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Want to learn a new skill? Take some short breaks

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Re: Want to learn a new skill? Take some short breaks

#121
post #72

This is something I've found true in my own personal experimentation over the past few years. Any time I've been training something, if I take a break from it, I come back and I have more skill than I had previously. Recently this occurred with my handstand practice. It's something that I've been working on the past year or two on and off, but more heavily recently. I've made some great strides, but the past week or…

What I noticed a few years ago when I decided to bring myself up to date again on machine learning after a ten years break (and what ten years that was for the domain!) I read a ton and watched several online classes. I realized that the pace was very different from the classes I had been during my student years: classes were boring, so I had time to think about stuff. The rhythm that I found worked really well for s…

I read somewhere that you are not thinking consciously about the problem, but the unconscious is. I do it quite a but, walk away, get lunch and come back and viola! you have the solution!

Re: Want to learn a new skill? Take some short breaks

#122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Speaking of handstands, I've been wanting to get started with that too as an item on my skills-to-acquire list. Any tips for a fellow beginner? I could never seem to get past the point needed to balance. I kick my body back and it stop right before the balance point and my body slowly goes off center and comes crashing down. Have you found it easier to do with trying to keep your body straight and stiff or feet tucke…

The one trick that helped me quite a bit was to focus on alternating pressure between the tips of your fingers and the base of your wrist.

As a former (rather mediocre) college gymnast I would agree that is essential.

Re: Want to learn a new skill? Take some short breaks

#123
post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Body needs water so it doesn't have to eliminate all that it gets! Do you think we drink water to rinse our internal organs?

Why do you think they call it a liquid "cleanse" diet.

If you mean detox diet then water may be a part of it but it is not a detox diet itself.

Re: Want to learn a new skill? Take some short breaks

#124
I have been trying to remember 15 thousand words for the last 3 years during which I have similar experiences.Several times, I pushed myself hard to keep learning for hours, but ended up with efficiency decreasing as time went by. I may be unable to take in anything after two hours of intense learning. Then I try to rectify my own approach to find the most suitable method for myself. Following is my own experiences. Whether the break is needed depends on my specific task. Whatever task I do, I try to keep doing it without any break for at least about 45 minutes. If I’m coding, I need less intervals of break, and I can keep coding as if I enter a status called the mind flow. While if I’m reading and digesting a whole book, I need to stop sometimes to think. Well, if I’m remembering and digesting plenty of words and its usages, it’s better for me to take a break more frequently, maybe I will watch a short video about 20 minutes every 45 minutes, to clear my mind.

IMO, it all about the ability to keep oneself concentrated. I’ve heard that some people can stay concentrated for a very long time, like several hours, and I’m not this type of person although I once experienced this state for two days and lost it forever. And I get exhausted more quickly when I am less concentrated than I am.

Re: Want to learn a new skill? Take some short breaks

#125

This is something I've found true in my own personal experimentation over the past few years. Any time I've been training something, if I take a break from it, I come back and I have more skill than I had previously. Recently this occurred with my handstand practice. It's something that I've been working on the past year or two on and off, but more heavily recently. I've made some great strides, but the past week or…

This has happend to me with video games. Been really trying to get good at fortnite in februrary/march and I actually got quite good but hit some kind of a mindblock... Then due to busy life I couldn't play for a month. Got sick 3 days ago and been staying home and playing it and I am noticably better than I was a month ago. So maybe alternating in playing for a 14 days and then taking a break for few days could do s…

Happened to me with Bloodborne. Just couldn't beat a boss after 15-20 tries. Came back next weekend and got em on the second.

Re: Want to learn a new skill? Take some short breaks

#126
post #97

A couple of anecdotes: I went to a group rhythm workshop in San Francisco called TaKeTiNa wherein a group of 50 of us learned, over the course of a few hours, to perform a stomp/clap polyrhythm (that is, a sequence that is really the combination of two sequences with different time signatures) that I wouldn't have guessed we could learn in a single session. The facilitator guided us through by starting with an approa…

San Francisco really is a different planet

the workshop facilitator was of ambiguous mediterranean origin and clearly traveled the world giving this workshop.

i've lived in SF for close to a decade—while it remains a very special and unique place, its reputation as a nexus of counterculture is overinflated.

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