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This email is going to cover the Feynman technique, a method I used extensively during the MIT Challenge. The idea is inspired by the Nobel laureate Richard Feynman, who was famous for his ability to grasp hard ideas intuitively.

You may have heard me talk about the Feynman technique before, or perhaps have watched the short demonstration video I have here:

However, today I’m going to go beyond what I’ve talked about before, and provide you additional instruction for making the best use of this powerful method.

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The Basics

The Feynman technique is fairly simple:

1. Take out a piece of paper and write down the name of the idea you want to master.
2. Write, using your own words, an explanation of the idea as if you were teaching it to someone else.
3. When you get stuck, go back to your notes, textbook, a peer or a teacher to help with that specific detail.

The Feynman technique works for two reasons. First, by articulating the ideas, you reinforce your initial understanding of the idea. Second, articulating the idea allows you to narrow down your misunderstandings to smaller details. Many times during the MIT Challenge, I felt I couldn’t understand a broad concept, it turned out the failing was on a specific detail I had missed.

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When should you use the Feynman technique?

The Feynman technique is powerful, but it’s also time consuming. It’s simply not possible to apply it on every idea you cover with the thoroughness that would make it truly effective. Doing so will likely cut into your practice time, which should always be the foundation of your learning.

Instead, view it as a laser, focusing exactly on your weak points. Just as connecting ideas can reinforce ideas that stubbornly refuse to be remembered, the Feynman technique can reinforce ideas that refuse to be understood.

I suggest using your practice testing as a guide for what to apply the Feynman technique for. If you’re struggling with a particular category of problems, say those dealing with torque in physics or the categorical imperative in philosophy, that’s a great opportunity to set aside twenty minutes to do a Feynman technique.

In particular, here’s what I’d look for when doing practice problems to bring up areas where applying a Feynman technique might make sense:

1. When you don’t understand a particular concept at all. Practice won’t help with this, but a Feynman technique can.
2. When you don’t understand a solution process. Such as if you can’t see why a particular set of steps leads to the correct answer, or you have no idea how to tackle particular categories of problems.
3. When you lack a good intuition about a concept. Intuitions about abstract ideas are incredibly useful. If you only have a mechanical ability to solve problems, but no clear mental pictures for intuitively solving them, use this technique.
4. When an idea is foundational to other, more difficult concepts. Sometimes it helps to go back and apply this method for the most basic ideas, simply because understanding them more deeply can create a stronger foundation for further ideas.

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How to use the Feynman technique to maximize your understanding

Start by narrowing your idea as much as possible. The Feynman technique is a process of narrowing down on a particular misunderstanding. If you start with too broad a search you can either spend hours writing about every detail, or write too vaguely and skip over your specific misunderstanding entirely.

That’s why I suggest getting clear, from the start, what you intend to understand with each application of the technique.

If you’re trying to get an intuitive picture of the idea as a whole, focus your efforts on explaining the concept through examples and then moving to analogies or metaphors as you feel more comfortable.

If you’re trying to explain a solution process, go through each step individually with a concrete example and explain why each step is necessary to the final result.

If you don’t understand an idea at all, use the technique to do a survey from which you can narrow down into more detailed iterations or return back to practice problems to figure out which subsections you’re having difficulty understanding.

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How to teach yourself the hardest ideas

To me, the real power of this method is it allows you to teach yourself the hardest ideas. Before I started using this method, I wouldn’t have had the confidence to tackle MIT graduate classes in computer science without peers or a teacher.

However, the technique can replace some of the functions of a teacher because it can guide you to forming the correct understanding of an idea on your own. The key is to do the technique with your studying material open, carefully going through every word of the original explanation.

To do this, open up your book or notes to the idea that utterly baffles you. Then take each sentence of the explanation and paraphrase it so that you understand it yourself. Change jargon words, symbols or complicated words into lengthier, more easily understood descriptions. Keep writing your explanation until you feel satisfied that you’ve understood every word of the original explanation.

If you still can’t get it from that original explanation, look online for alternate descriptions and go back and forth between the different source materials. Again, go word-by-word, paraphrasing the original explanation and original examples so that you’re confident you’ve correctly understood each part.

Once you’ve done this process, you can try closing the book and repeating the entire explanation with a different example or analogy.

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How can you use this idea to learn better?

Once again, I want you to apply this idea immediately so it won’t be forgotten. Doing a complete Feynman technique, particularly if you’re using it with the side-by-side paraphrase of an original explanation, can take as much as an hour or two if done correctly.

I know you’re busy, and may be reading this without much time, so instead I’ll keep the homework simple:

For right now…

Take one idea you’ve learned recently. Instead of writing it out on paper, speak aloud and take 3 minutes to explain the idea to yourself as if you’re teaching it to someone.

If you’re in an office or public place and feel self-conscious about talking to yourself, open a word document and quickly type it over three minutes. Just saying it in your head isn’t enough.

For next time you’re learning…

Next time you encounter an idea that fits the criteria I mentioned above (don’t understand it at all, don’t understand the solution process, lack a good intuition or discover a foundational concept you haven’t mastered yet), set aside a Pomodoro for doing the technique.

If the idea is truly baffling, walk through it side-by-side with the source material. If you only need to build an intuition off a mechanical understanding, spend your time trying to craft good examples and analogies like a good teacher would.

That’s it for today. In Learning on Steroids, I give full walkthroughs of these variants of the Feynman technique, as well as other techniques to deepen your understanding such as deep linking, concept debugging and matching the deep structure of ideas in analogies.

Tomorrow focus on how to learn skills more quickly.