Trying to understand

What does one do when one does not understand? Keep staring at it so that it is in the front of your mind most of the time. In due course, after few days or months or years, one gets some feeling of familiarity and understanding. “His peculiar gift was the power of holding continuously in his mind a purely mental problem until he had seen straight through it. “ That was Keynes on Newton.  Well, one may not be able to see through it like Newton, but it seems to help. I was reminded of this when a collaborator used some material of whose basics I did not well and stared it for about six days before convincing myself. There were times when it took months or years. Here is a link to the Keynes article   Newton, the Man.