Placeholder Image

Subtitles section Play video

  • Hey what's going on guys?

  • So today we are tackling

  • how you can learn new skills incredibly quickly.

  • Over the course of this video,

  • I'm gonna share a four step process

  • that you can use to take any skill,

  • whether it's related to school or your future career,

  • or whether it's just a fun one like guitar or cooking,

  • and break that skill down

  • so that you can learn as much as you need to

  • about the most important parts

  • and then start practicing them effectively

  • so you can gain basic proficiency really really fast.

  • Now this process we're gonna talk about

  • applies to any skill,

  • because at its core,

  • skill development, whether it's really physical

  • like basketball

  • or whether it's really mental like mathematics,

  • it's all learning.

  • As you intake information about the skill,

  • and as you practice it,

  • you're forging new neural pathways in your brain,

  • you're connecting them with other neural pathways,

  • and you're strengthening them over time.

  • As you do this,

  • you move though what's called the three stage model

  • or skill acquisition,

  • which starts with the cognitive stage

  • where you're just learning about the skill,

  • and you're just forming those neural pathways.

  • Then moves into the associative stage

  • where you're doing a lot more practice,

  • and now you're able to sort of self reflect

  • and pick out mistakes and change things

  • based on those mistakes.

  • And eventually you move into the autonomous stage.

  • At that point you have mastered the skill,

  • and it's basically able to be done automatically.

  • And this autonomous phase takes

  • a really long time to get to.

  • Mastery takes a lot of hours of practice.

  • But that doesn't mean you're doomed to spend

  • dozens of hours in the beginning phases,

  • because if you know how to structure the learning

  • and the practice processes the right way,

  • you can make a surprising amount of progress

  • in a very very short period of time.

  • In fact, in his book The First 20 Hours,

  • author Josh Kaufman argues that you can learn

  • basic proficiency in almost any skill that exists

  • in under 20 hours of dedicated practice.

  • And his process for doing this breaks down

  • to a series of four distinct steps.

  • And in a second we're gonna go over those steps,

  • but first I wanna issue you a bit of a challenge.

  • If you're sitting there watching this video,

  • and you have a skill you've been wanting to learn,

  • use this framework to create a plan for doing that.

  • Once the video's over,

  • take out a piece of paper and create a plan

  • going through each of the steps,

  • and then start putting it into action.

  • So the first step in Kaufman's process

  • is to deconstruct the skill.

  • Basically you break it down into its component parts,

  • and then you prioritize those parts

  • based on your particular goals within that skill area.

  • Now to give you an example

  • let's talk about playing the guitar.

  • A lot of people want to play the guitar,

  • but there are lots of different ways to play the guitar.

  • There's tons of different musical genres,

  • you might want to just play a few different songs,

  • or maybe you want to be like Slash

  • or like DragonForce guitarists

  • and be rippin' solos all day long, right?

  • These are very different skills.

  • So, by breaking it down into individual sub-skills,

  • chords, scales, picking technique,

  • reading tabs, understanding musical intervals,

  • you end up with a list of building blocks

  • that you can then prioritize and take action on.

  • The second step in Kaufman's process

  • is the education step.

  • Basically at this point you want to take each sub-skill

  • that you've prioritized and learn enough about it

  • that you can practice well

  • and identify your mistakes and self-correct.

  • Now notice I said enough about each sub-skill,

  • not as much as you can about each sub-skill.

  • Because I know personally I'm the kind of guy

  • who will walk into Barnes & Noble

  • and look at every single book on the shelf

  • related to what I'm interested in,

  • and think, I should buy every single one here

  • and read them all before getting started.

  • And that's just not how good skill development works,

  • especially if you want to do it quickly.

  • You need to learn just enough about each sub-skill

  • so that you can start practicing,

  • getting your hands dirty, and making mistakes,

  • because then you're gonna know what you should correct.

  • Alright, step number three in the process

  • is to eliminate any potential barriers to success

  • or barriers to your progress and your practice.

  • And in my mind,

  • the most likely thing that's gonna get in the way

  • of your practice is a lack of motivation in the long-term.

  • So, find a way to motivate yourself on a constant basis.

  • Maybe it's having an accountability partner,

  • maybe it's joining a forum where you can talk

  • about your interest,

  • or maybe it's just making a record

  • of every single day you practice

  • so you can see a chain developing

  • that you don't want to break.

  • Alright, so skill has been deconstructed,

  • learning has been done,

  • and barriers have been sliced in half with a samurai sword.

  • We are now on the fourth and final step of the process

  • which is simply to practice deliberately.

  • In The First 20 Hours,

  • Josh Kaufman's rule is that you should practice deliberately

  • until you've achieved your goals for each sub-skill

  • that you prioritized,

  • or until you've hit 20 hours of dedicated practice.

  • And what he recommends

  • is that you actually practice by using a timer or a clock,

  • and track the amount of hours you put in.

  • Because when you're practicing something difficult,

  • it can be really really easy to overestimate

  • how much time you spend practicing.

  • Now that we've gotten through the four step process,

  • I want to give you a few additional tips

  • you can use to make your skill development journey

  • even more successful.

  • And the first one is to identify the work

  • of somebody who is a master

  • or somebody who is where you want to be.

  • Analyze that work as best as you can,

  • and then try to imitate it.

  • Now a lot of people are gonna say,

  • this is copying, this is ripping people off,

  • but actually as long as you're not passing off

  • this work as your own,

  • this is how a lot of people learn their skills.

  • And in fact in Japanese martial arts,

  • there's a concept called shuhari

  • that is exactly this.

  • And in music, it's the same.

  • The famous jazz trumpet player Clark Terry

  • believed that imitation was in fact

  • an essential part of becoming a great musician.

  • And he told his students that music learning happens

  • in a three stage process,

  • which he called imitate, assimilate, and innovate.

  • Here's what he said about the role of imitation.

  • "By imitating the players you love,

  • "you'll begin to understand the music

  • "on a deeper level and begin to see a personal sound

  • "develop in your own approach to improvisation.

  • "Questions that can't be answered

  • "by music theory or etude books,

  • "like how to play longer lines or how to articulate

  • "and swing, will reveal themselves as you start

  • "to imitate the masters."

  • Part of the reason this tactic works so well

  • is it gives you a method to go way way beyond

  • your comfort zone and your current level of skill.

  • Because if you can take something that a master made,

  • and you can analyze it from every angle,

  • you can probably recreate certain aspects of it

  • even if you don't know exactly what you're doing

  • or why you're doing it.

  • Then later on as you're kinda backfilling your knowledge

  • by learning the theory and all the fundamentals,

  • you're gonna be able to say,

  • oh that's why I did that, or that's how I did that.

  • I didn't understand it at first, but now I get it.

  • And I kind of have like a rung to pull myself up

  • because I did that work in the first place.

  • The Stanford mathematics professor Ravi Vakil

  • called it backfilling.

  • And here's how he described it in terms of mathematics.

  • "mathematics is so rich and infinite

  • "that it is impossible to learn it systematically,

  • "and if you wait to master one topic

  • "before moving on to the next,

  • "you'll never get anywhere.

  • "Instead, you'll have tendrils of knowledge

  • "extending far from your comfort zone.

  • "Then you can later backfill from these tendrils,

  • "and extend your comfort zone."

  • Of course, another way to learn from the masters

  • is to simply be taught by them.

  • Which is why another way you can really accelerate

  • your skill development process

  • is by finding a teacher or a coach or a course

  • that you can take.

  • Now I know from personal experience,

  • having a coach or somebody who can tell you your mistakes

  • is probably the most valuable thing in the world.

  • But you don't have to let geography be a limiting factor

  • in your access to teachers

  • because there are 100s of 1000s of tutorials

  • and online courses that you can use for basically

  • any skill that you're trying to learn.

  • And one place where you can find those courses

  • that I wanna let you know about

  • is Skillshare, who's actually the sponsor of this video.

  • Now Skillshare is an online learning community

  • that has over 12,000 courses in a ton of different subjects.

  • And I've actually been taking a few of those

  • in After Effects animation,

  • but they also have courses in photography,

  • graphic design, logo design,

  • and things like cooking, guitar, presentation skills.

  • In fact, they have a presentation skills class

  • from Simon Sinek who gave probably my favorite

  • TED talk of all time.

  • But one of the reasons I really like Skillshare

  • is that it gives you the ability to get feedback

  • from both your teacher and from other people

  • who are taking the same course.

  • There's two ways it does this.

  • Number one, below the videos in any course you're taking

  • there's a comments section.

  • And if you ask a question, you can get an answer

  • from the course instructor.

  • But also, most of the courses on Skillshare

  • have a participation component.

  • Basically there is a project section of the course

  • where you can upload your own work for feedback.

  • Now a membership to Skillshare

  • is normally around $8 a month,

  • which is right around the same price as Netflix,

  • and potentially a lot more useful.

  • But, if you wanna get three months

  • of completely unlimited use on Skillshare,

  • you can get it for 99 cents by using the link

  • in the description below,

  • and I'll have a few more details about that

  • at the end of the video.

