Transcripts
1. Welcome to the Class: Hi, I'm Eddie. And I just recently
finished my masters in medical physics in Germany
with almost full grade. And the path here was not easy. And studying physics
forced me to find the most effective way to
study and absorb information. And the path until here
was not the simplest one. It forced me to
learn how to study and absorb material in the
shortest period of time. Being born and
raised in Portugal, I had to learn a new
language as an adult, and there I learned what to do for memory intensive tasks. Then I continued to study
physics in Germany, and there I realized
these tricks for memory intensive tasks don't quite apply for these
practical ones, such as coding, math, or even more creative activities such as learning how
to play an instrument, video editing, or
even photography. Throughout the years, I've read books and papers to really understand the
scientifically proven best way how to learn. I tried it and it works. And in this class,
you learn how to maximize your progress without wasting any unnecessary time just by avoiding these
simple mistakes. There is no prerequisite. As long as you're willing to learn anything,
you're good to go. And by the end of the class, you'll understand everything you need to know about
effective learning. I'll identify the biggest
time waster mistakes, and I will substitute them with the most
effective method, both for memory and practice
intensive activities. And at the end, you can
submit a photo of any part of your most effective
studies in the class project. There, you can ask any
specific questions and get feedback directly from myself
or any students as well. And with that said, I'll
see you in the next lesson. Well, I will identify the biggest time waster
when learning. Sea.
2. The Biggest Time-Waster in Studying: This might hurt to
hear for some of you. As it did to me in high school, as I studied this way. You see everyone around
studying like this doing it, and when you do it, it feels really productive.
That's the problem. However, this is the most
useless study method, the biggest time waster, but it feels just so
productive when you do it. And it is to rewrite
your notes to maybe ingrain the material or to make it prettier
or easier to read. This is by far the
biggest time waster. During my school years
for my history class, I had lower grades, and I wanted to
really improve them. So what I did was, I rewrote all my notes and easier to read, and it took me hours to do it. And it felt so productive. I put the work, I put the hours. But at the end of it all, my
grades just did not improve. It was so frustrating
to me, and at the time, I did not realize that this method was the
biggest time waster. And the two main problems with this problem are the first one, re reading or
rewriting your notes is a very passive
method of study. We can all admit
this in one point. You just read a
paragraph or a page. And then what did I
read? What did I learn? You don't even remember because your brain wasn't
actively thinking about it. It was very passive. And the second point fits into the first point where having
a nice cup of hot chocolate, a nice music playlist, just copying the notes feels
really nice and comfortable. However, sometimes discomfort
also leads to memorizing without understanding and
really understanding. That was the problem. You might learn a thing or two, but the speed that
you're doing with this method is incredibly slow. And by the time you're
finished doing your notes, you're back to 0.1, where you're just rereading passively without
really understanding, and it becomes super slow. That was the real problem I had for my history
and philosophy class. And I wish I knew this sooner. I know the information
I just gave you might be shocking
for some of you. It was shocking to me
when I just learned it. What I want you to do
is maybe close down your notebook for transferring notes because in this lesson, I identify the problem. But in the next one,
I will substitute it with the most effective
way. See it there.
