Kyle Kingsbury Podcast - #45 Jim Kwik

Episode Date: August 6, 2018

Jim Kwik stops by Onnit HQ to give some tips and tricks to improve brain performance in one of the most motivating episodes to date. Jim Kwik On Instagram Facebook Twitter Youtube Listen to the Kwik Brain Podcast Connect with Kyle Kingsbury on Twitter and on Instagram Get 10% off at Onnit by going to Onnit.com/Podcast              Onnit Twitter        Onnit Instagram

All right, guys, before we get started, I want to talk to you about a dope new product we have. It is our grass-fed whey isolate protein. It is hands down the best protein ever made. It comes from healthy and happy New Zealand cows that roam on gorgeous green grass-fed pastures. There's no added sugar, which means it's great for a low-carb diet, which I follow pretty much year-round, because even in the summertime when I'm eating carbohydrates, I don't want to get carbohydrates in fucking powdered form. I want them from sweet

potatoes, starches, berries, real food. That doesn't mean I don't mind getting a little extra protein from powder form, especially when it comes from high quality cows. And this has got it all. It's got a lot more than most protein powders. We include digestive enzymes that help lower inflammation and help you absorb and assimilate the most amount that you can possibly take in from this protein. We've also added in probiotics like lactobacillus acidophilus, which is incredibly important for the gut microbiome and our immune systems. Check this product out. You're sure to like it. We've got delicious flavors like vanilla and Mexican chocolate. I know you'll enjoy it. Give it a look. We isolate protein from grass-fed cows. Welcome to the Human Optimization Hour with Kyle Kingsbury, presented by Onnit. Our guest today is Jim Quick. That's J-I-M space K-W-I-K. I got to spell it out because he's founded a thing called

Quick Learning. And a lot of this is on speed, how you can learn faster, how you can retain more, how you can read faster and retain more. All these tips and tricks really optimize the way we learn. And Jim has a fascinating story on what got him into this, which we take a deeper dive into, but also on just some of the ways we can learn more. And he has an amazing podcast called Quick Brain, that's K-W-I-K, Brain, that I think everyone should dive deep into. They're only about 10 to 15 minutes each episode. I've been going down the rabbit hole on them starting with episode one, just trying to retrace every episode the guy's done. Just a phenomenal guest. Eas easily one of the best podcasts we've done

i know you'll dig it thanks for listening well we're here we got jim quick in town i i've been looking forward to this thanks kyle yeah same here i've been following you for a while i can't remember the first time i listened to you is probably i want to say two or three years ago now yeah um but obviously this is a massive. Anytime you can teach somebody how to learn quicker and retain more information and speed reading, I mean, there's a ton to unpack here with you. But it's been something I've wanted to really dive into because as there's a thirst for knowledge and a want to learn more, there's also a want and a need to do it better and more efficiently, right? And the one thing that we're all lacking is time.

So how we can use that more efficiently becomes a really big driving factor in our lives. Completely. I mean, time is our most valuable asset. I think for me, right on the top, everyone could relate to, I mean, people always make more money, but we all have, what, 86,400 seconds in a day. We're not all equal in terms of our network, our education, our contacts,

but we all have the same amount of time. And it's really, I don't believe so much in time management, but I do believe in managing our tasks and managing our priorities that we have and making the best use of it. Yeah, there's so many experts that come in and I want to qualify you as an expert for sure. So many people that get

into the field of health and wellness, diet, nutrition, or anything for that matter, there's some driving force behind why they needed to do that, why they needed to learn the things that they did. And obviously, I've heard a bit of this, but I would like you to elaborate a bit on what made you want to work on your brain and master all these skills. Yeah, I could tell you that the quick story, pardon the pun, is my inspiration really was my desperation. When people see me on stage and I do some mental feats or what have you, I always tell people, I don't do this to impress you. I really do this to express to you what's really possible because the truth is every single person listening to this could do so much more. They're capable of so much more. We're just not

taught. If anything, we're taught a lie. We're taught a lie that somehow our intelligence, our potential, our abilities, our memory is somehow fixed like our shoe size. And the exciting thing is that we've discovered more about the human brain more in the past 20 years than the previous 2,000 years combined. And what we found is we're grossly underestimating our own capabilities. And so I know this because I grew up with learning difficulties. At the age of five, I had an accident, head trauma, brain injury, and I was never the same since then. I mean, my parents describe it as just my personality changed. I didn't understand things.

