PDF Summary:The First 20 Hours, by Josh Kaufman

Has there been a skill you’ve been wanting to learn, but you’ve been putting it off for years? It can be hard to find the time, energy, and motivation to learn something new. Fortunately, in the international bestseller The First 20 Hours, skill acquisition expert Josh Kaufman provides a simple and effective method for learning almost any skill in just 20 hours. Whether you want to learn how to cook, speak a foreign language, or practice a martial art, by following Kaufman’s rapid skill acquisition process, you’ll pick up and enjoy your new skills as fast as humanly possible.

In this guide, we’ll discuss the misconceptions that hold us back from learning new skills and the science behind skill acquisition. Then, we’ll explore Kaufman’s step-by-step process for mastering the basics of any new skill with only 20 hours of practice. Along the way, we’ll share additional insights from psychologists and performance experts, as well as actionable tips to help you optimize your skill-building experience.

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Kaufman provides some suggestions for researching your skill:

Find Reference Materials

First, gather at least three resources (articles, books, and videos) that discuss the skill and quickly scan through them to find out what you need to know to practice. Look for approaches, techniques, and materials that the different resources agree on. For example, multiple art sources might recommend you learn form by drawing figures like spheres, cubes, and cylinders.

(Shortform note: In A Mind For Numbers, Barbara Oakley explains why skimming is advantageous for learning: It prepares your mind to organize the new information—similar to creating a mental filing cabinet. She explains that you can absorb information better when you already have the categories in mind. This is an example of top-down learning, where you start with the big picture and then add in the details. This contrasts with the bottom-up approach, where you start with the details and then build up to the bigger picture.)

As you research your skill, you’ll likely encounter terms or concepts that are unfamiliar to you. Kaufman assures that confusion is not only normal at this point but encouraged. The more confused you are, the more motivated you’ll be to learn and the faster you’ll progress.

(Shortform note: Some research suggests that confusion actually enhances your learning by making you think more deeply and remember more information in the long run. However, experts point out that confusion is only beneficial if you have the resources or guidance to resolve it. If you don’t, you may feel stuck and give up on your skill. This underscores the value of Kaufman’s suggestion to gather and skim resources before you start practicing, so you have everything you need to cope with confusion and learn more effectively.)

Look for Mental Models

To make the most of the information you find during your research, Kaufman recommends you look for mental models. These are concepts you learn that help you understand how something works. For instance, in creative storytelling, the Hero’s Journey (which describes a common 12-stage story structure) is a mental model for understanding how to structure a plot.

(Shortform note: You can use mental models not only for understanding specific skills and disciplines, but also for general thinking and decision-making in all areas of your life. Just as each skill has its own concepts, Shane Parrish and Rhiannon Beaubien write that the world functions according to a set of concepts and rules that can be simplified with mental models. In The Great Mental Models Volume 1, they present nine mental models to improve your thinking and decision-making. Learning different kinds of mental models (both skill-specific and broadly applicable) can help you enhance both your skill learning ability and understanding of the world.)

To remember the mental models you come across, use metaphors or analogies to connect them with things you already know and understand. For example, you can think of books or films that follow the Hero’s Journey structure. Drawing on these connections helps you to apply new knowledge more easily when you’re putting the skill to practice.

(Shortform note: In Learning How to Learn, Barbara Oakley and Terrence Sejnowski suggest ways for making your metaphors more memorable. One way is to create mental pictures that allow you to visualize the metaphor. Pictures are easier to commit to memory than abstract concepts. Another way is to create acronyms or mnemonics—for example, if you’re trying to remember the notes of the treble clef (E-G-B-D-F), you might create a memorable mnemonic like “Energetic grasshoppers buy donuts frequently.”)

Consult Experts

Another way Kaufman suggests you research your skill is to ask experts for advice. Experts can clear up misconceptions you have about learning the skill and help you set realistic expectations for yourself. They may also have tips that can help you avoid wasting time, money, and energy on unnecessary supplies or ineffective techniques.

