Main components of learning

There are essentially three components when it comes to learning new things:"Cognition, metacognition, and motivation"Let’s review their definitions one by one as well as how to make improvements in each component.

Cognition
Cognition is your ability to solve things. You could have high cognition for mathematics but not for music for example.

Cognition can be improved through exercise, meditation or mindfulness, good nutrition, and so on:

My Learning Trajectory, Chapter Two: Things That Increase The Quality of My Learning

Metacognition
This one is commonly defined as “thinking about thinking” i.e. analyzing your own cognition.

If you don’t “naturally” possess a certain degree of cognition, this is the one you should focus on to improve:

People who learn how to learn can outperform those with very high IQs. Much of it comes down to “metacognition,” paying close attention to how you are thinking, writes Center for American Progress’ Ulrich Boser.

Or this quote showing the importance of metacognition:

I recommend reading the Wikipedia article on metacognition, and especially its components (metacognitive knowledge, regulation, experiences etc.) to understand how to make improvements in each component:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metacognition#Components

A second important component of metacognition is metamemory i.e. knowing how your memory works and how to improve it. This can be done via techniques like the method of loci:

Are Metacognitive Skills Domain-Specific?
from Wikipedia:"There is no distinction between domain-general and domain-specific metacognitive skills. This means that metacognitive skills are domain-general in nature and there are no specific skills for certain subject areas. The metacognitive skills that are used to review an essay are the same as those that are used to verify an answer to a math question."

Motivation
The last important component of learning is motivation. It doesn’t matter how good your cognition or metacognition is if you don’t have the motivation to learn at all.

(There does seem to be a positive correlation between metacognition and motivation, namely that those with better metacognitive skills learn things more easily and thus are more motivated to learn more).

Changing your environment in such a way that it promotes motivation to learn is much more effective than trying to fight and combat your “laziness”:

Why Willpower Doesn’t Work

You can imagine how it’s difficult to make homework with your phone next to you while receiving hundreds of text messages. Trying to combat that via willpower doesn’t work. Instead, just placing your phone elsewhere is much more effective. Read the article linked above to find out more behind this concept.