Teachers would repeat themselves five, six, seven times, and I would just pretend. I would have this imposter syndrome at the age of like six and seven where I would pretend to understand, but I didn't really understand. I had very bad focus. I had a horrible memory. I didn't retain information. I was very forgetful.

And actually, for reading, it took me an extra three, almost four years longer just to learn how to read. And so I struggled through school. At the age of nine, I remember this very clearly. An adult, a teacher pointed to me talking to another adult thinking I wasn't paying attention or maybe not smart enough to understand, pointing to me saying, that's the boy with a broken brain, which is crazy, right? Yeah, I know. I mean, that really messes with your psyche. I mean, that's why adults have to be very careful because your external words become their child's internal words. You know what I mean? That became my self-talk. So every single time that I didn't do well, which was all the time, I wasn't picked in sports or I didn't do well on a quiz.

I would always explain it because I'm the boy with the broken brain. I'm just not here. I talk about superpowers and superheroes a lot because I actually taught myself how to read by reading comic books late at night. Something about the hero's journey, good versus evil, this idea of hope and real help, that one person fundamentally can make a difference. It just brought the words to life. But I think my superpower growing up as a kid was invisibility. I did everything I could

not to have the attention on myself because I didn't want it. I was introverted, but I also became painfully shy. When you feel like you don't have a lot to offer people, you don't really want to connect with people. I remember I had one opportunity in high school to change my life. I was not doing very well in my classes. They called my parents in, the teacher did, saying that, hey, we're going to give your kid, Jim, one chance to get some extra credit and do this book report so he could pass. And the book report I chose was Leonardo da Vinci and a little bit on Einstein also as well.

And I did it and I spent months on this and I had professionally bound and everything. I was so excited about this because it was something I really committed myself to. And then the day that it was due, I have it in my backpack and the teacher asked me, says, class, we have a surprise. Jim, come up and talk about your book report. And I was so scared

because I was terrified of public speaking. And I actually, I mean, my heart was being out of my chest. I was perspiring. I'd spent a good amount of time in the Amazon rainforest. I swear I was sweating more in that classroom than I did in that whole voyage. But I was so scared that I actually told the teacher that I didn't do the report. I had dedicated two months doing this every single day. And it was the one thing that was going to make the difference, but I just was so scared. And

I took a failing grade. And on the way out of class, when everyone left, I threw the book report in the trash. And it was symbolic also at that same time. I was kind of throwing my dreams and my potential out also. And so I really struggled. At the age of 18, though, is where everything turned around. I was lucky enough to get into a state school. And I was like, as a freshman, I want to just make a fresh start. And who doesn't want to make a fresh start in their life sometimes, right? I wanted to show the world, show myself, show my family, make them proud that I was good enough and took all these classes and actually did worse. And I was ready to quit school because I didn't have the money at that time. My parents

immigrated here. Early on, we lived in the back of a laundromat, that whole story. But I didn't have the money, and so I was ready to quit school. But a friend was like, hey, before you quit school, let's get some perspective. I'm going to go visit my family this weekend. Why don't you come with? And I had never been to California before. And so I agreed to go on this trip. And I feel like perspective, Kyle, is so important in our life. And for me, changing perspective is changing place and changing people. And it gives me a new point of view on things, whether you need to problem solve or innovate or make a new decision. And when I go there, the family is pretty well off, beautiful home near the water and such. And then the father walks me around the property before dinner

and asks me a very innocent question, but it's the worst question you could ask me at the time. He says, Jim, how's school? And I was just like, oh, man. And I just unload on him and I just tell him, oh, I'm the boy with the broken brain and I'm ready to quit school. I don't know how to tell my folks.

He paused. He's like, stop. He's like, Jim, why are you in school? These are interesting questions. Outside of perspective, I think questions really define us a lot. The questions we ask ourselves on a regular basis, they're really key. When I teach people how to read faster or remember names, a lot of it is question-based because I think ask and you shall receive.

And if you want to create new solutions, you want to ask new questions. And I've never been asked that question. I was like, I don't know why I'm in school. Well, he was like, what do you want to be? What do you want to do? What do you want to have? What do you want to share? And there are new questions.