(Shortform note: If you can’t connect with any experts in your skill, psychologist Anders Ericsson says in Peak that you can still gain helpful insights by investigating the methods they used to achieve their level of performance. For example, if you want to learn digital art, research the training methods of professional digital artists and imitate their process. Ericsson recommends that when you do so, you focus on what they’re doing differently from others and try to replicate that.)

Gather Necessary Materials

In addition to learning about your skill, you’ll also need to gather the right tools and equipment to practice the skill. Based on your research, identify everything you’ll need and make sure you can acquire it—whether it’s a piece of equipment, software, or facility. This way, you won’t disrupt your practice by suddenly discovering that you’re missing a vital component.

(Shortform note: While the equipment that’s required for some skills can be expensive, don’t be discouraged if you’re on a tight budget. If you can’t buy all the necessary materials, get creative and find alternative ways to get what you need. For example, you could borrow equipment from a friend, or you could organize a community swap where you exchange items with others. Another option is to use the Internet—there are many websites that help you learn skills for free.)

Step 3: Identify Essential Subskills

Once you’ve completed your research, the next step is to separate the skill into subskills and focus on learning the most essential ones. Kaufman explains that most skills are composed of a set of smaller skills. These subskills should include everything you need to attain your proficiency goal (and you’ll likely have found some important ones during your research). For example, if you want to learn to skateboard for commuting purposes, you’ll need to learn several subskills, such as how to balance, push, and turn your board.

(Shortform note: In The Art of Learning, Josh Waitzkin echoes Kaufman’s advice to break down your skill and suggests you patiently learn the fundamentals. He argues that the fundamentals are the most important elements of a skill, so you should learn them first. Once you’ve defined the basic elements, practice each in isolation until they become intuitive. This has two benefits: First, when you have a solid grasp of the basics, you’ll be able to combine and use them in new ways and in different situations. Second, by diligently working at the basics, you learn to appreciate the process of learning and growing over the outcome.)

To make sure you’ve identified all crucial subskills, Kaufman suggests you think of the worst-case scenario that can occur when you’re practicing the skill. Think about what’s risky or what outcomes you want to avoid. For example, when you’re skateboarding, there’s a danger you’ll fall or crash into obstacles. This clues us in to some other vital subskills: How to brake with your foot and how to fall properly.

(Shortform note: People often avoid thinking about the possibility of negative outcomes. That’s why analyzing the worst-case scenario (a mental model called inversion) is a powerful thinking tool: It helps you see things from a different angle. Similarly, some thinkers recommend another counterintuitive way to shift your perspective—by contemplating your mortality. In The Laws of Human Nature, Robert Greene writes that this helps you gain a fresh perspective on your life, clarify what matters most to you, and get motivated to take action. Overall, these two thought exercises share an underlying purpose: To help you consider different viewpoints to make better decisions, anticipate challenges, and achieve your goals.)

Step 4: Overcome Learning Obstacles

We’ve discussed how to research and break down your skill, but before you start practicing it, Kaufman recommends that you first think ahead and prepare for potential obstacles that may affect the quality of your practice.

Let’s look at a few common obstacles and how to avoid them.

Obstacle 1: Psychological Barriers

According to Kaufman, the biggest obstacle to learning new skills is emotion, not intellectual or physical capabilities. Learning a new skill is uncomfortable because it requires you to struggle and feel inadequate at first. You start off with many doubts and frustrations when all you want is for the skill to feel easy and fun. To overcome this barrier, focus on competence, not mastery. If you immediately want to be outstanding at something, you’ll get frustrated and discouraged.

(Shortform note: It can be hard to overcome frustration and doubt when learning a new skill. However, in The Defining Decade, Meg Jay argues that struggle, and even failure, aren’t just obstacles to surmount—they’re the sources of real confidence. She explains that when you learn skills easily, you develop a fragile confidence that will crumble under pressure. But when you become competent at a skill after facing hardship and setbacks, you build a strong sense of confidence in yourself and your abilities.)

