The 20-Hour Rule: A Lazy Person’s Guide to Learning Anything
And actually sticking with it
The other day, as is often the case with YouTube’s algorithm, I found myself feeling incredibly bored, mindlessly watching one meaningless video after another.
Then, out of the blue, YouTube decided to push a video from my “watch later” list onto my screen.
I kid you not, but everything that can succeed me in life has been locked in my “watch later” playlist.
So, the video was a Ted Talk by Josh Kaufman. A little intro to the man of the article, Kaufman is a successful entrepreneur and the bestselling author of the renowned self-help book The Personal MBA and knows the art of great storytelling.
I have to practice for an upcoming national-level exam and the preparatory time is less than 62 days. And as you guessed, procrastination had become my unwelcome companion. And Josh’s video got me out of that slump.
Inspired by Kaufman’s talk, a dormant desire to solve the Rubik’s cube blazed to life.
By dedicating 20 focused hours, as he suggested, I managed to fulfill this long-standing bucket list dream.
Deconstructing the skill:
The first and foremost rule that he tells is to decide exactly what you want to be able to do when you’re done. The more you break the skill apart the more you’re able to decide which parts would help you achieve the skill quicker.
In my case, I knew I wanted that always jumbled cube on the shelf to be solved. The hardest part, I knew, wouldn’t be memorizing algorithms. It would be staring down that colorful mess and not giving up.
So when I deconstructed the skill of solving the cube, I had to readjust my mindset and attention span, so that I could sit patiently and wait for my hands to solve the cube until it was as good as new.
Learning by doing, not watching:
I eventually broke the cube and fixed it.
That’s where Kaufman says “Get 3–5 resources about what you’re trying to learn, but don’t use that as a way to procrastinate on practice, learn just enough that you can practice and self-correct.
Learning becomes a way of getting better at noticing when you’re making a mistake and then doing something different.”
I hopped on YouTube and learned the algorithms to solve it, only to forget them mid-solve.
Cue the frustration spiral! But then it hit me: there’s no shortcut to mastering the process.
So I practiced the Sune and Niklas algorithms till I got the hang of it and eventually applied them correctly until the cube started clicking into place.
Removing practice barriers:
Kill the distractions and build a little bit of your willpower so that you can practice.
Honestly, this is such a simple yet tough thing to do. I realized why I’ve failed multiple times in learning something as simple as a Rubik’s cube.
Because giving up was my default setting.
But this time, I made a pact: 20 hours, that’s it. If I still couldn’t get the basics right, I’d remove solving the cube from my bucket list.
20 Hours — a journey, not a destination:
That day when I decided to click the watch later video, I knew deep down, that it was a sign from the universe that I’d eventually solve the cube without tutorials.
Josh says “Most skills have a ‘frustration barrier’. You know the grossly incompetent knowing it part. We don’t like to feel stupid and feeling stupid is a barrier to us sitting down and doing the work.
So by pre-committing to practicing whatever it is that you want to do for 20 hours, you’ll be able to overcome the frustration barrier & stick to the practice where you gain the reward.”
Four days of 30-minute battles later, the “click” came. The cube, once a jumbled mess, transformed into a thing of beauty, solved by my own two hands.
It wasn’t a sub-two-minute speed solve, but the satisfaction was pure gold.
The most impactful line that I found from this Ted-talk is “The major barrier to skill acquisition isn’t intellectual, but emotional.” — J.K
He was right. It wasn’t the lack of intelligence, but the lack of patience, the urge to give up, that held me back.
The 20-hour rule wasn’t about a magic number; it was about a mindset shift, a commitment to overcome the emotional hurdles.
So, the next time you find yourself lost in meaningless scrolling, remember: the 20-hour rule isn’t just about Rubik’s cubes or exams.
It’s about unlocking the potential within, one dedicated hour at a time.
And who knows, you might surprise yourself with what you can achieve. Here’s to getting the ABCs right in the first 20 hours. 4x4 cube, here I come!
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