3. What to Do Instead? (1/2): We identified the problem with the most popular
learning method. It was simply because
it was too passive. The opposite, it's what we
call deliberate practice. This applies both for memory intensive and
practical activities. The first thing I want you
to actually understand is the harder it is for your
brain to think about it. It takes time and your brain
is just mentally tired, the more you're
actually learning. Let me give you some examples. So instead of rereading your
notes from start to finish, you identify the points you
don't really understand. Maybe these two words, you don't really understand
what they actually mean, and you investigate them. Maybe you can ask a teacher
Google or Chat CBT. You really dive into this
topic. It takes time. It takes a few extra minutes, and of course, your brain
doesn't want to do this. It's outside its comfort zone. It's really thinking about it, and then you have
this, ah, ah hah. Then you understand. And this is a new puzzle piece you have in your brain and it
will stick there. Chances are you will not
forget about it next time. Just by doing this for a few extra minutes
for one concept. This feels really slow, taking the extra time going
through the whole notes, Google Ling, cha gting, or asking the professor. But I can guarantee you this is the opposite of
slow. This is fast. Tackling the problems
you don't understand, it is guaranteed to be
the fastest way to learn. The extra minutes you
spend are crucial, and the extra brain power you use is really vital
for learning. Again, I'll repeat the fundamental concept
of deliberate practice. The harder it is
for your brain to really think about
it, to go around it, and understand it,
the more tired it is, the more actual
learning you're doing, and the faster you're learning. Deliberate practice also applies for practical
activities as well. For example, let's take pianos. When learning specially
a long piece, you might low already some
parts of the song and others, you don't feel so comfortable. But again, deliberate practice says that tackling
the hardest parts, really thinking about
them, going for it. Taking the extra time is
the fastest way to learn. This frustration of going through the complicated parts is what sets the difference apart between a good student
and the best student. Instead of just playing
the easy parts, the parts you
already know, going through the parts you're
not so comfortable with. Over and over again, that's where the true
learning is coming from. If you can take something
from this lesson, it is that the best
students are the ones who are willing to go
through the hard parts. They're willing to go through
the mental gymnastics, the mental fight, to
understand the concept or go through a hard part
over and over again. Just to learn something new. Some people might play the
guitar for years, for example, and if they just
learn and then play the most comfortable
and fun songs and they go over it again and again without really
learning anything, in practice in theory, they're not really improving. If you want to be the
best guitar player, student, swimmer, you have to go through this mental strain of
understanding new concepts, new techniques,
and going through them in this process
over and over again, it might feel tiring, but
you're really learning. It feels completely slow, it feels the opposite of fast. It feels slow, but it is the most effective and
fastest learning method. Now it is your turn. In whatever you're learning, I want you to first identify which hard parts do you have? If you have a long text, maybe which hard concepts
you don't really understand. If you have an equation,
what does this mean? If you are playing
an instrument, doing playing a sport, maybe you can identify
which techniques or which parts you're feeling
the most uncomfortable with. And those are the key points
where you really have to go through over and over again. And one last time when your brain is really
feeling tired, that's when you really
know you're learning. Otherwise, you're
just going through the easy parts and
learning nothing. I'll see you in the
next lesson with the next following
common mistake. Good luck.
4. The Most Common Study Mistake : The next common mistake will
sound obvious, too obvious, in fact, but what most don't know is the scary statistics
that are behind it. This mistake, unlike
the first one is already more well known. The other one feels like a trap where people don't even know they're committing
the mistake, but this one even teachers tell you that what's happening. And I think everyone knows you should not study
for exam the night before. And they rightfully tell
you that because it's true. But what no one tells you about is that within 1 hour
after you learned, you statistically forgot
50% of what you learned. And after day, you
forgot even more. And this is shown in
this forgetting curve. For me, this is scary
and mind blowing that most of what we
learned is actually forgotten in such a
short amount of time. So with this curve, now you
fully understand why studying intensively all in one go the night before is a terrible idea. The teachers were completely
right on this one. But instead of getting
anxiety from this, we can use this new learn
information to our advantage. Knowing the rules
of our brain can help us counteract with the
most effective techniques. For the last two
years of my masters, I used this technique, and I studied only during the commute to go to the
university and back. When I came home, I
did not study at all, and I achieved great grades. It is that powerful. Self. Oh, it's ripped. So what I want you to do
is to prepare some time in advance for your next exam
or your next project. And in the next lesson, I will explain you the most
effective way to learn that doesn't involve cramming
all things in one night, the night before. See you then.
