Use This Powerful Technique to Learn Anything Quickly

When we are in school, there is a large amount of memorization that we are told is necessary to learn most subjects.  It can be math, science, history or languages, memorization is seen as vital.  The truth that we all learn very quickly is that memorizing something is unnatural and quite difficult to do.  Yes, there are techniques that can help us memorize, like mind palaces, mnemonics and word pegs, but it can still be tedious.

Many teachers would argue that having a memorized base of knowledge is essential to learning and that it must be built upon, but there is an easier and more effective way to learn.  Rather than learn to remember, it can be much more effective to learn to understand.  When you learn to truly understand a subject, it locks it into your mind.  Memorizing a list of facts, words or numbers without connecting them to knowledge that can be used to really understand a subject usually results in the knowledge being forgotten very quickly if it is not used.  On the other hand, truly understanding a subject can make it a permanent part of your knowledge base as it is connected with emotion and real utility.

In the case of a language, the goal is not to memorize verbs, phrases or numbers, it is to communicate with someone in another language.  If instead, the student begins to learn the most popular phrases and immediately uses them to speak to someone, they attach emotion and utility to that phrase.  They will probably remember how to ask for a drink in another language if they have done it with someone else or in a restaurant rather than how to count.

Attaching real situations and understanding are very powerful ways to learn.  Adding the step of teaching it back to someone else and learning can be supercharged even further.

So, learn to understand rather than remember and watch your knowledge explode.