I know I feel most alive when I am learning something. Do you?
Something I have learned about learning from my friend Lynne, and from Leo Babauta of Zen Habits is that it is perfectly OK to start with baby steps.
Really tiny, embarrassingly tiny, baby steps. ('But I'm not a baby!' I hear myself thinking...)
I'm learning some Italian and I'm learning to swim better and in both endeavours I am trying to do too much too soon. I'm not a patient learner!
Babauta says make your first steps so easy you cannot fail.
Swimming on Friday I was trying about 8 different things. Next time I am going to try two - going from floating on my back to vertical and treading water, and gliding then lifting my head to take a breath and gliding again. Or maybe I'll just do this... Can I recommend the videos on Ian Cross's website Swimming Without Stress if you are wanting to learn to swim or improve your confidence in the water? They are excellent - on doing more with less - minimalist swimming!
In Italian I'm finding the free online course at Busuu fun and relevant (though they keep trying to sell me the upgrade part, and send a lot of emails - but that's OK - I can ignore that for now). The courses I've looked at are designed so that you can go entirely at your own pace, and repeat your tottering baby steps as often as it takes....Interesting, and quite fun.
What have you learned about learning?
And about yourself as a learner
.