Focus on one topic or project at a time. It is very easy to fall in to the trap of consuming too much information at once if you are focusing on too many different things at the same time. That seems obvious, but we continue to do it. Do you read multiple books at the same time (excluding fiction, which, presumably, you not trying to learn from)? Even if the books are on different topics (i.e. how to write better and how to learn Chinese), you are likely absorbing very little information from either. This problem magnifies once we add in our RSS feeds that focus on a third, fourth, or even tenth subject, and then try to apply things that we learn from those posts. Sure, we did this in high school or college, but as adults I think that we process information different, considering all of the other external factors we face.
How can you fix this? Focus on one thing at a time. It sounds simple enough and it is, if you try. It doesn’t mean that you can’t shift gears after you finish the material you are currently on, even if you have more materials on the same subject that you want to read – just don’t try to absorb two different topics at the same time.