Book SummaryThe Only Study Guide You'll Ever Need, by Jade Bowler

1-Page Summary1-Page Book Summary of The Only Study Guide You'll Ever Need

In The Only Study Guide You’ll Ever Need, Jade Bowler explains that many students struggle in school due to the overwhelming pressure to get good grades while also managing extracurricular, familial, and social obligations. Overwhelmed students can develop issues that negatively impact their performance, like fear of failure, lack of motivation, and procrastination. However, Bowler argues that school doesn’t have to be this way. If students learn how to effectively manage their mindset, study habits, and time, they can minimize their stress and live a balanced life while excelling in school.

Bowler is a YouTuber and content creator, commonly known by her handle “UnJaded Jade,” whose content focuses on study techniques and academic success. She began her YouTube channel in 2017 and helped to pioneer...

The Only Study Guide You'll Ever Need Summary Part 1: Manage Your Mindset

Bowler explains that to perform well in school, your first step is to prioritize having a healthy mindset. The health of your mindset is determined by how positively you think, feel, and act. A healthy mindset is crucial to academic success because unhealthy mindsets result in thoughts, feelings, and behaviors that hinder success.

In Bowler's experience, the most common symptom of a negative mindset is the fear of failure, which often leads to lack of motivation and procrastination. She explains that the fear of failure makes students either overwork themselves in the pursuit of perfection or avoid academic work altogether due to the anxiety it causes.

Fear of failure often leads to a lack of motivation: students having no desire to study, either because they’re uninterested in or have given up on academic success. A lack of motivation usually stems from either a student’s negative beliefs about their ability to succeed or from a genuine lack of interest in the academic material. A lack of motivation usually leads to procrastination—when students ignore or delay their work.

**Procrastination and Lack of Motivation Are the Results...

The Only Study Guide You'll Ever Need Summary Part 2: Study Effectively and Productively

Once you’ve adjusted your mindset and have a positive outlook on school and your ability to succeed, Bowler says that it’s time to start studying. She elaborates that studying effectively means maximizing productivity—getting the most work done, or developing the deepest understanding of the material you can, in as little time as possible.

(Shortform note: In Deep Work, Cal Newport explains that the key to learning difficult things quickly and maximizing your output (in Bowler’s context, studying productively) is to do deep work—focused, uninterrupted, undistracted work that pushes your cognitive abilities to their limit.)

To maximize the productivity of your study time, Bowler explains that you must first understand how your brain learns. Then, you must adopt study techniques that work with your brain.

Understand How Your Brain Learns

Bowler explores four ideas that explain how your brain learns best. (She uses the acronym “SAAD” to represent these ideas.)

Idea #1: Engage Repeatedly

**First, your brain remembers information best by engaging with it_...

The Only Study Guide You'll Ever Need Summary Part 3: Make a Schedule

In this final part of the guide, we’ll discuss the importance of making a schedule. Bowler claims that scheduling will ensure you’re making the best use of your time, helping you accomplish your schoolwork while maintaining free time for extracurricular and non-academic activities. Her scheduling method will help you identify your priorities, allot blocks of time to complete important tasks, and determine which study techniques will optimize your learning.

(Shortform note: In Eat That Frog!, Brian Tracy reiterates the importance of scheduling, citing the 10/90 rule as evidence: spending 10% of your time on a task planning it (for instance, by prioritizing it, scheduling it, and determining how you’ll complete it) will reduce the time required to complete it by 90%.)

Bowler’s method for making a schedule can be broken into four steps.

Step #1: List Your Obligations

Bowler explains that the first step when creating your schedule is to write down every obligation you must complete each month (like projects, exams, and so on); their deadlines; and...

Shortform Exercise: Build Memory-Aiding Connections Through Storytelling

Bowler explains that one of the best methods to memorize important concepts is to build connections by telling a story and connecting information to things you already know. To practice this method, we’ll walk through the process of creating your own story.

First, consider a topic you’re currently studying and write down all the components of that topic that you need to memorize. (For example, for your history class, you might need to memorize the major events leading up to the fall of the Ottoman Empire—write those events down here.)