I'm with you but I think it depends on the person. I have actually found people to be very different in this regard. For instance, I work in data science and

I'm with you but I think it depends on the person. I have actually found people to be very different in this regard. For instance, I work in data science and a lot of my peers like to learn about new techniques by applying them to real problems or working with datasets and exploring. I don't like that approach. I always like to learn the theory of something before using it. Similarly, I had the goal of learning math for statistics and general relativity among other subjects. But my desire to have a deep understanding, ended up with me essentially learning the equivalent an undergraduate math degree and selected graduate level topics. In my case, just learning in a bottom up way with maybe a slight direction would have been sufficient.