+1: #1030 Want to Make It Stick?

You're listening to Optimize with Bryan Johnson. More wisdom in Less time. Hi, this is Brian. Welcome back to another Optimize plus one. In our last plus one we talked about the research on the fact that the pen is mightier than the keyboard advantages of long hand over laptop note taking. I got a link to that academic article in the one today I want to talk about another way to make what we're learning stick. We're going to consult with Barbara Oakley on this one. Barbara, as you may know, taught one of the most popular classes in history. Nearly 2 million people from 200 countries have taken her Coursera class called Learning how to Learn. She also wrote a book on how to learn called A Mind for Numbers where she tells us, I quote, the legendary Charles Darwin would do much the same thing when trying to explain a concept he imagined someone had just walked into his study. He would put his pen down and try to explain the idea in the simplest terms. That helped him figure out how he would describe the concept in print. Along those lines, the website Reddit.com help has a section called explain like I'm five where anyone can make a post asking for a simple explanation of a complex topic. She continues by saying, you may think you really have to understand something in order to explain it, but observe what happens when you are talking to other people about what you are studying. You'll be surprised to see how often understanding arises as a consequence that of attempts to explain to others and yourself rather than the explanation arising out of your previous understanding. This is why teachers often say that the first time they ever really understood the material was when they had to teach it. That's today's plus one. Want to master something? Explain it to someone like they're five today. We hope you enjoyed this episode of Optymyze with Brian Johnson. To find out more, go to Optimize Me. Hey guys, this is Brian with a quick little P.S. i'm really excited to let you know about an event we're working on. Plan is to make it the premier self optimizing event of 2020. We're calling it Optimize 2020. You the modern hero. Basic idea. Five days, 101 world class luminaries. One million people. You can learn more and get your tickets to the online and offline event at Optimize Me 2020. Again, that's Optimize Me 2020. Hope to see you there.