5. What to Do Instead? (2/2): So with this technique,
I was really able to study for my master's
degree in the train during the commute back and forth while doing YouTube
when I came home. It is that important. And instead of studying all
intensively in one goal, we will substitute this
stressful method with the best, most effective one, which is
called spatial repetition. And this is a graph of
the forgetting curve. After you come out
of your class, this is how much you retain
after one day, not that much. We remember less than half of
what we originally learned. But let's imagine the next day to revise the material again. This could be anything
from practicing piano piece or learning a
language or studying for exams. When you revise the
information the next day, we start forgetting again, but we do end up remembering
a little more than before. And repeat this
over the next days, and we remember much more compared to the first day
without any revision at all. Forgetting is always present, but it's really starting
to stick to your brain. The most common mistake is for people to intensively
in the beginning, study too much, and they get
frustrated or too tired, and they lose motivation to
continue the next few days. More effectively,
this, for example, happened in my class where
people trained to type faster. They were really motivated
in the beginning and they trained and trained and trained for hours in the beginning, and then they got
really tired of it. And the best method is
the actual opposite. Instead of training
so intensively, you go a little in the
beginning, and then you rest. The next day, you train a
little, and then you rest. And the next day, so
long, and so forth. Both situations, they train
for the same amount of time. And the second one, just
because we have an interval of time to rest between
practice sessions, they noticed a much
better improvement in their typing speeds. While having more fun, less grind, and
less frustration. During my masters
in medical physics, it became more about
understanding and memorization. I was able to effectively only
study during the commutes, than the rest of the day was for resting or
doing other things. But I will go more into
detail in a later class, but it was essentially
spatial repetition. Instead of just starting for the exam a week before the exam, I took the different approach and just casually studied in the train to go
back and forth to university throughout
the whole semester. And when the exams came, I was more than prepared
to get a good grade. You go to see
something cool I know? This method allowed me
to study a full time master's degree while running a YouTube channel and doing
some skill share classes. It is that powerful if you use spatial repetition
to your advantage. Now it is your turn. Now that you know
spatial repetition, you should set in advance some some fixed time that
you would like to study, maybe a few times per week
or a little every day. This is the most effective way. This really depends on yourself and also the activity
you're actually learning. If you have less time, I would
suggest to keep it short, but more frequent
throughout the week, because this decreases
the frustration and increases the effectiveness
of your learning. Good luck.
6. Combine Study Methods for Maximum Impact: It is to no surprise when we put the puzzle
pieces together, the best scientifically
proven method is to combine deliberate
practice and spatial repetition. It is nothing
complicated, really. All you have to do, for
example, reading your notes, is to really put yourself willing to
understand the concepts, going through it, maybe
taking a few extra minutes off while at the same time doing this throughout a
spaced interval of time. However, not all
subjects are made equal. In the following two lessons, I will divide into two categories of potential
things you want to learn. The first one is memory
intensive subjects. This would be language learning or memory intensive
subjects you might have. The second one is more
practical intensive subjects. This is not about memorizing, but more about doing things. Like learning an instrument, doing some mathematics coding, all of the sports and
puzzle like subjects. With that said, I
would like you to take your task ahead and maybe categorize it into a memory intensive or
practical intensive subject. I would recommend you to learn both because in the long run, you'll come across
both. So good luck.
7. Memory-Intensive Subjects: Step-by-Step Study Techniques: Memory intensive subjects,
with this method, I was able to do a full time master study while
at the same time running a YouTube channel and doing a few extra
skill share classes. It is that powerful, like I explained earlier. The best method to learn is
actually with flash cards. They perfectly combine
both fundamental concepts, as long as you're willing to
stop at the ones you don't understand and search deeper and why and why you
cannot understand. And this is exactly how I studied in the train
with my phone, doing my flash cards, going to university
and back home. And I made it easy since I made all my flash cards in the computer while
typing really fast. And I studied digitally
throughout my phone, where I could just
comfortably be in the train just studying.
Instead of scrolling. Instead of wasting time
scrolling through social media, I was simply just studying using my flash
cards in my phone. So after every class, I would just take
about 15 to 30 minutes in my computer doing
my flash cards, then I could revise. When I was revising in
my phone in the train, I would take my time. Maybe some flash cards had something I didn't
really understand, and I went through
the notes again or I just Google as chat GVT, or even if that didn't work, I asked the professor about
something in my flashcard. Again, this process
sounds really slow, but it's so fast compared to just reading
over your notes. Basically, all the
studies were done in the train and I got
really good grades. To learn languages, the
strategy is similar. However, the method I did
flashcards was different. I did this to learn German
to a really high level, and I'm doing this
currently with Dutch. In the classes you learned about grammar and how to
structure your sentences. But once you reach
a certain level, it's all about having
more vocabulary. Vocabulary included
in your brain for you to use or understand
when you hear it. This is why flash cards
are so important. When you're reading a text or when you're
listening to a show, and you don't understand
the word that you keep hearing
over and over again. I usually go to
Google Translate, and I search the word. Once I understand, uh huh, then I take a print screen, and while I'm in the
train going somewhere, I usually go to my photo album, my screenshot album,
and I go through them. With one finger, I'm just
covering the translation, and I'm going through them. And as I am familiar with these words, I don't
need them anymore. I just delete the photo. I repeat this process. I'm hearing more words. I translate, I take
a print screen, and as I don't need it,
I just delete them. That's how I learned most of
my vocabulary for German, and right now I'm
doing it for Dutch. And while you're going
through your screenshots, the covering with your
thumb is really essential because you're really asking
yourself deliberately, what does this word mean? Or what's the translation
of this word? You're really trying to think about it, really
deliberate practicing. And this combined
with doing this over a period of just going in
the metro or the train, you're really training this in a spatial repetition manner. These two methods combined
are a very good combination. Now, it is your turn. Have you ever tried
using flashcards? If not, this is the best way to learn, memory
intensive tasks. Doing the flash cards already
by itself is studying once. Taking the time to understand is reaching to the next
level and doing this in a timely manner over
periods of time in a week, that's the best combination. So best of look.
