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The Ultimate Secret to Fast Learning

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Girl listening to music

Want to pick up a new skill? Don't we all. And we also want it to happen fast, so fast. And preferably without any effort as well. Well, I do have one secret that at least will "make it feel" like there's no effort. And I can guarantee that it will speed up your progress. Here's the secret.
The brain just wants to have fun.
I'll say it again. You brain simply wants to have fun. When it does, you will learn. Fast. And I want to help you understand how to make it happen. It might not sound like any major news, but this realization came to when attending a course in finance by my employer. What I thought would be pretty difficult to learn was actually surprisingly easy. After a whole bunch of games, role playing and exercises I had understood everything. But the real important part of that course is that I still today, 1 year later, I remember pretty much every single part of the content. Simply because it was so fun learning!

How I Learned Chinese

Using this little secret is how I have been able to learn Chinese - a language far different than anything I knew before. One of the real methods I have used is to listen to Chinese children's songs. That's right! It might sound a bit silly, but that's what I did. Why? Because it was fun! It's always fun to feel like a child again - to sing out loud (even though I sound horrible), to play games and to enjoy every moment. Another method I used when learning was to everyday write a funny little story using the new words I had picked up. This forced me to use my creativity to write down something entertaining :-) There are many great ways to have more fun while learning, so here are 5 of my tips:

5 Ways to Learn the Fun Way

1. Learn together with friends

Almost everything in life becomes more fun when you do it together with someone else. Learning is definitely one of those things. The thing is that you can feed of each other's energy to build momentum. It also much easier to create some sort of game, quiz or similar.

2. Create a game

As I just mentioned, why not create your very own game? It doesn't have to be complicated, just something to motivate you a little bit. This is at least the case for me since I am strongly motivated by any form of competition. You can e.g. set a time limit and then try to collect points for different sort of progress. This works for whatever you are trying to learn
  • A course in school
  • Juggling
  • Driving a car
  • A language
  • Etc.
It's all about using your imagination which I know you have.

3. Add something fun

A classic way to make something boring a bit more fun is to simply listen to music at the same time. We know that the music makes us happy and it will therefore make the entire experience a whole lot better. And there are many other ways you can add something fun to your experience. If you e.g. love the coffeehouse atmosphere, then just go to a coffeehouse while studying. Simple.

4. Change your focus

Instead of trying to include something fun, you can instead just put your detective glasses on. Then you try to find something fun in what you're learning. You see, you get what you focus on, so if you focus on all the hard work you have in front of then that's exactly what you will get. However, if you manage to see the fun part - perhaps the challenge or a specific detail, then you will both enjoy it more and get more out of it. That's win-win.

5. Smile

Smile. Try it now. And now try to feel sad while you keep that smile on your face. It's not possible, is it? So if you just manage to keep smiling, then you will have so much more fun in whatever you do. And in the end, you will also have learnt incredibly much. That's the power of smiling.   The explanation to why you learn so fast when the brain has fun is actually pretty simple. First of all, having fun is a fantastic motivator. You won't need goals or anything else to keep you going if you just have fun. Second of all, having fun makes your brain 100% focused on the moment. That means that you will learn things both faster and for the long-term. Now get out there and just have fun! Make you brain happy :-) and learn! Also, let me know your secrets for fast learning and how you make sure to have fun while learning. This guest post is contributed by Matthew M. McEwan from Early-Riser.com. His blog is loaded with ideas for how to wake up early. He also just started the brand new site for learning Chinese children's songs - Where anyone can learn Chinese the fun way. You can also Follow him on Twitter.

The post The Ultimate Secret to Fast Learning appeared first on Pick the Brain | Motivation and Self Improvement.


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