In the past few months, I went from knowing almost nothing about crypto to minting NFTs, launching my own token, and getting a job at a crypto startup.

Here's the method I used to get up to speed in no time, and how you can use it to master any subject.

(a thread)

Community

Join a community of people interested in the subject you’re trying to learn.

It doesn’t matter if they’re experts or starting out like you.

You'll get extra motivation to continue learning, help when looking for resources, and make good friends along the way.

For crypto, I'd recommend joining the @tech0ptimist Telegram group (link in their bio).

I really like it because it's:

- Small enough for people to chat casually and share what they’re working on.

- Big enough to have many smart people who can help you out when you get stuck.

Figuring out the unknown

Learning is hard because, when you're starting, you don't really know what you're looking for.

This is why, once you understand the fundamentals, it's much easier to learn new things on top of them.

You need to figure out what small parts make up your space before you learn how they relate to each other.

I do this by skimming through a bunch of resources (more on finding those in a second) for keywords that are repeated over and over.

Some examples of these "isolated concepts" in crypto would be:

- Differences between encryption and hashing
- Blockchain
- Ethereum network
- Smart contracts
- Ethereum tokens
- NFTs

If you don't look into these individually, you won't get how they come together later.

Research (Reading Stuff)

After you’ve identified those concepts, you need to learn more about them individually and collectively.

I start by searching for high-level articles and Twitter threads. Once I feel like I've understood those, I search for articles made by experts.

If you get stuck, turn to your community!

- Ask for resources that answer specific questions! (like “how do smart contracts work”)

- Ask for help with a part of an article you got stuck in!

You can also try reaching out to the authors themselves (Twitter is awesome for this).

Some resources I used when getting started:

- The Bitcoin Whitepaper (surprisingly approachable)
- The Ethereum website
- The Ethereum documentation
- @forefront__ & @seedclubhq's "Crypto trends in 2020" report
- @a16z's "NFT Canon" resource

Links to everything at the end

Learn by Building

Over the years, I’ve found that I learn best by putting knowledge into practice.

I try to think of the smallest possible thing I could build that includes one of the new concepts I’m trying to learn but also others I’m already used to.

I could have jumped straight to learning to write smart contracts, but instead started by building a @viamirror client.

This included a new concept (fetching decentralized data from @ArweaveTeam), but also using Next.js and Tailwind, something I’ve been doing for years now.

Do this a few times, either adding a new concept to your existing project, or starting a new one, and you’ll be surprised at how well you can work with them.

Learn in Public

"The best way to learn is to teach someone else"

Share what you’re learning publicly!

Write articles, Twitter threads (like this one!), share new things you just discovered in your community, etc.

- Creates new resources for others to find and learn from (making their journey easier!)

- Build an audience around your subject and earn credibility in the space.

- People can correct you when you get something wrong, and add context when there are multiple takes on a subject.

Learning and building in public is what has allowed me to get a following of crypto people here, win the @viamirror race, chat with super smart people and get a job working on crypto!

None of that would have happened if I had just learned quietly.

Keep Up!

Tech moves fast (and crypto moves 100x faster).

You need some way of keeping up with the times or you’ll miss out on all the new things in the space.

You could spend hours looking through Reddit and Twitter every week, but it's better to find curated resources.

@DefiantNews is a great example of this.

Their daily newsletter includes:

- Relevant news on crypto and Ethereum
- Profiles on new trends and projects in the space
- Interviews with influential people

Plus awesome tutorials on YouTube, and much more!

There’s a newsletter like this waiting for you on whichever space you’re diving into (and if there’s not, start one!).

There are assumptions backed on this learning strategy (for example, it assumes you’re learning a technical subject), but I still think it’s a great method to use when approaching a new space.

Hopefully, it’ll help you dive into crypto or anything else you want to learn!

Hope you enjoyed this thread!

A slightly longer version is available on my @viamirror blog, check it out for links to all the resources listed above! https://m1guelpf.blog/post/how-to-learn-crypto

You can follow me @m1guelpf for more threads about web3, crypto, and my journey coming very soon!

If you want to help me help others, you can also RT the first tweet

Have a nice day!