8. Practical Subjects: Step-by-Step Practice Techniques: For subjects that do not
require a lot of memorization, flash cards are
not the way to go. So let's take a look at piano. We need to hit these two points
to be the most effective. Deliberate practice and
spatial repetition. Spatial repetition is easy. When I really wanted
to get good at piano, I would practice at least
1 hour every single day. More than that made the
practice session a little too long and a little too
boring and frustrating, and last would be too little to even learn so many pieces. So spatial repetition is set. As long as you have this, you don't really have to
worry about it. This is done. But deliberate practice. This is the key difference. You hear so many people say, Oh, I've played this X Y and
Z for so many years. But once you listen to them, they play a good
or average level. That's because either
their deliberate practice or spatial repetition
was lacking. So it is not so much about how many hours
you're putting in. It is more about what you use these hours for if you're
using them effectively, training the hardest parts. In piano, you can practice the easy parts that you're
already familiar with. In typing, you can practice the easy words only
and type really fast. But it is the key difference of deliberate practice that it
is going over the hard parts, the hard words that your fingers are not so familiar with, that makes a difference between a good typist and
the best typist. And for mathematics, you can do proofs that
you're familiar with. It flows easy, you
go through them, you write them, it's
pretty, you understand. But it is the key differences to really go through the proofs
you don't understand. Try to understand them. Make your brain
work hard for it. That's the key difference. That's how you use it
the time effectively. And for video making, it's not about how many
videos you've practiced with. It's about in every video, you're trying maybe
a new technique. You're incorporating
something new here. It's something that's not
so familiar for your brain. And at the end, when
you practice so much, you have so many new skills,
and you're much better. You see what I mean.
Now, it is your turn. You first need to establish
a predetermined routine, if like learning piano every single day for 1 hour
or something like that. When this is established, you really need to focus
on the hard parts. You really need
to identify which parts your brain is not
so comfortable with. Then you have to tackle this because you
only have 1 hour, for example, you have to use this hour really effectively. It feels slow, but it's fast. It is slightly frustrating, It is tiring for sure. But in the long run,
this is worth it. So good luck.
9. What Causes Procrastination and How to Fix It Instantly: There are two simple
tricks that I use to reduce
procrastination time, and this is not
only for studies, but actually also for life. Let's imagine the situation. On the table, you have. What do you think
it's going to happen? Now, instead, let's
substitute it with this. And probably now you can
imagine what happens next. You can directly influence your habits by doing
such a small change. This doesn't only
apply for food, but it also applies
for your life as well. Make good and healthy
things easy to reach, and on the contrary, make bad habits harder to reach. For example, I have
all my snacks, not located here or here, have them located My
snacks are in the garage. They're located at a hard
to reach bunk. Right here. And this change has directly influence throughout
the long run how much junk food
I actually eat. On the contrary, I would
like to bike more. I would like to bike
more to the gym, so I have my bikes easily accessible right at
the gate of my garage. Now, for studying, the
same concept applies. On the contrary,
my study materials are right in front of the table. They're right here. So
when I go to my desk, instead of just picking
up my controller, I pick up my book and start maybe taking notes
or doing something. And it's actually
an active step. It makes me think before
I actually just pick up my controller randomly
or I play my games. So it's really easier
to start to study. Sometimes I even just
take the book I want to learn from and leave it on
the table on the right page, so it's just straight
on learning. Easy as that. Now, the second trick you can
understand from this. I want to move
this heavy object, but at first, it's really tough. But as you push it
and it starts moving, it's actually not so
hard to continue. Because at first, you
don't have any speed. You're just stationary. As you start to gain some speed, you gain some inertia, and it's way easier to
continue with this movement. This doesn't happen
only physically. It also happens mentally. Starting is the hardest part. So how I go around this is not only by making things
easier to start. It is also mentally. I tell myself, I'll just
read one paragraph. I'll really mentally prepared
just to read one paragraph. And by the time I
already read one, it feels so easy
to just continue. Have you ever noticed when you don't really feel like cleaning, and then you just start arranging a few things,
and all of a sudden, you're vacuuming and you've
done the whole room, it's exactly the
same for studying. You mentally prepare just doing one thing, and
then you can stop. By the time you're finished
with that one small thing, your body just feels with this momentum and inertia
to just continue studying. This is a very powerful trick. Now, it is your turn. Maybe your desk needs
a little organization. Maybe it has too
many distractions. Maybe you have to take a
few things out and put a few things in to make it easier for you to do
the habits you want. Gaming controller
out of the way. But the books you
need in the way. That's how you should do it,
and also the mental trick. Remember, it's all about
starting. Good luck.