Obstacle 2: Too Much Effort to Start Practicing

Another common obstacle to learning a skill is mustering the will to start practicing. Kaufman writes that your willpower is limited, and the more effort it takes to start practicing, the more likely you are to procrastinate or avoid doing it altogether. Because of this, he recommends you make it as easy and convenient as possible to start practicing your skill. For example, if your skill involves a lot of equipment that takes time to set up, you might clear out a dedicated space for it so you don’t have to set it up and take it down every time.

(Shortform note: In The Happiness Advantage, Shawn Achor suggests you reduce the time it takes to start a behavior to 20 seconds or less. This is because when your willpower gets depleted, you’re more likely to avoid hard tasks and fall into easy and comfortable habits. Because of this, Achor recommends you also make it harder to do bad habits, by increasing the time it takes to assemble all the needed materials to at least 20 seconds. For example, if you want to practice your new skill but tend to get distracted by video games, you could disconnect the console from your TV and store it in another room.)

Obstacle 3: Distractions

External distractions, like noisy roommates or phone notifications, can also get in the way of you practicing your skill. To avoid these, Kaufman suggests you pre-emptively clear your surroundings of distractions in preparation for your practice. For example, you might practice before others are awake or clear away electronics from your desk.

(Shortform note: In Indistractable, Nir Eyal says the root of distraction actually comes from inside you. He explains that when you experience discomfort (such as the frustration of learning a new skill), you instinctively look for ways to escape. To prevent this, you must understand and control your internal triggers: First, recognize which unpleasant feeling drove you to find a distraction. Second, record your distractions by noting the time, place, task, feelings you experienced, and details of the distraction. Finally, when you’re tempted by a distraction, tell yourself to wait 10 minutes. By then, you’ll likely have refocused and forgotten about it.)

Step 5: Practice Your Skill

Once you’ve made your preparations, it’s time to start practicing. To get good at any skill, you must practice it in a real-life context, not merely read about it or watch others do it. Because it’s easy to get frustrated and give up on a skill at the beginning, Kaufman recommends you commit to doing at least 20 hours of deliberate practice.

(Shortform note: If basic competence is your goal, then 20 hours of deliberate practice can likely get you there. However, In Poor Charlie’s Almanack, Charles T. Munger writes that if you want to maintain that competency level, you must continue to practice or your new skills will fall into disuse and diminish. This is especially true if you’ve only practiced your skill to basic competency. Skills you’ve mastered fall off more slowly, but with skills you’ve only trained to a basic level of proficiency, you’ll have to practice more frequently to stay at that level.)

Deliberate practice is when you actively work on improving your skill instead of just passively doing things related to the skill, and Kaufman argues that it’s crucial for improvement. When he was learning to type with a different keyboard layout, for example, he found that his typing speed increased when he deliberately worked to improve his technique in focused sessions. However, when he went for a period of time without this deliberate practice, and instead just used his new keyboard for everyday tasks like writing emails, his typing speed didn’t increase.

(Shortform note: The concept of deliberate practice originates from the work of Anders Ericsson. In Peak, Ericsson outlines five principles of deliberate practice that differentiate it from mere repetitive practice: It uses objective ways to measure your performance, is competitive, follows proven techniques and best practices, involves guidance from mentors, and requires hard work and training.)

Kaufman provides some tips for practicing your skill more effectively:

Tip #1: Break up your practice. Kaufman suggests you spend at least 90 minutes a day practicing your skill. But because practicing for a long time can be frustrating and difficult (especially when you’re starting out), he recommends you split your practice time into 20-minute chunks throughout the day. This allows you to remain focused while also getting in enough practice time.

(Shortform note: In Learning How to Learn, Barbara Oakley and Terrence Sejnowski write that splitting up your focused practice time allows you to employ two modes of thinking: focused thinking and diffuse thinking. During practice, focused thinking helps you study the details of a problem but limits the range of your ideas. When you take a break, you enter diffuse thinking—your brain wanders and connects diverse ideas to come up with creative solutions. By splitting your practice time, you can reap the advantages of both: focused mode helps you absorb the information and diffuse mode allows your brain to process it more fully.)