I start to answer them. And he pauses. He says, stop. And he reaches into his back pocket and he pulls out a journal. And I honestly thought only 11-year-old girls carried diaries and stuff like that. But he takes out a couple of sheets, tears a couple of sheets out and hands them to me. And he gives me a pen and makes me write down my answers. And after I don't know how long the exercise was, I have like a bucket list, you know, and I didn't know it was a bucket list at the time. And I thought the exercise was over and I have like, you know, dozens of things that

I want to be, do, have, share. And I start folding it up to put in my pocket and he grabs it right out of my hand. And I'm freaking out because I wasn't expecting him to look at my dreams. You know, these are things that are very private. And he starts looking at them and I honestly don't know how much time went by, but he looks at me. He's like, Jim, you are this close to everything on this list. And he spreads his index fingers about a foot apart. And I'm thinking, give me 10 lifetimes. I'm not going to crack that list. And he takes his fingers and he puts them to the side of my temple,

the side of my head, if you will, meaning that what's in between my brain, my mind is really the key that's going to give me the things, my dreams. And he takes me into his home. And you'd love this, Kyle. He takes me into his home, into a room I've never seen before. It's wall to wall, ceiling to floor covered in books. I've never seen a library in somebody's house before. And now keep in mind, I've never finished a book cover to cover. I hate reading. I have dyslexia, like I flip things in my head and with my learning challenges. And so I'm phobic of reading. It'd be the equivalent of walking books and there are these biographies of some really incredible iconic men and women in history and some very early personal growth books like Napoleon Hill, The Power of Positive Thinking. And so I was like, what am I doing with these books? And he's like, Jim, I want you to read one of these books a week if you want the things on that list. And I'm like, have you not heard my story? I have

learning challenges. I can't even keep up with school. I'm ready to quit. I have midterms. And I have all this schoolwork. And he looks me right in the eye and he says, Jim, don't let school get in the way of your education. And it flipped me out. I get goosebumps thinking, I call them truth bumps. But I didn't realize it was a Mark Twain quote at the time. And I was like, that's a really nice saying, and yet I can't do this. Because if I commit to it, I'm going to do it. And he's a very, very smart man. He takes out my bucket list, which he still has, and he starts reading every single one of my dreams out loud.

And something, I don't know, Kyle, something about hearing another man, a stranger, who's obviously very happy and successful, hearing your dreams and somebody else's voice encanted into the universe, it just messed with my mind, my heart, my spirit, my soul, something fierce. And I agree because a lot of things on that list as a backstory had to do with my parents, things I wanted to do for them, things that they can never afford to do for themselves or would do for themselves. So with that leverage and that motivation, and I think that's also another critical key. We talk about perspective, asking questions. Motivation is key to learning. Motivation is key to keeping a fit body.

Motivation is key to having a fulfilling relationship and such. With that motivation, I agree to read one book a week. And now fast forward, I'm back at school and I'm at my desk, I have a pile of books I have to read for school and a pile of books I want to read for my life and I can't keep up. So what do I do? I sacrifice the most important thing that we opened this conversation with, which is my time. I don't eat, I don't sleep, I don't work out. I don't spend time with friends. I don't spend time in nature. I don't do all the things that we know would be healing. I actually just live in the library. And 24-7, I'm studying. And I'm pulling all-nighters. And it's not very sustainable. I end up passing out one night. I fall down a flight of stairs at the library. I hit my head again. And I wake up two days later

in the hospital. And I'm hooked to these IVs. I'm malnourished, dehydrated. At this point, I'm wasting away. I mean, I'm down to 117 pounds. I mean, I just look, I look like death, right? And when I woke up, a different part of me woke up also and asked a new question saying, there has to be a better way, right? You know, what am I going to do here?