10. The 80/20 Rule: How to Study Smarter, Not Harder: Roughly 80% of the results come from 20% of efforts or causes. For example, 20% of customers
generate 80% of sales. O 20% of the software bugs
cause 80% of the crashes. This is called the
pareto principle, and this is a very
interesting phenomena, and we can use this to our
advantage here for studying. In this class, it means
that roughly 20% of what we study causes 80% of
what the grades mean. This is very powerful. Let me give you some examples. For example, in physics
and university, I've noticed that instead of
just reading the whole book, doing all the exercises, I would just take the few ones, the ones from the old exams. I would just practice them. This would correlate to 80% of what I would
see in the exam. In some subjects where I didn't
have all exams available. I would study mainly the exercise sheets that the
professors would give us. This study focusing
only on this would result in 80% of the
grades from the exam. This applied for instruments
while practicing piano, instead of just practicing
the easy parts, I would focus really my time on the 20% of the
piece that was really hard and this would correlate to 80% of my results
of my improvements. Now, it is your turn. Can you identify which 20%
of exercises, old exams, hard parts you should really
focus on to be even more effective because this 20% will really cause 80% of
the results in your grade. So from early on, identifying what you really
need to study, the core, what's really important might make a huge difference
at the end when you're doing the exam or your
performance, anything? Good luck.
11. Case Study: How My Notes Led to Top Grades: So in this lesson, I
would like to show you my notes for one of my
classes in my masters, and in this class, I
got the maximum grade, and maybe this will help you get an idea what my notes look like. Because I'm fast at typing
throughout the lessons, I just used a word document. The first thing you
can see already is that it is not pretty. It is just fast typing and
not too much organized. Because this is
what I retain from the classes or the PowerPoints, and I would just print screen the images, nothing too special. Maybe some important questions. Again, remember, the
questions they give you, the 20% that might generate
the 80% of the results. This might be really important. So you see already
for the first view, nothing is too pretty. Maybe I would highlight a little red for
the doubts I would have if I didn't really understand with
Google or Chat GBT, I would then ask the
professor about it in class. And Everything I said is true. It is really effective. So how it would actually
happen is here, for example, here, we
start with Lecture two. And I would just open
this document in class, and I would just take
the print screens from the PowerPoints and just
write everything generally, what I would learn and
everything inside here. And at home or in the train, I would take my laptop and actually prepare my
digital flashcards. So I would just have this
document on the site and the website of choice for me to do my
digital flashcards. I would just take
the questions here, and then I would just transform this information
into flashcards. Later on, maybe the next day. I would immediately,
already with my phone, I would study in the train. And this document
would no longer be so useful because everything from this document is
already in my phone, which I would then study for. Of course, repeating this
with deliberate practice. Again, you saw the questions
I had were in red. And if I didn't
really understand, I would ask the
professor alongside with studying a little every
day during the commute, this is a very
powerful combination that allowed me to really understand everything
here and get me the maximum grade for the
subject specifically. I hope these notes
really give you a better perspective that it
doesn't need to be pretty. It doesn't need to
be all perfect. I'm just showing you
this to maybe you realize that to get
the maximum grade, you don't need to get
the perfect notes. It doesn't need to be perfectly aesthetic because
that does not matter. What matters is
having questions, understanding, trying to have the questions that professors
gave you, noting them down. This is what's
actually important and transforming it into whatever
methods you like to learn. So I hope this was helpful. What I want you to do is maybe take one or two
things from here and maybe incorporate them in your next lesson or
next study session, and I hope this helps improving your
grades. Best of luck.
