The First 20 Hours: How to Learn Anything . . . Fast!

The most well-known general method of rapid skill acquisition is immersion: completely changing your environment in a way that results in constant deliberate practice.

What tools, components, and environments do you need to have access to before you can practice efficiently? How can you obtain the very best tools you can find and afford?

I find it’s useful to think of these principles as a secondary checklist. Whenever you decide to acquire a new skill, just review this checklist and decide which principles apply to your project.

anticipate and eliminate (or reduce) as many distractions as possible before you start practicing.

Observations—what are you currently observing? Knowns—what do you know about the topic already? Hypotheses—what do you think will improve your performance? Tests—what are you going to try next?

The amount of time it will take you to acquire a new skill is largely a matter of how much concentrated time you’re willing to invest in deliberate practice and smart experimentation and how good you need to become to perform at the level you desire.

Remember: once you start, you can’t stop until you reach your target performance level or the twenty-hour mark. Struggle if you must, but don’t stop. Show your grit, and keep pushing forward. You’ll get there: all it takes is practice.

Here’s an added benefit: whenever I find an area of my business that’s repetitive or frustrating, I start thinking in code. How would a program that solves this problem work? More often than not, there’s a way to systematize the process in a way that makes my day-to-day life easier.

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