Comments on: Do Something Easy, Or Nothing At All. There Is No Hard.

By: Marcos

Marcos — Mon, 22 Jul 2019 21:00:25 +0000

nice going

By: When Are You Going to Stop Trying to Score Only Three-Pointers, Start Making Friends with Mediocrity and Start Realizing That Excellence Comes From the Rejection of Perfection? | AJATT | All Japanese All The Time

Sat, 05 Apr 2014 15:38:27 +0000

[…] Do Something Easy, Or Nothing At All. There Is No Hard. […]

By: You Have Only Three Choices | AJATT | All Japanese All The Time

You Have Only Three Choices | AJATT | All Japanese All The Time — Fri, 06 Dec 2013 00:07:07 +0000

[…] Do nothing […]

By: Stop Trying To Do Things Well: Getting Over Zero | AJATT | All Japanese All The Time

Thu, 29 Aug 2013 19:07:26 +0000

[…] do things right, start doing them at all. The “right” thing may be the hard thing, but only the easy and fun thing actually works because you’re only gonna actually (consistently) do the easy and fun […]

By: chet

chet — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 02:34:32 +0000

…or “don’t tell yourself you’re going to do something you won’t do.” very sensible, but actually quite tricky for many of us who love to dream big and get that little boost from imagining all the hard work we’re going to do to get there. Being realistic means accepting that we might just be too lazy to do all that. but ok, let’s just take this one small activity that isn’t too strenuous, but a bit challenging or stimulating, and do that. anyway, got your point, just fleshing it out a bit.

By: chet

chet — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 02:31:59 +0000

I think you make a good point about not being unrealistic about what you are going to do, and kind of tricking yourself into making progress by allowing yourself to do very small easy things that don’t seem like work.
But, on the other hand, you’re kind of just playing with semantics, or redefining words if you will. You might as well just say “don’t do something you won’t do.” The traditional wisdom is that doing the “hard” thing is sometimes more rewarding than doing the “easy” thing. I think there is something to that my friend. But, I get your point.

By: Flemmard

Flemmard — Wed, 31 Aug 2011 01:00:51 +0000

That’s it – “studious” can mean absorbing, nourishing – even relaxing if you have the right attitude.

I think I’ve always found SRS reps interesting in themselves, because the subject matter of course motivates me. And the better I get – or the less I suck – the more interesting it gets, because I appreciate and retain the nuances of the material better.

But I had trouble fully enjoying it because to me, it was simply maintenance, not progress. Adding SRS cards was like shopping for funky new Japanese hipster clothes, reviewing them like doing the laundry. 🙁

But I feel now that adding an SRS card to a deck is like adding a weight disc to a barbell – it’s just the starting point. Then you gotta start the heavy lifting. 🙂

By: Drewskie

Drewskie — Wed, 31 Aug 2011 00:25:58 +0000

“Boredom is sometimes – sometimes! – simply a question of mindset:”

I think that’s a really important point. Sometimes I see people poo-poo the entire concept of SRSing as boring and thus counter-productive, but not everything studious necessarily needs to be boring. If you approach it with the right mindset, stop when you’re tired, and maybe add a little sugar to the medicine, it can be a lot of fun.

By: 魔法少女☆かなたん

魔法少女☆かなたん — Tue, 30 Aug 2011 22:23:02 +0000

Reviewing cards is not so much a chore, as long as you make sure they’re not too hard (ideally, I find they individually should include one or two recently learned new concepts at most), not too easy (stuff that you can already read without a problem), and not too long.
Having silly ones helps too. One of my favorites, which I got from Uncyclopedia (bit.ly/mTFc25 , and which kind of breaks the too long rule, but it’s fine because it’s awesome) is: 従って、名古屋共和国内の日本国民は、一般的には名古屋人同士の会話を理解できない。 (Therefore, Japanese citizens in the Nagoya Republic generally cannot understand conversations between Nagoyans.) It helped me remember 従って and 同士.
Remember, SRS value = 0 if your cards suck.

