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    Rapid Knowledge Acquisition & Synthesis: How to Quickly Learn, Comprehend, Apply, and Master New Information and Skills
    Rapid Knowledge Acquisition & Synthesis: How to Quickly Learn, Comprehend, Apply, and Master New Information and Skills
    Rapid Knowledge Acquisition & Synthesis: How to Quickly Learn, Comprehend, Apply, and Master New Information and Skills
    Ebook139 pages2 hours

    Rapid Knowledge Acquisition & Synthesis: How to Quickly Learn, Comprehend, Apply, and Master New Information and Skills

    By Peter Hollins

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    About this ebook

    From novice to expert: tools and techniques to make your learning faster, deeper, and stronger.



    Time to master the most important meta-skill of all: learning. Too bad you didn’t have this book years ago!


    Scientifically-proven, step-by-step methods for effective absorption, retention, and comprehension.



    Rapid Knowledge Acquisition & Synthesis is a collection of the very best methods to get ahead of the typical learning curve. You’ll learn how to create an environment for information absorption at shocking speeds. From scientifically-validated tips to best practices of some of the world’s smartest polymaths, you’ll get it all. Faster, deeper, stronger.


    Directly from one of self-education's thought leaders.



    Peter Hollins has studied psychology and peak human performance for over a dozen years and is a bestselling author. He has worked with a multitude of individuals to unlock their potential and path towards success. His writing draws on his academic, coaching, and research experience.


    Clear guidelines for every stage of the learning process.



    •The most common obstacles of learning and how to overcome them.
    •Single loop learning, double loop learning, and how to fundamentally change your comprehension mindset.
    •Best practices for reading, note-taking, absorbing knowledge, and making things stick inside your brain.
    •The most strategic questions to ask that will make information become memorable and 3d.
    •Dual coding, REM sleep, shifting locations, the efficacy of variety, and catching your own blind spots.


    Unlock the most important meta-skill of all: learning.



    Make yourself recession-proof, upgrade-proof, competition-proof, absent-minded-proof, and stagnant-proof.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherPublishdrive
    Release dateJul 30, 2020
    ISBN9798670111232
    Rapid Knowledge Acquisition & Synthesis: How to Quickly Learn, Comprehend, Apply, and Master New Information and Skills
    Author

    Peter Hollins

    Pete Hollins is a bestselling author and human psychology and behavior researcher. He is a dedicated student of the human condition. He possesses a BS and MA in psychology, and has worked with dozens of people from all walks of life. After working in private practice for years, he has turned his sights to writing and applying his years of education to help people improve their lives from the inside out. He enjoys hiking with his family, drinking craft beers, and attempting to paint. He is based in Seattle, Washington. To learn more about Hollins and his work, visit PeteHollins.com.

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    • 5/5
      This book opens Pandora’s box to learning. It covers various aspects of learning. It has encouraged me to read more about specific topics, question my learning methods and generally increase my curiosity and eagerness to learn. Some systems are a bit too elaborate for my liking. However, I still highly recommend this book to anyone that loves to learn.
    • 5/5
      This was a great read,so many concepts that I learned in how to learn the most effective way

    Book preview

    Rapid Knowledge Acquisition & Synthesis - Peter Hollins

    Skills

    Rapid Knowledge Acquisition & Synthesis:

    How to Quickly Learn, Comprehend, and Apply, and Master New Information and Skills

    By Peter Hollins,

    Author and Researcher at petehollins.com

    CLICK HERE for your FREE 14-PAGE MINIBOOK: Human Nature Decoded: 9 Surprising Psychology Studies That Will Change the Way You Think. > >

    --Subconscious Triggers

    -- Emotional Intelligence

    -- Influencing and Analyzing People

    Table of Contents

    Table of Contents

    Chapter One. Your Obstacles Are Everyone’s Obstacles

    It’s not about smarts

    Maybe it’s all about avoiding failure

    More effective goal formation

    Style, format, and sources

    Chapter Two. The Double Loop Framework

    Single and double loop learning

    The theory-in-use

    Adapt and grow

    Chapter Three. Reading 2.0

    Four steps to reading

    SQ3R

    Chapter Four. Just Ask

    Questions for thought

    Socrates the great

    Chapter Five. Notes as Your Second Brain

    The Luhmann method

    The Ahrens’ method

    Chapter Six. Lessons from the Science of Learning

    Technique 1: Self-explanation and purposeful elaboration

    Technique 2: Variety is the spice of information absorption

    Technique 3: What you do when you’re not learning

    Technique 4: Perfect practice makes perfect

    Technique 5: Use dual coding

    Summary Guide

    Chapter One. Your Obstacles Are Everyone’s Obstacles

    Whether you’re a university student, trying to grasp a new skill or simply attempting to improve your performance at work, learning how to learn may well be the best skill you ever acquire. Whatever our chosen area of expertise, we’ll always fare better if we pay conscious attention to how we learn—whether that’s taking more effective notes, processing new information better, quickly comprehending material or simply learning to read lightning fast.

    How we learn is what gets us from Point A to Point B; it is the vehicle that we drive, and we can choose to arrive in a rusted jalopy, or a smooth and sleek Ferrari.

