Have you ever taken a 3 hour exam and noticed a few people leaving a good 60 minutes before anyone else has even finished? Perhaps later you find out that one or two of these early finishers actually got high marks on their exams. Maybe you even discover that one of them got the highest overall marks in the class.
So you are left thinking that this person must be freakishly smart. Ironically, the early finisher is often thinking the opposite: “.. people who are great at something are not so much convinced of their own greatness as mystified at why everyone else seems so incompetent. ” – Paul Graham
If you went and talked to most of these early finishers, they would be hard pressed to tell you why or how they manage to do so well and do it fast. As it happens, in-between procrastination at high school and university, I occasionally pulled off the feat of finishing an exam way ahead of everyone while still getting 90% or better on the exam. I also knew a few early finishers in university, and I talked to them about how they did it, using my personal experience to corroborate what the “trick” is.
Ultimately, it boils down to speed. The trick is to push yourself to answer problems as fast as you can. Also, you want to get instant feedback on each problem and find out if you got it right or wrong.
For example, when doing a math problem out of the textbook, do the ones that have an answer in the back of the book. Do it as fast as you can, then look it up at the back, and if you got it wrong, figure out why and then move on. It can feel uncomfortable when you are going so fast, because it feels like you are out of control and that you might miss a crucial step. That is a normal feeling and perfectly acceptable.
I have observed that the bulk of students, including many slow but straight A students try to consciously solve the math problems. They go at it slow enough to understand the problem at a conscious level, and rigidly follow all the steps. As a result, they take ages to solve one math problem. There is no particular benefit to doing it this way, you aren’t going to be right more often, but you will feel more in control.
Going fast works, but why does it?
Well, I think it is because our pre-frontal cerebral cortex (where the frontal lobes are) is the most recently evolved part of the human brain. This is primarily where our consciousness is located, and it is only taking up a fraction of our brain. What about the rest of our brain? It has been around a heck of lot longer evolutionarily speaking, and it has survived millions of years to get to where it is now. Where do you think your instincts or gut feelings come from?
The rest of your brain that is not “you” (your consciousness), has a lot more computational resources and is a lot smarter than your consciousness can be. That is how it can detect things “you” didn’t notice, and report this as instincts to your consciousness. Check out dirtsimple.org’s Multiple Self article for a similar explanation about how you are not your consciousness.
Now that you know that your conscious part of your brain isn’t that smart, and that you have a lot more resources in your reach, how can you access that? Well, that is the tricky and uncomfortable part. Ultimately, it is about going faster than your consciousness can handle, and trusting in the rest of your brain. It requires a fair amount of faith, but the results will astonish you if you can take the leap.
Note: This applies to all technical & memorization-heavy subjects.