I recently went on a two full day Photoshop course.  I have been planning to do so for a long time, although actually I wanted to go on an Adobe Premiere Pro course for video editing.  The Adobe Premiere Pro course was not available and I thought that instead of forever trying to fiddle around with books and save the money a course costs, I should try the course instead.  I was quite apprehensive about it, thinking that I would endure some poor quality lecturing or some Mickey Mouse training college, etc.  I was very relieved to discover that the course was in fact excellently taught by a man who clearly knows Photoshop better than most Priests know the Bible, and has extensively lectured on the topic, and is also the author of a published book on Photoshop and Lightroom.  

It has certainly given me the green light to start going on more courses again because, although at times I felt really mentally drained, I realised that I am just somebody who loves being a student.  In other words, I love learning from people who know more than me on a variety of subjects.  There is no quicker way to expand your knowledge and to have the benefit of somebody who knows more than you to teach or lecture you and there are so many areas in which all of us, unless you are a “know-it-all”, can learn.  

It does not mean you have to pay the person to learn something from them.  It might well be that you know somebody who is good in a particular field or particular type of thing and who is effectively mentoring you for free with advice anyway.  I am sure that I will forget many of the things I have learned, despite the notes I took, but I certainly plan to take more courses going forward – and not just in computer software. For example, I would love to go on a cooking course for example just to try that – not learning how to cook everything, but maybe just one or two meals.  To be able to cook them superbly and make the sauces yourself as opposed to buying them is a skill and it is something I wish I had learnt when I was younger.

What I did realise, while sitting in class for two days, is that when you work on things that you understand and know, you don’t strain your brain that much.  Some of you who for example study a second language in your spare time will know how good that is for the brain - and I have not been doing anything like that for years.  I would literally stagger away from the lectures, feeling almost like a moron who could not remember anything.  Things I could do in class that seemed so simple I could not repeat at home an hour later on Photoshop, although after the second day I was a lot better.  The lessons I learnt in that regard could be a host of blog topics including: to keep your brain working you need to stretch your brain and not just read things that interest you all the time; taking your own notes, even if you are supplied with notes, will always make it easier for you to remember things, keep you more focused and sharp.  Another thing that interests me, and maybe it is something I will explore in another blog later, was that there was a 42 year old man on the course with me who is a web developer and he told me that he takes half a pill of Ritalin each day and then he focuses much better!