Habits

10 Life lessons learnt from playing Elevate App

After suffering from lack of apps in a Windows phone, I bought an android phone for the first time last year. I was as excited as a kid who got a new toy. I drowned myself in the quest of finding the right apps for my phone. That was when I came across this app – Elevate. After 8 months of using this, I don’t know if I have really trained my brain. I don’t know if I am sharper and more focussed. But when I write, I am more conscious of the words I choose. I try to avoid redundancy. When I do math, I definitely do quick calculations. When I read, I am more sensitive to the grammatical mistakes others have made. These learnings are just one side of the picture. Yesterday I could not stop myself from admiring the design of the app which has lead to its success. No doubt, ‘Apple’ has called this as ‘App of the year’.


These are the lessons which the app has taught me:

  1. Life is not unidimensional – When you first login to the app, you notice that the app asks you questions across a few areas and not just one. You will be successful in life, by not strengthening yourself in one area but across multiple areas.
  2. Compare rightly: The app tells you how many points you have scored everyday. It tells your percentile range with your age group and not across all age groups. Even in life, you can only compare how much you have progressed from yesterday to today. You can only see how much could you have done for your age. Any other comparison does not make sense.
  3. Invest just a little time everyday: You don’t become a genius overnight. But you can definitely become a genius with small efforts everyday. The app allows you to play only 3 games everyday. In that way, it does not become addictive. Also, if you want to become best at something in life, all you need to do is spend time on it everyday but not once a week.
  4. Work on basics: In order to train you to be a math genius, the app does not test you on calculus. It tests you on fractions, percentages and divisions. Similarly, if you want to be successful, work on making your foundation strong. The building will stand by itself.
  5. Attitude matters more than aptitude: I was bad at listening section of the app. I ignored it for a very long time. But then I realised that by avoiding it all the time, I am not going to improve from a miracle. I need to work on my weakness. Now my listening scores are in par with the other sections .
  6. It is okay to not be good at everything: I am doing exceptional in Math, good in reading and writing and okay in speaking and listening. And that is perfectly okay. Because I can’t be equal in everything. I need to make use of my strengths and work on improving in my weak areas. Surprisingly, it aptly shows my strengths and weaknesses of real life.
  7. Life gives you a choice: You can play 3 games on elevate daily. It shows you only 3 headings. But behind every heading another game is hidden. That does not make it 6 games. But for each game, you have a choice to play that or the other one. You can only choose one from two. Even in life, you always a choice. But it will not be explicit. You need to explore. You need to make the right choice.
  8. Small mistakes can cost you a lot: When you make even one mistake while playing a game, you won’t get an excellent score. To be excellent, you need to learn your way away from the pitfalls.
  9. Review your mistakes: The app sends you a list of errors you have made to review. Similarly in life, you need to review your mistakes to keep going forward.
  10. Life is a journey not a destination: 300 is the upper limit to points you can score in a game. I reached that in measuring. All through the journey, I was looking forward to reach in at least one game. Now I have reached that. What next? Is it over? Waiting to reach destination will not help us enjoy what we already have. Reaching the destination makes us feel that is it already over? So just enjoy the process.


Happy elevating!

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