And when I had that thought, the nurse came in with a mug of tea and had a picture of an iconic genius, the opposite of what I thought I was. It was Albert Einstein, who I kind of did this book report about back in school. And it had a phrase that you've all heard before. It said, the same level of thinking that's created your problem won't solve your problem. And it made me ask a new question. I was like, what's my problem? My problem is I'm a really slow learner. I was like, well, how do I think differently about it? Well, maybe I can learn how to learn better. And so I think, okay, I asked the nurse for a course bulletin for next semester's classes. And I look

at all the classes, hundreds and hundreds of classes, but they're all classes on what to learn, not how to learn. Classes like math, history, science, Spanish, all important classes, but there's no classes on how to learn, like how to focus, how to concentrate, how to think, how to solve problems, how to be creative, how to read faster, how to remember things. I always thought it should have been the fourth obvious R in school. They teach you three R's, reading, writing, arithmetic. But what about recall? What about retention? What about remembering? Socrates says learning is remembering. And so I put my studies aside and I just studied this, the area of learning, adult learning, learning theory, multiple intelligences, anything I get my hands on.

Because I wanted to solve this riddle, this puzzle, which basically is how does my brain work so I could work my brain? How does my memory work so I could work my memory? And I pour myself into this. And basically, the quick of it is 60 days after studying the brain, studying how people learn, a light switch flipped on. And I just started to understand things in class for the first time. My focus became clearer. My memory became sharper. I started to understand and retain and apply this information. And my grades shot up. And not only my grades, my life. Now, how I end up doing this 25 years later for the past 25 years is because I couldn't help but help other people. I was so angry that this wasn't taught back in school because I didn't have to suffer and struggle. I had to work three times harder for a third of what everyone else had. And it was just very disheartening.

And so I started tutoring people out of my passion. And one of my very first students, she was a freshman. She read, get this, Kyle, 30 books in 30 days. Could you imagine going online, picking up 30 books, and not just reading it fast, but retaining it? I've got 30 books on my desk. Exactly. I want the knowledge.

Exactly. And it's amazing. And I was like, I didn't want to know, but retaining it. I've got 30 books on my desk. Exactly, 30, exactly. And it's amazing. And I was like, I didn't want to know how she did it. I know exactly how, but I want to know why, going back to motivation. And I asked her and I found out that her mother was dying of terminal cancer, was given two months, just 60 days to live.

And the books she was reading were books on health, medicine, wellness, energy, you know, like, and she was determined to save her mother's life. And I just wished her luck, you know, and what do you say at that time? And six months later, I get a call from this young lady and she's crying and she's crying and crying. And I find out when she stops that there are tears of joy, that her mother not only survived, but is really getting better. Doctors don't know how, they don't know why. They called it a miracle, but her mother attributed 100% to the advice she got from her daughter who learned it from all these books. And in that moment, at my soul level, I realized that

if knowledge is power, learning is our superpower. That if knowledge is power, learning is our superpower. And it's a superpower we all have. And it's time really now to unleash it. Fuck yeah. Yeah, let's do that. Let's take the deep dive here. You mentioned a term that I'm unfamiliar with, multiple intelligences. Can you unpack that? Yeah, absolutely. So one of the myths I believe is that people think that intelligence is fixed, that something like IQ, you take an IQ test when you're a kid,

and that's something that stays with you for the rest of your life. My problem with that and a lot of standardized tests, even when you look at the SATs that we took growing up, it has two areas that it focuses on. It has the verbal linguistic, and it has the math. That's the SATs. And my thing is, there are two problems with it. Intelligence, for me, is not fixed.

Intelligence is something that's fluid. It's something that could grow. We could always level up our learning and level up our life. But the other thing is society, those tests don't really accurately represent what we value in society, in today's society, because there's so many other areas of intelligence. So let's say somebody is great verbally, which is wonderful, and mathematically. But what about somebody who has incredible interpersonal skills, like interpersonal intelligence, people who are incredible with other people, right?

Whether they're speakers, they're coaches, they are politicians or leaders, people. That's a form of intelligence, right? People who are good with people. What about kinesthetic intelligence? You know, people who have an incredible level IQ with their body. Yeah, Michael Jordan's a genius. Exactly, exactly. And that's the thing with genius.

