Josh's Blog

Category: Study Skills

  • A Typing Tip

    Random fact I wish I knew before: I went back to typing.com to practice typing numbers and actually watched the video I normally skip. If you want to know what finger to use to type a number, just count your fingers starting with your pinky finger on your left hand. Your pointer fingers count for…

  • Batch Tasks to Increase Performance and Conserve Energy

    Batch Tasks to Increase Performance and Conserve Energy

    I was recently watching a Thomas Frank video where he was talking about batching tasks to save time and energy. The concept is simple: You take tasks that are similar and do them all at once. He uses the example of how he batches his high energy tasks earlier in the day when he has…

  • Study Skill: Let Your Mind Wander

    Let your mind wander to study better: https://getpocket.com/explore/item/an-effortless-way-to-improve-your-memory

  • How You Read

    “How often you read something is immaterial; how you read it is crucial.” – Virginia Voeks (from 10 Steps to Earning Awesome Grades (While Studying Less)).

  • How Do You Come Back When You Fail?

    “When you do make a mistake or something bad happens to you, how are you going to come back from that?…How do you come back from a mistake?” – Dean Lister It’s easy to get knocked down by a mistake or circumstance and not get back up. Get back up. Figure out how to come…

  • Keep Your Progress

    In James Clear’s book “Atomic Habits”, he argues that maintaining the progress you’ve made is more important than making new progress. He uses the example of money. If you have $100, and gain 50%, you have $150. But it only takes a 33% loss to get you right back where you started. Put in the…

  • Study Skill #11: Give Good Distractions a Time and a Place

    We all have things to do, errands to run, people to see. These are what I would call “Good distractions”. They are things that we need to do in order to do our job but they are not the key object of our job itself. Michael Hyatt would call these “Backstage Tasks”. He has three…

  • Study Skill #10: Prayer

    One study skill that is often overlooked is prayer. We need God’s guidance and direction in our lives and His strength in our studies. Proverbs 3:5-6 tells us “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding, in all your ways acknowledge Him and He shall direct your paths.”…

  • Study Skill #9: Teach to Learn Better

    Recently, I have been teaching what I learned through conversations with my friends and on this blog. It has helped me to think through what I need to do to apply what I’ve learned. It challenges me to do what I advise other people to do. To pass on what you’ve learned is to challenge…

  • Study Skill #8: Focus Defined Differently

    According to Daniel Goleman, focus is not keeping your attention focused on one thing for an extended period of time. Focus is bringing your attention back when it wanders. Our brains are wired to be distracted a good chunk of the time. The goal is not letting that distraction de-rail our work but bring our…