12. Feeling overwhelmed? Do this!: At some times, especially
close to the exam period. I would have a lot of
exams at the same time, and I would not like
to break my streak of doing videos every week
on my YouTube channel. So I oftentimes felt
a little overwhelmed. And for me, what helped was exactly what's here in
this computer file. I just made a
simple Excel sheet, and you can copy my
method and learn from it. So right on the first
row, I have the dates. It was January 2023, and I had the dates marked. And the first thing I did
was mark the exam dates. So the exam for medical
imaging technology was here. And the exam for the
next subject was here and a period
of 17 days before. And four days after I had another exam for
image processing, and then the final exam
was here on March 8. Throughout this period, it
was really stressful for me. So this is how I
actually studied. So I had flash cards
for every class, the first class, class two, three, two, till 11th. So every time I studied a set of flash
cards, for example, class one, I would evaluate
myself on this color, a light red or class four. I studied on the same day. And I saw that this class I
had a lot of difficulties, so I marked with
a dark red color. And then I studied
on the next day, maybe class five, and
maybe a week later, I studied the class
seven, eight, nine, and you have to understand
this is already way before the exam period. I was just doing this casually, and I was just noting down which classes I had
the most difficulty. While on top having here the YouTube
video I wanted to do, we see here that my YouTube
channel actually got hacked. It was a stressful time, so
I did no studying at all. And once I got it recovered, thankfully, I really started
intensively studying. We can see that Lesson
four started off horribly. It was dark red, really hard. I really wanted to
repeat lesson four, lesson five, and then
these two lessons that were also really hard. You can see this heat map. The next day, I started
off by starting these two because they were
the hardest ones and the other ones as well. This heat map allows you
to organize yourself. To know which lessons
to actually study for, you can organize each
class by different topics. For me, my case, it made sense to organize
them by different lessons. And we see that here the 15th, I decided to first study
the really hard ones. So from the day before,
these two first, and then the darker yellow here while ignoring these two because I knew
it was all right. And then the days pass, I continued to study starting
off by the hardest ones. And then going to
the easier ones and just learning them
balanced in a way. We see that at the end, my first lesson, I
understand everything. It was all memorized, not perfectly though,
before the exam, but it was mostly
well memorized, well understood and memorized
before I got to the exam, and I could go in confidently. It's all about being honest
with yourself and just analyzing which parts you should study first that
were really hard for you. We see that after
this exam is done, I just forget about it, and started learning already
for image processing here, while at the same time
preparing for deep learning. While also doing YouTube videos. It was a hard time for me. But this method here with
this Excel sheet just coloring this tiny
squares to tell myself, Oh, this lesson was really hard. Maybe next day I
should do this lesson. And then next day, the next day, the next day, and really
going through it, sometimes stopping to analyze a few concepts that
I don't really understand or asking
the teachers, You see that you can really organize
yourself with this map. I first started with
image processing, and then while I was the exam
date for this exam on top, I started to really
focusing on this, so I stopped learning for this. When this exam was ready, I really learned for this
exam again until I was comfortable while
at the same time studying for the following
exam intensively. I hope you got to understand that if you're
feeling overwhelmed, it is completely normal, but it is not impossible. I was doing videos at the
same time while studying for exams because I started
already doing this, the flash cards way
before this period. And the final period when
it's most intensive, I started doing this by
colors, just like so. And there you could really see the parts that
are really hard, and then you can focus on the
parts that are really hard. And then they get less
hard and you focus on the other ones that you
haven't done in a while ago. You want to try and make
the spatial repetition. That's why you forget some
lessons and then do them again later on in
a repeated manner, and at the end, you combine
these both methods, and you are way more
comfortable, way less stressed, and just more organize in your
mind how you're doing for each exam throughout
the whole exam period. I hope you learned
something and good luck.