I don't equate genius with IQ. But what about musicians, right? Musical intelligence is that's, I mean, think about, you know, all the incredible pianists, all the incredible artists that are out there. That's a form of intelligence. What about visual spatial intelligence, like the actual, like graphic designers and artists and architects, right? We talked about interpersonal, meaning self-to-others, but what about self-to-self, intrapersonal

intelligence, people who are just incredibly gifted in unknowing themselves, right? That is a form of intelligence. And so there are all these other forms of intelligence. The challenge is just in society, sometimes we like to put people in buckets. Like we talk about the education system and it was really, if everyone's listening to this right now, you can identify with three super villains that I talk about. I talk about superheroes, but the super villains now are villains that are new, that were generations before. They didn't have these powers. But I would say they're driven by the digital age, digital overload, too much information, too little time. I remember giving a talk and the chairman of Google said,

the amount of information that's been created from the dawn of humanity, since humans walked this planet to the year 2003, think about all that information, all the books, newspapers, everything. That amount of information now is created every two days today. It just takes 48 hours. Think about all the blogs and the podcasts

and everything that gets published, the books and everything. So the amount of information is doubling at dizzying speeds, but how we learn it, how we remember it, retain it, focus on it, has that changed at all? So that growing gap creates anxiety, right? They call it information fatigue syndrome because everything has a syndrome, right?

Higher blood pressure, compression of leisure time, more sleeplessness. I mean, the list goes on and on. So digital overload. The second supervillain is digital distraction. I mean, who doesn't feel like, how do you remain focused and concentrated in a world full of distraction? I mean, full of social media updates and app alerts and everything else like that. And finally, a third supervillain, I would say, you have digital overload,

digital distraction, is digital dementia. And you're going to be hearing this term in healthcare a lot. This is where we're outsourcing our brains to be hearing this term in healthcare a lot. This is where we're outsourcing our brains to our smart devices, and it does everything for us. It keeps our to-dos, it keeps our calendars. I was out recently with a bunch of friends, it was 10 of us, and three people at the end, when the bill came, took out their phones to get their calculators to divide by 10, right? And you think it's kind of silly, but we've outsourced our brains to our smart devices, and our minds are like muscles, and it's use it or lose it. And how many phone numbers did you used to know growing up? All of them.

Exactly. How many phone numbers do you know right now? Just my wife. Exactly. And there could be somebody you call every single day, but you don't know it if your phone is, you know, battery is dead or you don't have your phone with you. Not that I want to memorize 500 phone numbers, right? But we've lost the ability to memorize one

or a pin code or what hotel room you're in or whatever. And so they call it digital dementia. They're not getting early detection of brain aging conditions because of GPS now. Because if you're relying on a piece of technology, a third-party piece of technology to tell you when and where to turn, you're not realizing when you'd have memory lapses.

So you're not going to doctors to get checked out. So technology, I use my phone and it's a tool, but I use it as a tool. So many people are addicted to their phones, right? Every time they have any white space, they grab it right away instead of going for a walk and being grounded and being in nature and such. And it's an addiction and it's meant to be a tool, but when it's using you, then who's the tool, right? You know what I mean? And so digital distraction is a big challenge also as well. So my thing here when we're going to intelligence is that intelligence is not fixed. And it's not when we're thinking about math or reading or whatever you feel like your intelligence is, it's not how smart you are. It's not how smart your team is. It's not how smart

your kids are. That's not the right questions. It's not how smart you are. It's how are you smart? It's not how smart you are. It's how are you smart, which is more useful because we all have these incredible superpowers. And I talk about modern day superheroes that are listening to this because for me, defining traits of superheroes are twofold. Somebody who's discovered and is developing their superpowers. And I don't mean jumping, leaping tall buildings and shooting lasers out of their eyes and stuff like that. Although I know a lot of people here in your office could probably do that. I'm talking about your super you know, your superpowers, like your unique ability, your unique talents, your unique strength that makes you who you are. But just having a superpower doesn't make you a superhero. You have to use that superpower for service, right? For good and impact, like what you're doing, you know, here and, you know, on your show, you know, with the brand. And so that's what I love. I vision because I grew up with no superpowers. As a kid, I used to, you know, ride my bicycle. My favorite comic book

growing up, people ask me this all the time, one of my favorite superheroes were actually the X-Men. And you're like, Jim, well, they're not the strongest. It was not because they were the strongest. It's just because they didn't fit in. You know, they were the mutants. And I felt like I was, I didn't fit in growing up. I didn't have my friends. And I grew up, actually, it was kind of interesting. I grew up out in a suburb of New York City in Westchester, New York.

And I remember reading one night in the comic books when I was nine years old or something that the X-Men school for the gifted, Charles Xavier, Professor X, was in Westchester. So I swear to you, Kyle, every weekend, I would ride my bicycle around my neighborhood trying to find that school because that was my dream because I wanted to find my superpowers.

