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elfsThis has nothing to do with the video game. Just so you know.
I don’t know if it’s my ADHD or whatever is going on inside my brain, but I’ve discovered a weird phenomenon with my learning ability. When it comes to explicitly physical skills such as juggling, drawing, or martial arts, I know exactly what day that skill is going to fade.
If you’re familiar with learning techniques, the two most powerful known are related: spaced repetition and active recall. Spaced repetition is the notion that a bit of knowledge that you’ve learned is reinforced if you’re reminded of it as close to the moment when your brain is about to forget it as possible. It’s a signal to your learning system that, no really, that bit of knowledge needs to stay around and be available for recall. Active recall is the process of making the method by which that reminder is brought to your attention demanding in a way that makes you think hard about the answer, wrapping it in layers of attention that your brain now credits with importance, giving the knowledge memorized a higher priority.
These techniques work for me when it comes to knowledge work. But when it comes to physical skills, the act of building “muscle memory” is very real and, to me, seems to be different from, well, memory memory.
So, the weird part is this: when I’m trying to learn a physical skill, if I do it for a while and then leave off for a few days, there comes a day when, as I wake up, I’m very aware that if I don’t practice today that skill is going to be gone. I’ll be back to the beginning, and have to go through the practice all over again.
I call this phenomenon Half-Life Day, because my embodiment of that skill has a half-life, and that day is the day that skill will fade away so effectively I won’t be able to recover it.
Today, I spent a half-hour drawing, because I knew that if I didn’t, the smallest steps I’ve taken toward recovering my drawing skills were going to be gone. I feel pretty good about that.
But I was wondering if other people have reached that point, where they know that a skillset is about to die, and how they deal with their own half-life days.
I don’t know if it’s my ADHD or whatever is going on inside my brain, but I’ve discovered a weird phenomenon with my learning ability. When it comes to explicitly physical skills such as juggling, drawing, or martial arts, I know exactly what day that skill is going to fade.
If you’re familiar with learning techniques, the two most powerful known are related: spaced repetition and active recall. Spaced repetition is the notion that a bit of knowledge that you’ve learned is reinforced if you’re reminded of it as close to the moment when your brain is about to forget it as possible. It’s a signal to your learning system that, no really, that bit of knowledge needs to stay around and be available for recall. Active recall is the process of making the method by which that reminder is brought to your attention demanding in a way that makes you think hard about the answer, wrapping it in layers of attention that your brain now credits with importance, giving the knowledge memorized a higher priority.
These techniques work for me when it comes to knowledge work. But when it comes to physical skills, the act of building “muscle memory” is very real and, to me, seems to be different from, well, memory memory.
So, the weird part is this: when I’m trying to learn a physical skill, if I do it for a while and then leave off for a few days, there comes a day when, as I wake up, I’m very aware that if I don’t practice today that skill is going to be gone. I’ll be back to the beginning, and have to go through the practice all over again.
I call this phenomenon Half-Life Day, because my embodiment of that skill has a half-life, and that day is the day that skill will fade away so effectively I won’t be able to recover it.
Today, I spent a half-hour drawing, because I knew that if I didn’t, the smallest steps I’ve taken toward recovering my drawing skills were going to be gone. I feel pretty good about that.
But I was wondering if other people have reached that point, where they know that a skillset is about to die, and how they deal with their own half-life days.