  • Before we end this video though,

  • I've got three additional tips for you.

  • And all three of them

  • relate to making your practice sessions

  • more effective and more useful.

  • The first one is find a way to record

  • some of the practice you do.

  • Now you don't have to record all of it,

  • but recording some of it is gonna allow you

  • to analyze your performance,

  • see the mistakes you're making,

  • and make improvements.

  • And this is something my skating coach

  • actually told me to do.

  • She said bring your iPhone to the rink,

  • set it up on a tripod,

  • and film yourself practicing the moves

  • you have to practice for the competition.

  • Because if you can't see what you're doing,

  • you don't really know how to make improvements.

  • My friend Martin also does this with Spanish practice.

  • One thing he does is have an impromptu speech

  • in Spanish with his webcam,

  • so that way he can go back and analyze his accent,

  • his rate of speech, if he made any grammatical errors,

  • et cetera.

  • Secondly, if you want to accelerate your development process

  • and actually get good,

  • you need to make time for hyperfocused

  • and honestly lengthy practice sessions.

  • Now I was gonna say when I was writing this script

  • that you could just do 20 minutes a day

  • or 10 minutes a day of practice,

  • as long as it was consistent.

  • But when I got to thinking,

  • I couldn't think of a single skill that I have

  • that I'm proud of, that I think I'm truly good at

  • where I just put in 10 minutes a day

  • or 20 minutes a day of practice.

  • I mean, After Effects, public speaking, skateboarding,

  • figure skating, all the things I think I'm pretty good at,

  • I spend hours and hours of practice on.

  • And each individual session was honestly quite lengthy.

  • And lastly, as you practice you want to vary up the stakes.

  • When you're learning a new sub-skill,

  • you want to start with low stakes

  • where you're in a very low stress situation,

  • there's not much of a threat of consequence.

  • And then move to higher stakes situations

  • where there is some pressure.

  • And video game design is a perfect example of this,

  • because if you analyze almost any video game,

  • as it teaches the player a new skill,

  • it usually gives them a space

  • where there's some isolated practice.

  • Where you can basically practice the skill

  • with not much else going on, very little threats,

  • the opponents aren't hitting back.

  • And then, once you've gotten it down there,

  • you move it into an actual situation

  • where the opponents do hit back

  • or when things are happening faster

  • and when there's very low margin for error

  • or there's some consequences.

  • If you look at real word skills,

  • this principle applies just as well.

  • I mean look at learning a new language.

  • When you know absolutely nothing,

  • you need some low stress periods to drill flashcards,

  • or learn vocabulary,

  • but then to really up your skills

  • and solidify what you've learned,

  • you might do something like scheduling a conversation

  • with somebody on Skype or even going to a foreign country

  • and talking with people face-to-face.

  • Now I know we went over a ton of different tips

  • in this video,

  • and because of that there might be a temptation

  • for you to wait for a perfect moment

  • to start building your skill

  • when you can plan everything out,

  • when you can integrate every single tip,

  • but if you take nothing else away from this video,

  • just take this away.

  • The best time to start learning a skill is now,

  • even if you have an imperfect implementation plan,

  • even if you start really slowly.

  • If you can start making some mistakes,

  • start learning some initial

  • foundational pieces of that skill,

  • that's gonna help you build into the future.

  • So whatever it is, whatever you want to learn,

  • something career focused, something totally fun,

  • make a plan for implementing it,

  • use that four step process,

  • and then just get started.

  • Once again, I want to give a big thank you to Skillshare

  • for sponsoring this video.

  • This is actually my first sponsored video,

  • so let me know what you thought about it

  • in the comments down below.

  • But I'm a big fan of Skillshare personally,

  • so it was a no-brainer for me.

  • And if you want to try it,

  • once again you can try that link in the description below

  • for three months of unlimited use for just 99 cents.

  • Or if you're on the site,

  • you can use the promo code beard when you sign up,

  • because hey it's me.

  • Beyond that, if you enjoyed this video,

  • I'd love to hear what you thought about it

  • in the comments down below.

  • Definitely ask me questions if you have them,

  • and I'll try to get 'em answered in future videos

  • or in the comments themselves.

  • And also if you enjoyed this video,

  • give it a like to support this channel.

  • You can subscribe right there

  • if you want to get new videos very single week

  • on being more productive

  • and improving your learning capabilities.

  • Or you can click right down there

  • if you want to watch another video.

  • See you in the next one.

Hey what's going on guys?

Subtitles and vocabulary

Click the word to look it up Click the word to find further inforamtion about it