Despite that — or, maybe, because — my father was a math academic, I did poorly in school with math beyond basic arithmetic. When I was about 25 years old, a fr

Despite that — or, maybe, because — my father was a math academic, I did poorly in school with math beyond basic arithmetic. When I was about 25 years old, a friend gave me three algebra textbooks written by an ex-military pilot, John Saxon. In a marathon session lasting about two weeks, I went through all three books from end-to-end and really learned algebra. For whatever reasons, the Saxon books worked really well for me — better than any other learning I have ever gotten from a textbook. Yes, I was really motivated but I attribute a lot of my success learning algebra to those books. Learning that opened a lot of doors since then, mostly because my confidence in taking on matters technical was so much improved.