    We often assume there is only one way to learn, or that people will naturally find the optimal approach without trying too hard. We believe everyone learns through processes that they are most comfortable, and thus productive, with. Nothing could be further from the truth—effective learning is a meta skill that improves our ability to learn all other skills, and it’s something we need to deliberately and consistently cultivate in ourselves if we hope to improve.

    This book is about learning—about how to become better at acquiring, processing and retaining knowledge and skills of all kinds. Learning is a complex process of being aware of, managing, comprehending, absorbing, synthesizing and recalling information on an ongoing basis. The better we’re able to manipulate and handle information according to our goals and needs, the more deeply we understand, and the more thorough our learning process.

    With that being said, why do so few people spend time developing their ability to learn? Why is there not more attention paid to learning for its own sake, or to sharpening those abilities that support and enable all our other ones?

    Unfortunately, becoming better at learning is seldom easy. There are obstacles that prevent people from fully exploring their intellectual potential, and have them operating at a lower, less efficient level out of pure habit. This is why we’ll begin this book not with the techniques themselves, but with all the things that ordinarily impede our mastery of them. In removing our own resistance, we gain better access to better learning.

    It’s not about smarts

    Can you think of any potential obstacles to learning? If you’re like most people, you might have listed poor time management, not having great study skills or simply lacking intelligence.

    Maybe the kind of environments where you typically try to learn—home, school, etc.—haven’t been the most conducive to acquiring knowledge. Distractions, and negative past experiences such as bad teachers or boring, one-dimensional school curricula, are all reasons why someone might be turned off by the concept of learning something new. In rare cases, obstacles might also be presented by physical disabilities such as perceptual or memory issues.

    The truth, however, is that most learning attempts are jeopardized way before you get to the stage of sitting down to learn. In other words, the obstacles that are most likely to derail your effective learning are usually psychological and behavioral, not strategic. This means that improving your methods may have a very limited effect in the first instance if you haven’t addressed the deeper barriers that are preventing you from ever getting started with them.

    Firstly, this is not a matter of laziness or a poor attitude. In fact, many of the mental and psychological obstacles we’ll discuss here are simply part of human nature, or are otherwise encouraged and even rewarded in our workplaces, schools and society in general.

    Human beings want to learn, in many cases, because they desire mastery. What is mastery except the ability to control and command something? Instead of being at the mercy of an unknown, we might seek to dismantle and understand it, so that it’s us who can then manipulate, control or predict the phenomena we confront in the world around us.

    But it’s this need for control that can actually backfire in the learning process. In our struggle to retain control, and to avoid any state of vulnerability or ignorance, we may act in ways that actually limit our perspective and keep us failing harder and for longer.

    Stemming from this larger unconscious motivation is the need to think of learning as mere problem-solving, as something we do to win—over our colleagues, over our own weakness, over nature itself. It follows then that we’ll be squeamish and intolerant of losing (or what we characterize as losing) and so behave, again, in ways that actually ensure we lose all the more often. This is often a question of ego, pride, and the avoidance of the nasty feeling of failure. As you may have noticed in other areas of your life, this avoidance of pain can be a quite powerful motivator.

    Using learning and knowledge acquisition as a means to increase control also encourages us to be as rational as possible, to be infallible, perfect, complete. We will want things to follow neat, orderly and linear logic and be unable to bear uncertainty or ambiguity with any patience or nuance. Again, by doing so we only close down our field of possibility and force a narrower vision of learning on ourselves.

    An attitude that approaches learning in this way may work in some contexts, for some of the time, but it will never be as good as approaching learning with a truly open, curious mind—one that is receptive, creative and willing to tolerate the unknown or feelings of incompetence along the road to mastery. One attitude is expansive, open-ended and curious. The other is fearful, controlling and narrowing. Both can lead to learning, but one path will be far easier and more successful!

    Being bad at learning is seldom a question of technique and more a problem of attitude or perspective. Today, there is a popular model proposed by psychology professor Carol Dweck outlining the difference between a growth mindset and a fixed mindset. This model closely mirrors the fundamental differences in attitude one might bring to learning.

    A fixed mindset is just that—fixed. Static. This is the person who insists that the experience of life come to them in a predictable, unalterable way. This is the person who believes that human abilities are inborn and that you either have or don’t have. Creativity, intelligence or being a fast learner are simply attributes you possess in an unchanging way.

    A fixed mindset implies a view of the world and yourself that downplays deep and genuine learning. After all, if you are already all that you can be; what more is there to learn? It would be largely impossible, beyond a few tiny improvements. You look at other successful people and assume that things were simply easier for them because they were smarter or more talented.

    This close identification between skill and identity also means that failure is not just failure—it’s a damning statement about your worth as a human being. You don’t fail, you are a failure. With a fixed mindset, not understanding or knowing something is embarrassing and experienced as a deficit in character—something that should be hidden or denied. Not exactly the right conditions for learning to occur!

    On the other hand, a growth mindset sees learning in an entirely different light, as something that is dynamic, constantly moving, and always possible to change. With this mindset, we don’t see ourselves as saddled with an unchanging set of abilities, but rather as living and developing beings who can grow and improve with effort.

    Whereas a person with a fixed mindset will give up quickly (why try when you can’t do it immediately and easily?),

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