Be The One With Something Interesting To Say

By Author: Steve Gillman
Total Articles: 89
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How Do You Learn Something New?

If you could learn fast and effectively, you might become
the person with something interesting to say on any topic.
It also can help you in your carreer or business. You can
learn more efficiently. Just use a few of the following
techniques, and use them until they become habit.

First, when you want to learn new material, expose your mind
to it as soon as possible, even before you feel "ready," or
have time to study. This first stage of learning is the
confusing part where you look at new ideas and say, "huh?"
If you do this quickly, however, reviewing everything for a
few minutes, your unconscious mind will start "incubating"
the new concepts, and finding some way to organize them.


The next time you sit down with the new material, begin to
relate it to what you already know. Compare and contrast
things. Say to yourself, "That's like...," or "How is that
different from..." The concept of the autoresponder was new
to me when I started my newsletter, but it really ...
... sunk in
and motivated me when I thought, "It's like someone doing
all my addressing and mailing for pennies a day." This
prompted all the important questions, and I was ready to
learn about it.

Create Curiosity and Anticipation

You probably agree that you can learn more effectively with
curiosity and anticipation working for you. So how do you
create this state of mind? One way is to leave each learning
session with a question or two clearly in your mind. This
creates the sense of anticipation and curiosity that will
help you the next time you approach the material. It's like
a television show cutting to a commercial at an interesting
moment in the program. You want to stay tuned, to see what
will happen next.

Use Your Imagination

Want to totally change your perspective to make learning
more effective? Study with the idea in mind that you will be
teaching what you're learning. As you learn something,
imagine how you will teach it. This is a powerful way to get
a good grasp on new information.

Imagine how you will use what you are learning. There is so
much information, and so little of it is the "important
stuff." By imagining how you'll use the new information, you
tend to automatically focus on the things you really need to
know.

Take Breaks

Learn more by working less. Well, almost. Research shows
that we remember best what we studied first and last in a
given session. By taking breaks, you have more "sessions,"
and increase the number of firsts and lasts. Get up and move
around during your breaks, as this can also keep your mind
fresh.

Finding Time

Is it difficult for you to find time to learn something new?
What if it took no extra time to learn a new language, take
a course on negotiating, or study something new and
interesting? What would you want to learn then?

You can start this week, by using the dead-time in your day.
That's the time sitting in your car, or on the bus, or in
the waiting room at the dentist's office. There are
thousands of books now on tape, CD's, and MP3's. Your public
library probably has hundreds of books on tape, and you can
even instantly download books on the internet. One website I
use has 18,000 choices!

This is, without a doubt, one of the most under-utilised and
easiest ways to learn something new. Is your job 25 minutes
away? If so, you spend over 200 hours per year sitting in
your car going to or from work. Could you learn something
useful if you had four hours per week of audio instruction
for a year? You bet. And the only extra time it takes is a
few minutes to stop by the library or place an order
online.

Put in a tape on your way to work, get used to using a few
of the techniques here, and you could soon be a virtual
learning machine.

About the Author Steve Gillman has been studying brain improvement,
concentration, creative problem solving, and related topics
for years. You can visit his website, and subscribe for free
to his Brain Power Newsletter at:
http://www.IncreaseBrainPower.com/newsletter.html