What to do when learning is frustrating

“You got to learn how to fall before you learn to fly.” - Paul Simon (Image by Manie Van der Hoven)

A friend of mine is learning German.

She’s trying. But she keeps stalling out.

A brilliant woman with multiple degrees, she is certainly capable of learning a new language. However, she’s getting stuck. “I don’t want to be frustrated like this in my free time.” The process is feeling awfully unpleasant for something she’s doing for fun.

Here’s my hypothesis, based on twenty years as an educator: She is focused on gaining knowledge, not skill. Because she gains knowledge quickly and easily, she’s keeps advancing on that front. However, her skills are not keeping up. And actually speaking a language may require knowledge, but it is, itself, a skill that needs to be built.

The solution for my friend and anyone else in this predicament — which will show up in writing, learning an instrument, playing a sport, and many other places — is to shift to a focus on skill-building.

How do we do this? We focus on the process. Instead of thinking about what we can do, we pay attention to how well we’re doing it. I’m not talking about the quality of the finished product. I’m talking about the way the work feels.

If we are feeling frustrated, we’re probably taking on too much at once. In language-learning, for example, that might mean we’re trying to hold onto too many words, like taking too many shopping bags in from the car on one trip. We may know all these words (we have the knowledge), but we can’t easily use all of them (we don’t have the skill).

Thus, we can practice constructing sentences out of fewer words — lots of different sentences using just a handful of words and ideas. We’ll know that we’re ready to add more when the negative emotion that arises is boredom as opposed to frustration.

As a teacher, I’ve guided countless students through this process. Whereas students are often looking to be able to do more complex things, that’s not the only way to make progress. Instead, we might strive to do simpler things more smoothly and confidently. Embracing this repetition is beneficial — resisting it is what triggers frustration.

For example, when someone is new to finding their way from chord to chord on the guitar, they have to stop and remember where their fingers go for each new chord. This might require checking and re-checking the chart, or it might mean that there will be a moment of hesitation as they consciously place each finger on its correct string and fret.

As the student continues to practice over the course of hours and days, the time it takes to correctly place each finger will go from seconds to a fraction of a second. Eventually, it becomes automatic.

There’s no need to learn more chords. Instead, the student can learn a bunch of different songs that all use the same few chords. Their knowledge may not be expanding, but their skill will be.

What’s exciting to look forward to is that, once the foundation of skill is in place, adding knowledge is straightforward. There is now a framework to place that knowledge on, like stringing lights on a tree.

Much of school rewards the gaining of knowledge. But most of the things we want to achieve, whether in our work or play, require skill. They are things we want to be able to do. Instead of doing more research to gain more knowledge, we can practice doing the thing, however impatient we may be with how simple it seems.

Maybe it is simple to understand what we’re supposed to do, but being able to do it doesn’t feel simple at first. However, as we continue to practice consistently, we will demonstrate greater ease, elegance, accuracy, and precision. What once seemed exhausting and intimidating now seems simple. That’s how you’ll know when you’re ready for more.