I wanted to discover them. I wanted to find my super friends because I feel like I want to run away from home and find my purpose and my strength. All right, I've got so many questions for you. But first, let me ask this because this is a question that I used to ask growing up and find my purpose and my strength. All right, I've got so many questions for you. But first, let me ask this, because this is a question that I used to ask growing up constantly.

Anyone's superpower from a superhero, and it can't be Superman, or you could pick one of his superpowers, but anyone's superpower, what would you take? Yeah, so this is an interesting question because Superman is pretty badass and he's pretty much invulnerable. My favorite superhero just happens to be Batman because he has no

defined superpowers. It's his intelligence, it's his discipline. And he's rich. He can afford all the toys. Maybe Iron Man and Batman, that's their superpowers. They have money. But they're super intelligent and I think that's the ultimate superpower. I'm thinking about it. Because I travel 200 days out of the year speaking,

the ability to teleport would be an amazing superpower. But also, I hate people suffering. Because I grew up as that shy kid with a broken brain, I would just watch people all the time and be a fly on the wall. And I could really empathize when people were bullied or hurt or not because I was going through that. And if I had a superpower to heal people, that would be self. If I had a selfless superpower, that would be it. But selfishly, I would like the Wolverine

superpower of healing. And that would be pretty badass. Or Professor X also, be able to mind-read people. But I don't know if I want to be able to know everyone's thoughts. That would be tough. Control minds, all that. It would be hard peeking in to that many people, especially with Cerebro. Exactly. And see everyone on the planet at the same time.

Yeah, that might be too disturbing. So one thing that you talked about that I think is really important is, and you used a term that I was unfamiliar with, but completely understand, digital dementia. Yeah. And our addiction to phones is very real. What are some of the practices that you have that help you unplug and reconnect to nature and do things that science is now saying are very important and people for millennia have been doing and we've just yeah kind of forgot because we're born with phones now my son is born with the technology of an ipad like this all this stuff exists for the first time and obviously um i don't know your age but you look around my age like

you're old enough to know when we had phones that were attached to the fucking wall right you could only take them a certain distance in the house. And we watched the cell phone become the car phone. And then that became the cordless Zach Morris giant brick phone that we would hold. So seeing that change is a help because we understand there was a time before the internet. There was a time before a lot of these things. But what are some of your favorite practices to unplug?

Yeah, let's unpack this. But first of all, just as a frame, I'm all for technology. I'm not phobic of it. I use it all the time. It allows us to help more people. My mission is no brain left behind because I was a boy with a broken brain. So I just want to build everyone's brains

better and brighter. And I think technology could be a very effective tool. My challenge with this, and I talked about this on my podcast, is with the digital devices, just so people are clear why we want challenge with this, and I talked about this on my podcast, is with the digital devices, just so people are clear why we want to do this, is because number one, like the EMFs, I did a whole episode on this, the electromagnetic fields that come off of our electric devices, like our smart devices, we don't know what it's doing to the human mind

and how it's rewiring ourselves. And it's really concerning for me because I read somewhere recently that over 90% of children actually sleep with their phones underneath their pillows. I mean, just thinking about it. Not on airplane mode. Exactly, and what it's doing to our brains. So some of the things that I'm just kind of just stream of consciousness that I do,

I have my morning routines, you know, like everybody does. I do 12 things every single morning to jumpstart my brain where they're very, very specific. The whole idea of as you own the day, if you will. What's not on that list, the first hour of the day, is everybody has a to-do list. I noticed that some of the successful people have a not-to-do list. They're non-negotiables.

On top of my list is not touching my phone the first hour of the day. It's literally not even in my bedroom. Part of it is I did two episodes on how to create habits and how to break habits. I interviewed Dr. BJ Fogg. He's from Stanford University. He runs the Influence and Persuasion Lab there. That's his job is to help make things habitual. Actually, to that extent, one of his students co-founded

