This is the final section in my review of things that went well for me in 2017. Part 1 covers health and part 2 focus, and here I plan to look at my efforts to bring a little more direction to my learning practices. Despite various attempts over the years, I’ve only started to make real progress in this area recently, so you may find it is somewhat less organized than the other two. If you have time, I would suggest reading the health and focus sections before this one.
Part 3: Learning
I have had what I consider to be a number of milestones or significant shifts in my learning efforts this year. Reading them, you may wonder if they qualify as “learning” as it is generally understood. At least this year, I didn’t take any formal classes leading to certifications. But I think learning really refers to any area in which you make a dedicated effort to acquire, retain and most importantly apply knowledge.
I was a bit slow to catch on to this, and drew a line between formal learning and stuff you might look at yourself because it is interesting. This has changed in the last few years as I’ve seen my life become significantly richer thanks to, for example, listening to folks on the Internet talk about things that have helped them. You do need to be selective but I think the key is to be always open to and seeking knowledge that can make a difference to your specific situation.
When I first began to realize this, I subscribed to a long list of e-mail newsletters and bought a stack of books on a wide range of topics. That turned out to be misdirected – for me, at least. Information overwhelm. Since then, I’ve greatly narrowed down who and what I follow, as I touch on in part 2 on focus. This is obviously part of a wider discussion on learning but it might help you make sense of the points I look at below.
Japanese
As you may know, part of my work is Japanese/English translation and one of my learning highlights for 2017 is related to the Japanese study I do to support this. Drum roll, please: I managed to reach 2,200 entries in my flash card software (Anki by Damien Elmes). This probably won’t mean so much unless you are using spaced repetition for learning but I’m feeling good about it.
College
To create space for my Japanese study and other projects, I made the gut churning decision to withdraw from my college degree in nutritional medicine. I had been doing the theory section over my last couple of years in Japan, with the practical courses to be completed in Australia. It was very difficult to step away from something I had committed so much to but I slowly came to realize it wasn’t the best use of my limited time. It is now officially a wonderful aspiration that I hope to return to one day.
Sea Change
I have now been following the Sea Change course run by Leo Babauta for three years. I’ve written about Sea Change in more detail elsewhere but it is essentially an ongoing program focusing on mindful habit building. Most of the things I’ve described in this review have been achieved using knowledge gained from Sea Change. It is mostly Leo passing on insights from his own life, so you need to be open to informal learning, but I have found it hugely useful.
Reading
I have finally managed to create regular daily reading sessions. These are times when I read books, articles, posts, etc. from which I may potentially learn something. I have always read a lot but for many years it has been mostly news or infotainment, basically sugary brain bubble gum to distract me from daily life. I still do this a couple of times a week on my big work days but on the rest, I try to read things that have slightly longer term value. It does depend on my energy levels, though.
And that’s about it. Yes, feel free to breathe a sigh of relief. As valuable as it has been, I feel a bit wrung out after writing it as well. Obviously there are other things I’m working on that have been less successful, and even what I’m calling successes are works in progress. But I’ve been trying to stay positive, use the results as feedback for adjustments and keep moving forward. I will write a separate post on several new projects and changes in trajectory I’m planning for 2018.
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