The investments you make compound over time – especially the ones you make in yourself.
Spending some amount of time learning and practicing new skills is important; It’s also important to take it slow so that you learn correctly the first time. Once you’ve learned a new skill, you’ll have it available to you for the rest of your life – so long as you work to retain it. As my friend Bryan used to remind me: “slow is smooth, and smooth is fast.”
This week I’ve shared some thoughts on the process of learning. I frequently find myself pushing to get through content quickly so that I can get to the next thing – when what I really need to be doing is slowing down. I hope you’ll find something in the newsletter this week that sparks that same hunger to learn 😊
Please note: this newsletter adheres to Daniel Miessler’s AI Influence Level (AIL) Zero
💭 A few quick thoughts
Learn slowly and methodically; learning to do something the right way the first time will save an immense amount of time unlearning how to do it the wrong way.
Treat skill development as if you will spend your life mastering it; because in truth, you will.
True mastery comes from repetition and an increasing attention to detail; any skill that is not practiced will atrophy. To keep things interesting, pay attention to the small details while you continue to perfect your practice.
📚 From the bookshelf
Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman. “Intelligence is not only the ability to reason; it is also the ability to find relevant material in memory and to deploy attention when needed.” It takes time for memories to convert from short-term to long-term, so take it slow!
Zen Flesh, Zen Bones edited by Nyogen Senzaki and Paul Reps. “Live with cause and leave results to the great law of the universe.” Be intentional about the life you are living, and the results will speak for themselves.
How to Practice by His Holiness the Dalai Lama. “To train the mind, you must exercise the patience and determination it takes to shape that steel.”
😊 Recently enjoyed
From CVE Entries to Verifiable Exploits. This is a great piece of research, which includes a thoughtful system design for the process of recreating CVEs from source-available software. That said, the social media FUD being kicked-up around this paper is overblown. To reiterate, the lynchpin here is that a malicious actor needs access to source code in order to use the tool. If an attacker already has that, they can simply patch diff and reverse engineer how to exploit it.
Prompt Injection Isn’t a Bug; It’s Rain that won’t stop. “Prompt injection isn’t an exploit you patch; it’s the tax for using systems that follow open-ended language. It’s a set of infinite exploits which forms a continuum over all natural language. We bought improvisation; the kryptonite ships in the same box.” You’ll never solve this problem with a system prompt. Thank you, Manish!
The nominations for the AI Darin Awards are open. “Artificial intelligence is just a tool – like a chainsaw, nuclear reactor, or particularly aggressive blender. It's not the chainsaw's fault when someone decides to juggle it at a dinner party,” I am so incredibly here for this! 🍿
🤔 This week’s question
How would your skill development process change if you knew you would spend the rest of your life practicing?
Learning in the “instant gratification” era that of today can feel painfully boring. Between social media, video platforms, instant chat communications, and other dopamine loops we expose ourselves to, it has become increasingly difficult to remain focused on skill development when sitting down to study. Not to mention the self-judgement that occurs when we compare our current level of talent to others.
For me, shifting my mindset toward a life of perpetual practice has changed the way I approach studying. First, I start by turning off notifications on my phone, closing apps on my laptop that might kick-off notifications (like email, Signal, or Slack), and setting a Pomodoro timer for 50 minutes.
And why do I go through this ritual? Because learning the right way to do something the first time will save me hours of unlearning how to do it the wrong way.
Along with this mindset shift, I try to acknowledge the fact that learning is a journey. Each being on this planet has the same 24 hours to spend – and while others might be further along in their learning journey, you need only continue practicing and honing your skills in order to reach the same levels of achievement.
So – how would your skill development process change if you committed to spending the rest of your life practicing?
Let me know what you think.
– Keith