Instagram, right? So think about how addictive Instagram is. They say the average person opens up Instagram 150 times a day. I think that kid was paying attention in class. Yeah, I think so also. But every like that you're getting and everything else like that, it's a dopamine flood, right? It goes along the motivation learning centers of your nervous system and it makes things addictive. And so if you're listening to this right now, if you don't open up Instagram 150 times a day, that means somebody's opening it up a whole lot more,

which is really scary. And here's the thing. I'm not to do this. I don't touch the phone first hour of the day. And the reason why, just from a brain perspective, is when you wake up, you cycle through these brainwave states. Like right now, everybody probably is in beta when you're most awake. Delta is when you're asleep. There are two states in between that are really critical for accelerated learning. Right above delta is a state called

theta. And theta is that state you're in and out of sleep. But that's a state of creativity. That's where genius comes out of you. And you know this. You know what puts you in a theta state is our showers. You notice when you're in the shower, you come up with all these great ideas. And I took four showers this morning, Kyle, just to prepare for this interview. Just taking a dump, put you in theta state, because I have some great ideas on the have some great ideas there also. Yeah, it's always with places where you can't write anything down. And so that's why we teach people how to memorize things like that. But the theta state is where you're most creative. And just by the way, at a meta level, if anyone gets anything out of this conversation, my thing is about taking

nouns and turning them into verbs. Meaning that when you wake up in the morning, people always want to just hopefully accidentally have creativity or have focus or have love or have motivation or have memories, whatever it is. And my thing is you don't have those things. You do those things. You don't have creativity. You do creativity. You don't have love. You do love. You don't have focus. You do focus. And you don't have memory, you actually do memory. It's an actual process. And the benefit of turning it into a verb instead of a noun is you don't just, hopefully you have this and just spontaneously someone gives it to you or you wake up with it. It turns into a recipe and a strategy so you could have it at will. And that's what's important. And so my life is about unpacking and showing people the method behind what looks magical to people. And so part of it has the reason why you

don't open up your phone first thing in the morning and I'll go through what I do. What I stop doing is texting my phone and I'll tell you what I do in a second, going out in nature and such. The reason why is when you're in this theta state and then above that is alpha state. The alpha state where theta is creativity, alpha, and I'm being very simplistic about this, the alpha state is a state of relaxed awareness. This is where we help people learn facts, figures, foreign languages,

anywhere from 200 to 300% faster by putting them into an alpha state, a state where they're so relaxed in a meditative state, they just absorb information. You know what puts you in alpha state? Television. Television does. You ever notice that, you ever see somebody watching television or a sports or a TV show they're really into, and you're trying to have a conversation with them, and they honestly do not hear you? They can't even look at you.

Exactly, because they're in a trance. Because television, it's interesting, television programming, I haven't thought about that before. But they're in a trance, and it's where information is going into their unconscious mind, unfiltered. Their conscious mind is set aside and they're in that kind of hypnotic state. And the alpha state is a really good state to learn in for accelerated learning. And so if you have facts or information coming at you and you're in the alpha state, you'll just absorb it. Meditation puts you in alpha state. That's why hypnosis, when it works, works because they'll put you into a trained hypnotherapist will put you into alpha state and then give you new suggestions where you're not going to fight

those suggestions, where you're not going to be critical, saying you are a non-smoker or you get things done easily and effortlessly. You have wonderful focus and an incredible memory, and you're more likely to accept those new beliefs because your critical not mind is off to the side, your beta mind, if you will. Now, my point in bringing this up, alpha, theta, you're highly suggestible. So when you pick up your phone first thing in the morning, which most people do, you're training your brain to do two things. You're rewiring your brain, number one, for distraction, meaning every single like, comment, share, cat video, whatever you're watching, which is probably not very significant, is literally making you more and more distracted. And you wonder why when you're at the office, you're reading a page of a book and you get to the end, you just forget what you just read. And you go back, your mind wanders and distracted

because you're training your brain to do that. But number two, the other thing you're training your brain to be is reactive. And that's just as dangerous. Meaning that if you want to win that day, you want to be optimal, you know, human performance and build your day and your year and your life, you can't be at the whim of everybody else's demands for you, right? Like how many of us have ever opened up our email or check our message, voice message, we get one bad message and we're in that hypnotic, relaxed state, right? Where we're very impressionable and all of a sudden it just ruins the whole day, right? And so my friend Brendan says, an inbox is nothing but a convenient organizational system for other

people's agenda for your life. Like why are you going to, if you're going to be a leader and a real modern day superhero and superhuman, why are you going to start your day in this hypnotic state looking at other people's fires for your life? You know what I mean? Respond, you know, like reacting. And you'll never have a quality life. The reason why I love your show is because the people that you attract in your community, you're thermostats, not thermometers. You know what I mean? The difference? Like a thermometer functionally, and we learn through metaphors. That's why I use metaphors to accelerate learning. A thermometer, what is its function? It reacts to the environment.

