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How I Remember Anything I Study
And enjoy the process
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You don’t remember by trying to remember.
Counterintuitive, isn’t it? But here’s the lesson I learned over the years: the more effort you put into rereading, highlighting, and perhaps taking some notes, the more likely it is that the information will not stick in your head.
Perhaps you experienced this as a student in high school or university.
You have some pages to study for your exam. You sit down and start learning. You highlight and reread them. You become more fluent in reading what you need to study. “Great! I finished studying. I’m ready for my exam,” you think.
The next day, you try remembering this hours before your big exam.
You realize you can’t. You need to check your highlights or the correct answers to do so. Anxiety increases. Stress burns your head. You feel you learned nothing. You feel you are not ready. Worse, not smart enough.
Did this happen to you?
Well, this is the cognitive illusion of learning.
To truly learn anything you study, you should do this:
