The hare and tortoise - sequel

Hare flung the beer bottle at the tortoise in anger. It was empty and thanks to its previous contents, both of them were tipsy now.

'Thaakk !!' - It hit hard on the shell of tortoise's back and broke.

'You broke the bottle, now you clean it', shrieked the hare as he stormed out of the room and out of the flat in anger.

The tortoise had ample time to think as he slowly swept clean the broken glass pieces. Times had changed much since he had won the epic race against the hare. Everyone multi-tasked now. The hare was the star in this fast moving world. Both of them were roomies. They shared the flat and worked in the same software company.

Tortoise and Hare had been arguing about doing the prestigious J2I certification. Anyone could study and do it over time and it signalled the full transition from Jaanwar to Insaan. That is not what they were arguing about. Hare wanted to do all 5 modules at the same time. Tortoise had patiently tried explaining that at best they had one study hour a day and each module of 20 hours would take a month to complete.

Over the course of next month, when it came to doing the actual studies, the hare was no-hare to be seen. 'Let me know when you are doing the final module, he had told the tortoise and I will start then'.

On the other hand the tortoise had thought about it long and hard and decided to spend an hour studying every day. 'This will be a rule for me'. 'I will study day after day but only on weekdays', Tortoise had told himself. The weekends are for chilling and recharging.

The first day, when he came back from work, Tortoise was already too tired from the long day. He flopped on the couch next to Hare, who was busy watching TV. He tiredly watch the Hare surfing the content. He could not bring himself to study for one hour after all this. So he crashed on the couch itself, that night.

Unlike the Hare the Tortoise has a long commute to work, though they both worked in the same office. He was thinking about his situation on the way to work and not feeling too good about himself. This distracted him too.

Just then, a hare brained 2 wheeler cut in front of him and the Tortoise struggled. 'Once I am going, I am just not able to change course', he muttered to himself. And then a bulb lit up. Of course that is the answer. I should not tell myself to do 1 hour of studying after I get back. It is enough if my study rule says, study for only 2 minutes. Me being me, once I get going, I will end up studying longer. The tortoise smiled to himself.

True enough that evening, when the tortoise sat down to study for 2 minutes - he could not help himself and kept going for a full hour. He felt quiet good about himself as he made Maggi and gulped it down in a record 20 minutes, after his studies.

Over the next week, the Tortoise figured out another hack that eventually put him on top of his class. He began to put his long commute to good use by switching over to audio books and listening on the way. Yes !!

No prizes here for guessing who got certified at the end of 5 months. A red faced Hare came over to the Tortoise and mentioned that he was thinking of joining another startup. The Tortoise told the hare with a straight face, 'Oh! you must do it. You must be all fired up to do so.'' Which indeed he was.

And so from then on the Tortoise had the whole flat - and not to mention the TV remote - to himself and lived happily ever after.

Recap

There are some things Tortoise did very well as a self directed learner.

One - Tortoise was realistic when making plans. He did not take on an unreasonable target for himself Two - His plans involved studying day after day on a consistent basis but without tiring himself out too much (remember his weekend rule?) Three - He learnt to take advantage of his natural strengths. His long commute - which was a bug earlier - became a feature ! Four - most importantly. He stuck with it.

Have you been presented with a similar dilemma? What did you do?