13. Optimal Desk Setup: You really need for
a good study place is a room with light, a table, and a chair. Obvious, I know, but there are three hidden things
that could be improved. You see, I believe anyone has a desk lamp to provide
some light at night, but one thing that most actually forget is the actual
position of the lamp. So actually, some people
have the light on the left. And this is okay because
if you're right handed, the shadows on the hand won't cast into the
things you're writing. However, if you are left handed, sometimes it's better to
have the light on the right. Investing in a good chair is one of the best
things you can do both for physical health
and study productivity, especially if you spend
long hours seated. Have you thought about how
many hours you sit per day, especially if you study. Investing in a proper good
chair is never money wasted. With a proper chair,
you can adjust most things for optimal
height and inclination, improving both your
physical and mental health. Now, a less obvious
improvement that most tend to overlook is plants. Seriously, it's a famous
research from 1984, which tested how would patients
recover after surgery? One group had a window with
a view of a brick wall, and the other group
had a view with trees. The shocking results were that patients with
a view of nature, they recovered more quickly, needed fewer pain
medications and had a more positive emotional state compared to those with a
view of the brick wall. Humans have an innate
tendency called biophilia, which is the desire to
connect with nature. Plants fulfill this need, creating a sense of
calm and well being. This calming effect
is also particularly helpful in study environments where focus and mental
clarity are crucial. Even fake plants provide the psychological benefits
simply by mimicking nature. They create a green, aesthetically
pleasing visual that our brain associates
with calmness. There are great
options for students who don't have time to
care for real plants, but still want the visual
and psychological boost. With that said, now
it is your turn. Is there any improvements that you could do to your table? In my case, I have real plants, which I have to water
them from time to time. But if you don't want
to, the fake plants also work just as nice. On the editing setup,
on my computer, I have fake plants
which I don't have to care about, and
I just leave them. And for me, plants just give me that little extra mental
boost to continue. If you see any tiny
room for improvement, then it is most definitely
worth investing. Good luck.
14. Passion Over Pressure: So there's a reason
why this chapter is right at the end because I honestly think this chapter is the most important
one in its core. And when doing anything, there are two types of motivation intrinsic
and extrinsic. Extrinsic motivation comes from external factors like
grades, rewards, or avoiding negative
consequences that might mean preparing for an exam because you want to get a good grade or working
hard to earn a scholarship. And intrinsic motivation
works within, driven by curiosity,
personal satisfaction, and genuine love
for the subject. Now, to be realistic with you, I don't think anyone is 100%
intrinsic or 100% extrinsic. I might be genuinely
curious about physics, but there's also part
of me that cares about the career or the money
that gets involved. But where you lie in
this spectrum can well determine how you're
going to do in the future. This lesson applies
not only for studies, but for anything
in life as well. So extrinsic motivation is really good for
short term results. Now, I'm completely aware
that at school or university, not all subjects are
created equally. Some have different professors. You have different
interests on some areas, and I'm aware that
sometimes it's just better to focus on this
short term result. So the subject for
this period of time, it's one and done, and then it's completely out of the way. And that's extrinsic motivation. Maybe you're studying
because you're trying to avoid
failing in class. Maybe you're studying because you don't want to disappoint your parents or fear of
missing an opportunity. However, I realized when I put too many extrinsic goals or I was thinking too extrinsically, thinking about what
others might think or the failing day exams or
what my parents might think, I created this shallow learning. I wasn't learning because
I wanted to learn. I was learning because of
all these things outside me, which quite honestly led
to me burn out a little. This is because you're putting your goals on external factors, things you might not be
able to completely control. So if you're relying too much on the extrinsic part
of the spectrum, there are two ways that you can help mitigate this process. The first one is to focus on the process
and not the outcome. For example, I told
myself I was going to practice 1 hour
of piano every day. Or I told myself I was going to review the flashcards
every day I commute, or, for example, doing
one YouTube video per week or study 1
hour after dinner. Notice how all of these goals
are within your control, one video per week, 1 hour of piano, 1 hour of studying, or just studying the
flashcards during the commute. All of these things are
inside my control and not what others think or
what grade I might get. All of these things
don't really matter. I focus on the process
and not on the outcome. For piano, it is not based
on what others think. For flashcard, it is based on what you do
during your time. For YouTube, it focuses on the video itself and not
how many views it gets. Again, all these goals are focused on the process,
