To learn math, the first step is learning what a number is.
ULTRA BASICS
In a lot of life, people like me have a tendancy to move forward quickly enough that we don't cover those kinds of basics. 2 + 2 = 4? Who has time for that shit? I need to move to calculus!!
I've spent the last year pushing myself to be more competitive than I've ever been before. Through massively multiplayer video game experiences in games like TemTem, I've seen that mere effort and grind isn't enough.
A thousand hours into TemTem, I was grinding my ass off, but I still wasn't anywhere near becoming one of the top ranked players. My basics, my fundementals of how to play the game well, were way off.
For me, learning is almost entirely about the ultra basics. The stuff that is so simple, so "beginner" oriented, that it is almost painful to even look at.
2+2=4 isn't interesting!! I want to do the calculus!!
Not Hypothetical
By the way the math thing isn't an arbitrary example. I really am studying very basic mathetmatics.
Check it out, here's my Khan Academy page:
Right now I'm in the middle of learning to calculate the volume of cones, cylinders, and spheres. It's so simple, so basic. Many would say that if you're 30 and you can't do the volume of basic 3D shapes, maybe math isn't your thing. That's pretty easy why don't you already know it?
Of course that's all nonsense -- I can only learn from where I am.
What's interesting is that the most important thing to learn is almost always "ultra basic" in nature. It's the simple thing that is usually missing, not the complicated thing. At least that's how it feels to me in my studies: Aim training, mathematics, blockchains, and beyond.
The more basic the study, the more effective it seems to be.
