Studying really isn’t complicated: Here’s how to do it
Recent trends on YouTube, Instagram, TikTok and study focused subreddits seem to trend towards more and more elaborate techniques that promise to ‘maximise studying efficiency’ and ‘decrease procrastination’. And although these resources will often claim to allow you to study for 10+ hours a day, they can often be unsustainable, difficult to implement, inefficient or in some cases even anti-productive.
If you’re reading this, the chances are that you’re struggling with studying. And if that’s the case, I hope that this article will give you an honest strategy that you can actually use to transform your study habits in a sustainable and effective way. But note that while this strategy is simple and sounds easy to implement, performing it consistently over time can be challenging and there will be times where you are tempted to skip sessions, not fully implement the strategy or just not follow through with it. But those of you who do implement this simple strategy should see noticeable improvements in focus, productivity and academic success.
So if you’re not interested in implementing these (at times, challenging) methods to improve your studying, thanks for clicking this article but this isn’t the one for you. If you are prepared to implement this strategy however, I will keep this article short and sweet so that I don’t waste too much of your time and that you can get back to your studies.
The five simple steps to actually get studying
1. Learn to take accountability
A trend I’ve noticed recently is a growing collective mindset that everything is someone else’s fault or that your specific personal circumstances are uniquely responsible for you being unable to focus or study. The problem is that as a society, we have coddled people whose situations (in a wider context) are actually very fortunate and privileged and excluding a very small minority of people who truly have no control over the circumstances, you almost certainly have more influence over your ability to study than you may think.
I hear and read a lot of excuses about not being able to focus, or study or do well on tests but often even a shallow look at a daily schedule can reveal that it’s not a case of not being able to focus or find the time to study, it’s a lack of discipline and poor prioritisation of time. To succeed as a student, you must be able to be disciplined with your time and effort (something that I explore in my article on the 7 habits of productive students), but perhaps more importantly, you must take accountability and ownership of your actions and their results. If you didn’t pass an exam, you know next time to study harder, more effectively or for longer. If you don’t understand a topic, take the initiative to study deeper into the topic or reach out to lecturers for additional support. The first step towards academic success is realising that it is within your control to achieve it.
2. Be ruthless in removing distractions
It’s no secret that we live in a world of distractions unlike anything any generation has faced before. From social media, Netflix, TV and more, we are bombarded with an endless amount of content to consume. Unfortunately, however enticing, enjoyable and relaxing these distractions are, they are the biggest enemy facing focused work in modern times. To genuinely focus, you need to be ruthless in eliminating these distractions. Cal Newport explores this in Deep Work where he says:
“To learn hard things quickly, you must focus intensely without distraction… If you instead remain one of the many for whom depth is uncomfortable and distraction ubiquitous, you shouldn’t expect these systems and skills to come easily to you.”
Largely speaking, the more extreme you are in removing distraction, the larger your chances of academic success. So how do you eliminate these distractions? A good place to start would be to remove all unnecessary notifications from digital devices. This can help remove many of the cues that feed the habit loop of distraction. But a more effective (if extreme) measure is to delete social media in its entirety from your devices. In future I will make an article or video on this but the key point is that you want to make your phone a tool that you control, rather than have it control you. If apps, notifications or any other distractions in the digital world don’t offer immediate benefits towards your goals, remove them.
The best option is to remove the device completely from both your study and relaxation environment. Put your phone in another room while studying or better yet, go to the library without your smartphone and laptop and study. When taking a break, read some fiction, cook, exercise or just simply zone out for a while. Many of you may read this and think ‘what if there’s an emergency and I need to contact someone or someone needs to contact me?’ This is a valid concern, but rather than use that as an excuse to study with these distractions, take meaningful actions towards your goals and seek solutions to these obstacles. Perhaps in this example you could buy a cheap $20 flip phone that you take to the library to study to avoid the temptations from a smartphone. Or remove all apps except Messages or WhatsApp. There are plenty of ways to remove distractions from your studies, but you have to do it ruthlessly.
3. Simplify your study resources
Of all the points, you’re probably going to be most skeptical of this one. It follows from the second point of removing distraction but goes into more specifics regarding the resources and methods of studying. Here, I’m suggesting that rather than relying solely on online resources for your studying, you spend some proportion of your time studying with textbooks, paper and pencil. Well, in reality it doesn’t have to be that primitive, it can instead be something more akin to printing out practice questions, lecture notes or slideshows in advance and working with those physical resources in a distraction free environment.
This approach is useful for two reasons. First, it forces you to write notes and answers by hand. A 2014 study by Mueller and Oppenheimer found that students who took handwritten notes performed better on conceptual questions compared to those who typed notes, even though typists took more notes. What’s interesting is that according to this study, “even when laptops are used solely to take notes, they may still be impairing learning because their use results in shallower processing.”
The second advantage is that this method is harder. While making studying easier helps pass exams, the real goal is to improve our ability to consume and retain knowledge, which is a skill beneficial no matter the field. Cal Newport, in Deep Work, says the two core abilities for thriving in the digital economy are “The ability to quickly master hard things.” and “The ability to produce at an elite level, in terms of both quality and speed.” Doing hard tasks develops the skills to enable you to perform at the highest level. The ability to be bored has been lost in this age of content consumption, and those who are able to embrace boredom and focus for extended periods of time will thrive.
Of course there are going to be instances where you need to study or complete assignments on a laptop. But if you asked yourself whether the laptop is required at all times, I think answering honestly would reveal some content that you could study distraction free.
4. Set your schedule and stick to it consistently
Schedules are a critical component of any productivity workflow and the glue that connects a productive schedule to measurable outcomes is consistency. Your implemented study schedule will largely depend on your commitments, your available time and more importantly, how far away your exams are. But the ideal study workflow should look something like the green line below.
The mistake that many students make is leaving tasks to the last minute (the red line) which increases stress and the probability of burnout while simultaneously reducing how effectively you’re able to remember and apply the concepts which reduces the overall quality of the work that the student can produce. Working at a natural pace consistently rather than the frenetic burst of cramming is far more sustainable.
Another common mistake is using work-life balance as an excuse not to study. While a healthy work-life balance is important and recommended, some students misuse this excuse after spending too much time on the 'life' part and not enough on the 'work'. It’s better to think of work life balance on a longer time horizon. At the start of the semester, do more of the life part with plenty of socialising. But closing in on exams, the harsh reality is that to maximise the chances of success, you have to sacrifice parts of your life to study.
Conclusion
Studying can be hard, that’s just a fact. And actually, it’s exactly that fact that makes your education so valuable since it’s only those who are willing to do the hard work that will succeed - particularly in higher education where ‘talent’ plays much less of a role than hard work. If you’re struggling with studying, I hope this article provided you with an honest, sustainable, and effective strategy to transform your study habits. While the strategy may seem simple, implementing it consistently over time can be challenging. There will be times when you're tempted to skip sessions or not fully follow through. However, those who persist with these simple rules should see noticeable improvements in focus, productivity, and academic success.