Watching tutorials feels like progress. Getting stuck on your own is where it actually happens.
CREATIVITY
WHAT THIS MEANS
Watching someone competent is smooth and pleasant and teaches you very little, because your brain is following instead of generating. Being stuck feels bad for the same reason it works: you are forced to retrieve and decide rather than nod along. Smooth and effective are rarely the same thing here.
Cap yourself at one video and then close it. Build the thing badly from memory and allow twenty minutes of being lost before you look anything up. Go back to the tutorial only for the exact place you jammed.
A QUESTION TO SIT WITH
How many hours of tutorials have you watched without building anything?
MORE IN LEARNING & CURIOSITY
- Japanese uses three writing systems at once. Hard things get learned anyway, one character at a time.
- The past isn’t a straight line of progress. Plenty of good ideas got lost and found again later.
- Good questions usually start small. “What’s this part called?” opens bigger doors than “explain everything.”
Free, with nothing to buy inside it.