast that's particularly good? Share it with a colleague who would appreciate the recommendation. Read an especially useful article? Send it to a friend with a summary of your top three takeaways.
And, of course, don't do other work during the time you've set aside for learning.
Why are habits so crucial to learning? Rubin says,
Habits are freeing because they save us from the difficult, draining business of making decisions and exercising our self-control.
Having made a commitment to writing a daily blog post, I never ask myself, "Do I feel like writing something tonight? Should I skip today and just pick things up tomorrow?" The decision has already been made, and that's liberating.
Today marks 61 straight days that I've done at least one lesson in Duolingo to learn Portuguese. I owe my streak in part to habit forming and in part to the way the app makes learning feel like a game. Today also marks 801 straight days that I've written a post for my Jenesis blog. I owe my streak in part to my obsession with streaks and in part to your encouragement. In both cases, I've learned so much.
