So, I don't think that struggle-based learning is the only way of learning or even the most efficient way of learning.
I think that this idea is more of a social ritual, than an actually useful method.
One can travel from one end to the other.
I was talking about being curious, how something works and figuring it out and being curious why something is done one way and not the other and figuring it out.
Yea, struggling, is one way, but there are others like optimizing for spaced reptition, visualization, etc.
The shift should be from "grind these problems so the pain sticks with you", to "create a mini logic board in minecraft to blow up that mountain". Or, "build mini simulations to show how forces work, and tie them to an interactive applet".
Yeah this has been my experience too.