Effective learners have four strengths in common: willingness to learn, curiosity, self-awareness, and ability to manage their inner dialogue. These strengths help learners to not just have staying power when learning is difficult, they are able to reduce stress levels, maintain enthusiasm, focus on the small wins as they work through being a novice, and keep a good mindset while accomplishing what they set out to do.
All learning begins with your willingness and readiness to learn, which is an important skill in itself. It is a competency, like reading and writing. Willingness is your spirit and desire, cheerful consent, and readiness to know new things and improve. From both a personal and business perspective you should want to improve professional skills or keep up to date with changes or new technologies in a field of expertise.
“We tend to associate personal growth with determination, persistence, and hard work, but the process often starts with reflection. One of the key requirements for self-improvement is having a realistic assessment of where we stand – of our strengths and our limitations. Convincing ourselves that we are better than we are leads to complacency, and thinking we’re worse than we are leads to defeatism.” – Serena Chan, professor of psychology, Berkely.
Ambitious learners can raise their aspiration level by giving thought to their experiences, actions, feelings, and responses. By focusing on what they will gain from learning something new, even if it seems tedious or unappealing, they envision themselves reaping the rewards and it propels them into action.
We draw on language when we need to become curious to propel ourselves forward. Great learners ask themselves curious questions and follow up that self-talk with actions.
People eager to learn seek out the answer: read an article, query an expert, find a teacher, join a group – whatever feels easiest to channel that curiosity into something noteworthy.
Self-awareness is about being in tune with what you know and understand about your own character, feelings, motives and desires. In your quest for learning acquiring self-awareness is one of the biggest gifts you can give yourself.
This is by no means saying that you look inward because something is broken and needs fixing or that you need to change your life. You choose to see yourself apart from your work, home, or environment to pinpoint emotions, motivations, triggers, etc that initiate both your positive and negative feelings. You look for insight to make sense of a situation so you can identify and distill what you learn. This leads to you being able to develop your own judgment and figure out your path and how learning fits with your goals.
Many of us were taught to forget about our weaknesses, to play to our strengths. We focused on what we knew and became unshakeable authorities and experts at some things. If you lead a fast-paced life, it is possible that you are not very comfortable with being vulnerable from time to time. Do you feel ill at ease with criticism? Feel foolish for being a novice? Do you find it difficult to admit, “I don’t know what you are talking about.” As an adult, it can be a tough thing to accept feeling vulnerable.
Great learners use self-talk to allow themselves to feel vulnerable in being a novice on the learning curve. They manage their internal dialogue by avoiding terrible repetitious thoughts that take up room in the brain: I’ll never get this right? I’m such an idiot? This is so frustrating. I hate this. They embrace a growth mindset to banish those negative reactions or thoughts.
Self-talk is a critical aspect of learning, because when you choose your thoughts, it changes brain chemistry. Give yourself permission to be vulnerable. Instead of thinking in dichotomies, as in things are good or bad, right or wrong, give yourself permission to expect mistakes while learning and making changes. Acknowledge your beginner status and use self-talk that is more relaxing and encouraging. Practice saying:
I’ve never done this before so I’ll be an amateur in the beginning.
I have a lot to learn about this new technology. I’m a quick study, so I’ll be able to pick it up.
My skills will be mediocre to start. I’m going to learn this over time.
It will actually cause your central nervous system to relax.
Self-talk strategies leads to heightened interest into what you are doing and the persistence to keep going, which result in greater opportunities to perform better.
When you lack enthusiastic energy and want to make the most effective use of any learning situation, it’s important to know how to overcome those times when you lack motivation.
If you are keen for self-learning you want to get the most from your experience, including satisfaction and quality education. Take charge because your achievements may be hinged on these 12 key factors.
Your brain has a soft spot for the comfort zone but it is designed for complexity and thrives on anything new, different, or difficult. It is edging for that extra push to reach its peak performance zone.
Use "SWOT" to identify your unique personal strengths and determine the workable strategies for your career development. It's a confidence builder and way to affirm you are on the right path.
Inspiration can strike when you least expect it, but that is an inefficient way to develop an idea or approach decision-making and problem solving. Instead, try one of these easy individual brainstorming techniques.
Curiosity can be learned and fine-tuned. The more curious you are about a subject, the greater the stamina of your concentration will be. Your curiosity leads you to ask smarter questions, inspire others, solve problems