By: Flemmard

Flemmard — Tue, 30 Aug 2011 17:44:15 +0000

Boredom is sometimes – sometimes! – simply a question of mindset: how you consciously approach or value a particular activity. One mistake I made initially was to focus exclusively on the number of cards in my SRS deck. Adding cards was fun, because it was quick, quantifiable progress. Reviewing cards was a monotonous chore to simply keep from losing what I had already learned. In reality, of course, reviewing the cards is what really makes them penetrate into your long-term memory. So each SRS rep is objective progress. So the value of your SRS deck doesn’t equal the number of cards, but roughly:

SRS deck value = number of cards x average number of reps per card

So you can keep track of your total number of accumulated reps as a measure of progress. Or rather, since reviewing the same card 20 times in a single hour won’t help a jot, there’s also the time factor. What counts is reviewing a card many times over a period of time, so :

SRS deck value = number of cards x average number of reps per card x average maturity of cards measured in months

…Or something like that. So, time doesn’t take things from you, by making you forget, but objectively helps you by letting things sink in – all the way down to the dank, deep-sea bottom
of your long-term memory. So it’s better to start today, and do a little, than in two months from now and do a lot. A well-aged SRS deck is like a fine wine (or a fine smelly cheese). 🙂

So perhaps an ideal would be: 10000 sentences x 10 reps each card x an average of 3-4 months’ maturity per card (or whatever make sense mathematically).

By: Reading Is Skimming | AJATT | All Japanese All The Time

Reading Is Skimming | AJATT | All Japanese All The Time — Thu, 11 Aug 2011 01:38:00 +0000

[…] Reading is not all or nothing. It’s some or nothing. It’s easy or nothing. […]

By: Lon Cherryholmes

Lon Cherryholmes — Sun, 17 Jul 2011 09:46:57 +0000

Great advice! But it reminded me a lot of of the joke:

There are three types of people in the world: those who can count, and those who can’t.

By: Język angielski trzeba znać, ale co jeśli nie lubię… | Język Angielski dla każdego - Ucz się sam!

Wed, 06 Jul 2011 10:32:43 +0000

[…] tego czy nauczysz się angielskiego czy nie zależały twoje życie. 🙂 Jak napisał Khatzumoto w swoim poście, zaplanuj sobie robienie czegoś trudnego, a w dłuższej perspektywie, sprowadzi się to do tego […]

By: Anotherkanjisite

Anotherkanjisite — Mon, 04 Jul 2011 22:40:57 +0000

That’s excellent. Nothing can stand in the way of undying conviction. Congrats on having a clear mind and I hope you inspire those who know you as well! がんばれ!

By: 3-Day Monks Revisited | Japanese On A Dime

3-Day Monks Revisited | Japanese On A Dime — Sun, 03 Jul 2011 18:08:25 +0000

[…] was reading a newer post on AJATT, here if you wanna read it, it’s short but good. As I read the comments though, I found a really […]

By: O nauce języków, nie tylko angielskiego – linki, czerwiec ’11 | Język Angielski dla każdego - Ucz się sam!

Thu, 30 Jun 2011 14:04:09 +0000

[…] Do Something Easy, Or Nothing At All. There Is No Hard. – Interesujące spostrzeżenie na temat wyboru drogi. Wybierając trudną i nieprzyjemną ścieżkę, tak naprawdę podświadomie decydujesz o nieuniknionej przyszłej rezygnacji z podróży. Równie dobrze mógłbyś nie wyruszać w podróż w ogóle. “Without understanding what the other person says, what you say does not matter. There is no conversation.” […]

By: Learn Hiragana

Learn Hiragana — Sun, 26 Jun 2011 01:06:28 +0000

“Telling yourself to do something hard is the same thing as telling yourself to do nothing at all. ” OR, telling yourself to be righteous and do it no matter how much you suffer doing it…

I agree with what you say Khatz: As long as you have in your mind “this is HARD” it will either not get done, or get done in a mediocre way, or get done after too much suffering and perspiration… it’s always better to start as small as one can handle, and from then take on bigger challenges. Thanks again for a short yet insightful post man. Muchas gracias! 😀

By: Eighth Linkfest

Eighth Linkfest — Sat, 25 Jun 2011 20:09:56 +0000

[…] Khatzumoto: Do something easy or nothing at all. There is no hard. […]

By: Andrew

Andrew — Tue, 21 Jun 2011 07:16:18 +0000

Not necessarily easy, but fun. Fun can be very difficult, some of the most rewarding things in life are very, very, very difficult, but people still do them because they’re worth it.

Cheers,
Andrew

By: Areckx

Areckx — Sun, 19 Jun 2011 00:12:44 +0000

Oh, I think I know what you are referring to~! I read about that somewhere. I put a bunch of post-it notes all over my room in the locations of where I put certain things, I learned “mado” <> really effectively that way!