not the outcome. This actually might sound
a little counterintuitive. For example, for studying, you might find a
weird not thinking about the outcomes or
the grades you have. You want to focus on
the process itself, on the learning,
the being curious, and what is this,
and what is that? That's what actually matters. By changing it, we can
visualize different structures. So instead of seeing
all the plastic, we can see all the more absorbing metallic
structures on the inside. And for video making, I'm focused on the one
video per week. I try my best to do the best quality video
I can in one week. And that's all I post and try not to care
about the views. Of course, this is
a whole spectrum. You're not only on
the intrinsic side, there are some
extrinsic parts that, of course, pull you towards
these short term goals. Of course, I might care
about how many views I get in my videos or what grades
I have in the exams. But merging your focus
on the intrinsic part, the part you can 100% control sets you up for good habits, good habits that on the long run compound overtime if you continue to
do this every week. If I study every day, if I post a video every week, all of this compounds overtime, and without you realizing, after doing this
for a few months, you will reach
much better grades than you expected or planned, or you will reach editing levels for videos that you might never thought you could ever do just
by putting yourself through this mental goal of doing things that
you can control. Focus on the process
and not on the outcome. And the second point is to
actually do what you love. I'm blessed to have tough
but caring parents. But reality is, as a kid, I used to do a lot of things
to make my parents happy. And this is actually a
really common thing for kids that have parents
from overseas. They came to a country
to have a better life, so they put a lot of
pressure on the kids. I chose physics because I
was genuinely curious about. But after five years of
bachelor's and master's, I got to realize the good and
bad parts of this career. And my heart set that I wanted to pursue
something different. Make my parents proud of me, I had to completely disappointment to go
against their values, to truly make yourself
proud, listen to your heart. That's all that everyone
should ever do. If you listen to your heart
and truly obey its instincts, then you will be happy. This book has taught
me a lot of things, and the top first regret that
people most often have and admit while they're
almost passing away is to not have lived a life
that they actually wanted. They lived maybe
a different life because of society expectations, parents' expectations or
partners expectations, anything that's from outside, but they didn't truly
listen to their heart. They didn't do what they
actually wanted in life. So as a final conclusion as to why I left
this at the end, is to really emphasize to listen to your heart and to
do what you really want. It is important for you to learn the things that you
actually want to learn. It sounds so simple, but it's actually true. Of course, not every step
of your life should be something that you
truly love 100%. There are subjects
at school I hated. They are subjects at university
that I disliked a little. But overall, it is really
important to choose the main direction to be
something that you really want. But as long as you're walking in the direction of
the goal you want, that's all you should ever do. You should really just listen to your heart and truly
obey its feelings. I honestly spend way too much
time on things that were very extrinsical because of what my parents thought
it would be good for me, but not what I actually wanted. And as a result at the end, it just became a
lot of friction. And it just took me
years to realize that. From reading books, seeing
other people's lives, you can choose what you want. It's really true because
if you truly are learning, if you truly are curious
about the subject, it just makes it 1,000
times more easy. I know many people that are doing the thing
that just because it is comfortable in life
or it sounds prestigious, but you really need
the love to be there. I think that's the
most important part in learning anything. That it's learning what
you actually want. That's all I want you to
take from this lesson, and I'll see you on the final
chapter. See you there.
15. Thank You for Watching!: Study for so long
without knowing the best learning
method for years. And I hope this lesson
got you to open your eyes and really understand what to do and what not to do. And if you apply
these techniques, they will have a very lasting, long term positive change, not only for your grades, but also for your life. Feel free to leave a review. This really helps
and also a photo, if you want in the
class project. If you have any doubts for
anything you might have, feel free to post them in the class project photo
or in the discussion tab. I will personally answer or any fellow students that
might also take this class. If you also want to
learn a life skill that helps with so
many other aspects, typing is one of them. I have that class
also available. Feel free to check it out. I also post weekly
videos on YouTube. These are my most
creative projects. I put hours into the edit just for a few
minutes of content. Feel free to check
that out as well. With that said, thank you so
much for taking this class. I wish you the best of luck for your short or long term goals. And I hope this class
really made you help to understand the
best way of learning.
Edi Liang, Physicist + YouTuber
