but I often find myself providing a drawn-out response to a question that other Monks answer in a few lines of usually fairly complex code.
First of all, drawn-out responses are often far easier to learn from than quick one-liners. Secondly, other than to figure out faster ways of learning, I wouldn't focus on the time, or amount of typing it takes to learn something. See The Path to Mastery for more on that idea.
What should I do? Pick up more books? Look through professional level code? What is the normal next step
Reading books and other's code are decent ways of learning, but I've found that starting a project is far more effective. Consider some of the ideas in Where the inspiration comes from ? and you should be on your way. :)
