Interested in the secret to solving really hard problems and understanding tough concepts? It's really simple. So simple, in fact, it can be summed up in a single word. Instead of calling problems you encounter in papers, class, problem sets, exams, or research "hard," call them "INTERESTING."
This single, seemingly insignificant, change in word choice is one commonality I notice in faculty and many sharp graduate students. I can recall many times being in a graduate course, and a Professor would describe a hella tough concept as being really interesting. In my head, I'd think "nooooo, that's really hard, what you mean is that it's really really hard--why do you insist on calling this interesting??" However, the professors knew better than me. They knew that if they described problems/concepts as "hard" it would shut down parts of their brain they needed to actually wrap their minds around the problem/concept.
It really hit me, when I was going over an Algorithms problem set with an advanced graduate student that had been through the course a year or so prior. He was extremely skilled at Algorithms even though that wasn't his area of focus. There was a ridiculously contrived and difficult problem I was having issues with solving, and his off base approaches to solving the problem showed that we were in agreement in how ridiculously tough the problem was. Neither one of us actually solved the problem. However, he insisted the problem was interesting. I looked at him as if he was crazy. He seemed enamored by the problem. I didn't get it then, and I'm not sure I fully get the whole being enamored part even now. Nonetheless, running into this problem with him gave me the key insight: people who are really skilled at solving hard problems, describe them as interesting.
You now know the secret.
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