When Larry Page and Sergey Brin, the intellectual duo who founded Google, first conceived of establishing Google, their main motivation was to organize all the information and knowledge in the world to make them accessible and useful to everybody. Sure enough, they were able to achieve this goal, and nowadays, anyone can readily access and learn information via Google. For this reason, it seems preposterous and unreasonable nowadays for someone not to be informed and learned for almost all the information that one can learn are readily available online. Yet, one thing is needed to learn a new knowledge and skill in life—enough motivation.
Two Kinds of Motivation
The motivations to learn online can either be external or internal. External motivations are the reasons outside of your personality that stimulate you to learn despite all odds. Internal motivations are the inner stimuli that move you to learn something. Both kinds of motivations can be very effective in driving you to learn new skill and knowledge; although internal motivation is stronger because it emanates from within.
How to Become a Motivated Learner?
- The famous author of “The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People,” Stephen Covey, once said that “everything is created twice: first, in the mind; then, in reality.” Likewise, learning is also created twice, first, you have to visualize yourself having a particular skill and knowledge; then, actualize what you have visualized in reality.
- Moreover, you have to write down your goals. Remember the old saying that “everything that is not written readily flies away.” If you have written your learning goals, you can always look back to what you have written and remind yourself of what you have set forth to achieve at the onset.
- Next, you got to divide the online learning process into achievable modules. There are subject matters online which are in modular forms. You can use these modules to facilitate your learning of new skill and knowledge. Similarly, if you divide your learning task into achievable modules, you can easily avoid getting frustrated by being overburdened with so many things to learn at the same time.
- You also need to reward yourself for successfully achieving and learning a particular module. Treat yourself to a hefty lunch once you have thoroughly learned a particular module for you definitely deserve a reward for achieving something.
- Additionally, you should also sport a positive attitude towards online learning. Remember, if you develop a positive attitude towards learning, even the most difficult subject matter online can be readily learned and mastered.
- Lastly, you should tag along with you a friend with similar interest to learn online subject matter. In this way, both of you can motivate each other, especially, in instances wherein one of you feels demotivated.
Principles to Help You Focus While Learning Online
Before you engage in learning online, first, you should ask yourself these basic questions: “What are the things in your life that you are not doing now, which if you do regularly would make a tremendous impact on your life? Second, what online course and knowledge should you study on a regular basis which would radically alter your present life? The answers to these questions will guide you on what online subject matters you should focus on.
Knowing that a particular knowledge and skill will have a tremendous impact in your life will give you enough impetus to learn that particular skill and knowledge. Say, for instance, your job is a travel guide guiding tourists around the nice places of Latin America. If you know Spanish language fluently, you will surely enhance your ability to communicate with your clients. Hence, it behooves you to learn the Spanish Language online to improve your communication with your clients.
Moreover, you need to know your priority and put aside the less important things in favor of the more important things. There are many distractions online which may divert your attention from thoroughly learning a subject matter. Hence, you should learn to prioritize the more important matters instead of letting yourself get distracted by less important matters.
Available Online Studies
If you are a student, for example, who wants additional learning, you can easily enroll online in some of the top-notch universities within the convenience of your room. Likewise, if you are an employee who wants to further improve your skill and knowledge, you can readily avail yourself of online education. There are video courses online which you can easily access, and examples of these are the Cyber Academy, OpenCourse Ware Consortium of MIT, the Khan Academy, Academic Earth, and iTunes U.
Lastly, learning online can be fun and exciting, especially if you have the needed motivation and you are aware that you are making progress in the skills and knowledge that you intend to learn. Always remember that learning is necessary, and without additional learning, your personality will definitely stagnate and your brain cells will surely atrophy.
