Here's an overview of the strategy I have been following to teach myself anything during the last 5 years. This is by no means definitive, just the current iteration.
Scoping
It always starts with a question — usually something I don’t know much about, but can’t stop thinking about. That curiosity kicks off the search.
I always set the goal to achieve mastery. I know that won’t happen tomorrow, so a new lifelong project is born.
Mapping
The first thing I do is map the "landscape".
I use things like Wikipedia entry trees, textbook tables of contents, and university curriculums to get a sense of what is there.
I’m not chasing completeness, just awareness and orientation.
I then break the findings down into four categories:
-
Core: Essential concepts without which the notion/topic breaks down.
-
Supporting: Upgrades to how you understand or apply the core. These include methods, tools, perspectives, or simplifications that enhance the core without replacing it.
-
Advanced: The hard-earned tools of mastery — abstract or technical ideas that, once grasped, feel like unlocking secret powers.
-
Historical: The backstory of the notion — where ideas came from, how they shifted, and what they displaced. Not always needed to apply something, but they enrich mastery by feeding analysis and deeper evaluation.
Once sorted, I start linking the entries — building a mental map that highlights relationships and dependencies.
Fact-Checking
I don’t accept what is currently accepted to be true right away, and even when I do, I still allow space to doubt or change.
Beyond the usual bibliographies and references, I pay close attention to potential biases in the content — the kind Daniel Kahneman explores in Thinking, Fast and Slow or Rolf Dobelli in The Art of Thinking Clearly.
Whether it’s cognitive biases, framing effects, or confirmation biases, spotting these helps me judge the reliability and perspective behind the information.
Now, I might not always reach new conclusions — perhaps I’m confirmation biased myself — but this exercise of bias filtering opens space for exploration and pondering.
As Dr. Barbara Oakley teaches, it’s through this thoughtful wandering and challenging of assumptions that new neural connections form, strengthening understanding and building the context needed for true mastery.
Getting clear on those details makes the whole picture sharper and more reliable.
Organizing
To keep my notes from turning into a chaotic mess, I follow a format that resembles Bloom's taxonomy. This structure helps me digest information step-by-step and makes it easier to revisit later without confusion.
-
Overview: I start with the essentials — the core ideas and definitions you need to grasp before anything else.
-
Practical Use: Next, I look at how this knowledge applies/is used in real life or practical situations. This grounds theory in reality and keeps things relevant.
-
Digging Deeper: This section covers additional details and explanations that build on the basics, helping me understand the topic more thoroughly without getting lost in unnecessary complexity.
-
Did You Know?: Here I include interesting facts, historical notes, or any details that don’t quite fit elsewhere but I still want to keep. It adds some extra context or flavor without cluttering the main points.
-
Explaining It: Finally, I consider how I’d explain the concept to someone else. As a part-time teacher, organizing my notes this way from the start is incredibly useful down the line.
Following the advice in Make It Stick, I always study with the goal of teaching, since teaching truly helps you learn.
To keep my skills sharp, I give myself the task of explaining the notion in random scenarios and to different kinds of audiences — a way to test and deepen my understanding beyond just memorization.
All sections include a short checklist of questions or tasks. Once most of them can be answered confidently, I consider that piece “learned enough” — not to close the door, but to move forward. It’s a way to prompt action, measure understanding, and avoid passive note-taking.
Iteration
Learning is always a work in progress—never finished, never perfect.
My goal is to find the truth so I welcome ruthless feedback because what’s solid will endure, and what’s lazy will fade away.
References
Kahneman, Daniel. Thinking, Fast and Slow. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2011.
Dobelli, Rolf. The Art of Thinking Clearly. Harper, 2013.
Brown, Peter C., Roediger, Henry L., and McDaniel, Mark A. Make It Stick: The Science of Successful Learning. Harvard University Press, 2014.
Oakley, Barbara. A Mind for Numbers: How to Excel at Math and Science (Even If You Flunked Algebra). TarcherPerigee, 2014.
Bloom’s Taxonomy: Originally developed by Benjamin Bloom and collaborators in 1956, revised in 2001 by Anderson and Krathwohl. Used widely as a framework for learning objectives and cognitive development.