Tip #2: Focus on quantity over quality. It’s more important to practice a skill regularly than to practice it perfectly. Instead of aiming to perform your skill as well as possible, focus on doing it “well enough” and as often as you can within a short period of time. This helps you learn quickly, as you get more chances to perform the skill and learn from your mistakes.

(Shortform note: In The Art of Learning, Josh Waitzkin says growth happens through trial and error—through acting, making mistakes, adjusting, and then repeating. Each time you repeat this cycle, you give yourself more opportunities to fail, grow, and add to your knowledge, which is why it’s crucial to practice a skill a lot instead of focusing on perfection.)

Tip #3: Use practice methods that give you immediate feedback. Ideally, you should practice in a way that lets you know immediately whether you did something right or wrong. Immediate feedback makes it easier for you to recognize with more accuracy what went wrong and to adjust your strategy. To get immediate feedback, you can use tools such as online tests, find coaches and mentors, or videotape yourself practicing.

(Shortform note: In Ultralearning, Scott Young echoes Kaufman’s advice to seek immediate feedback and explains that delayed feedback can actually worsen your performance. However, Young also adds that feedback that’s too immediate can also interfere with your learning. For example, if you’re trying to play a musical piece from memory but refer to the sheet music every other note, you’ll prevent yourself from actually committing that information to your memory.)

Tip #4: Practice motor skills before sleep. Kaufman cites research showing that sleeping within four hours of practicing a motor skill helps your brain process and store the movements you learned, making the skill easier to execute the next time you practice.

(Shortform note: Neuroscience research provides an explanation for why sleep may improve your motor skill performance: The neurons in your brain fire in a specific pattern when you perform a motor skill, and when you sleep, your brain “practices” the skill by replaying the same pattern of neural activity over and over again. This helps your brain transfer the information to long-term memory.)

Tip #5: Space out your studies. If the skill you’re learning requires memorizing information (for example, music notes and chords), Kaufman suggests you review the information at different time intervals—a technique called “spaced repetition.” This technique works because you need to revisit newer concepts more frequently than concepts you’re more familiar with to make them stick in your brain.

(Shortform note: In The Only Study Guide You’ll Ever Need, Jade Bowler also recommends spaced repetition. She argues that the best way to stop yourself from forgetting new information as time passes is to review it right before you’re about to forget it. By allowing a little time to pass before reviewing it, you’ll retain the information for longer, and you’ll eventually be able to allow more time to pass before you start to forget it.)

Tip #6: Create checklists and processes. Kaufman suggests you make the routine elements of your skill more effortless by creating checklists. For example, you could make a list of all the materials you’ll need for drawing that you can consult before you start. He also recommends creating processes for your practice so that your performance is consistent. For example, your process for drawing a landscape might be to find references, then sketch, then decide on the lighting, and then add colors.

(Shortform note: Creating checklists and nailing down processes helps you get information out of your head, clearing up mental space and energy to focus on your present task. In Getting Things Done, David Allen refers to this as “capturing.” He suggests you not only do this for a specific pursuit (like learning a new skill) but for all aspects of your life—from birthday reminders to project ideas to work responsibilities. Once you’ve identified all the things that occupy your mind, you should then sort them into lists to optimize how you spend your time.)

Tip #7: Experiment. During your practice, try out various strategies and techniques that you’ve gathered during your research and brainstorm new ideas. Experimenting with techniques accelerates your learning by helping you find better ways to practice.

(Shortform note: In Ultralearning, Scott Young describes five ways you can experiment to get better at a skill. You can copy an accomplished master’s work (such as trying to replicate a painting’s color scheme), compare two different works and isolate a single difference between them, challenge yourself with constraints (such as sketching without using reference images), study an unrelated skill, and explore the extremes of your skill—like creating art with odd materials.)