Literally, that's all it does. It just reacts to the environment. But a thermostat's completely different. A thermostat sets a temperature. It sets a goal. It sets a vision. What happens to the environment? It raises to meet that, right?

Because that's the whole, for me, that's the whole point of life is to live at cause, right, to be responsible. And most people avoid responsibility because they don't, because they're entrepreneurs and they value their freedom. They want to do what they want, when they want,

with who they want for as long as they want, but they avoid discipline and responsibility. But for me, you know, you've heard the term like discipline, you know, is freedom. It gives you the freedom because if you can't get yourself to do the things you need to do, to work out, to journal, to meditate, to float, to do your cold therapy, whatever it is is good for you, then you're in trouble, right? And I believe first you

create your habits and then your habits create you. You create those habits, but 40% or more of our day is spent habitual routine. And we don't even realize that when we actually design that consciously. And so that's a big challenge. So my point is put the phone aside, put it on airplane mode, whatever it is. For me, I wake up and what I do do is I have three things I need to do personally and three things I want to do professionally every single day. While I also have a to-do list with hundreds of things on it, I look for the early dominoes, right? The things that are going to have the mass effect and hit the most

things, Pareto's principle, the 80-20 rule and such. I focus on that. But the three things I need to, I want to work backwards. I always want to reverse engineer. At the end of this day, it's going to happen. And I want to come back to my loved ones and they're like, how was your day? I was like, I crushed it today. I won today. And then I think of, okay, what are the three things personally and three things professionally that had to happen for me to be that way? And I designed it backwards from that. What happened right before that? What happens right before that, before that? And so I don't touch my phone or check any of my messages unless I get one of those three things done. And then that gives me permission to do it. And it's an easy out in terms of test for me.

And then what do I do is I really do, and while I do a lot of the biohacking and the neurofeedback, and I do a lot of high-tech stuff, I also think the low-tech, the analog stuff, is nothing could replace that, right? Nothing could replace sunshine. Nothing could replace clean air.

Nothing could replace the best water ever. Nothing could replace that, right? Nothing could replace sunshine. Nothing could replace clean air. Nothing could replace like the best water ever. Nothing could replace movement. You know, our friend Aaron, you know, like the floor culture and just being on the ground, right? And all of that. And so I like to indulge in that because my problem is every, in this life, like we live in this age, I had to coach, I've done some work with Elon Musk and SpaceX. We live in a world of electric cars and spaceships that are going to Mars, but our vehicle of choice when it comes to learning and education, it's like a horse and buggy. It is so prehistoric, and that's the challenge. They say if Rip Van Winkle woke up today after decades of slumber and sleep,

the only thing he would recognize are schools. It's not a slight against teachers. Like my mother actually became a special ed teacher because she didn't know how to help me growing up with my issues. And my aunt's a school teacher and so on. But it's a system issue. The world has changed so much, but we're not prepared. So if you're listening to this, you feel overloaded, distracted, like you're losing, you're forgetful, you're absent-minded, you don't know where you put your keys or if not something larger like your car, you see the people in the parking lot, where did I park my car today? You forget names, all those things. It's not your fault. It's just

we weren't taught. And so my thing is everybody right now is sitting in front of their digital devices. And I was having this conversation with our friend Aaron. When you're touching on your phone, most people are bent over like this, right? Like this. If you take the phone out of the person's hand and just see the silhouette, they look like they're so depressed. Their physiology literally looks like they're sad. And that's what we're doing to ourselves all the time. And so for me, I like to, you know,

I set my alarm going off every 30 minutes and I work for 30 minute intervals and I take a five minute, what I call a brain break. And I do three things. I move because primarily, just so everyone knows, the primary function of your brain is to control your movement. So there's a very clear brain-body connection and a body-brain connection that as the body moves, your brain grooves. There was a study done at Oxford University recently that said jugglers have bigger brains. It literally create more white matter. And just so learning new physical activities actually makes you smarter. And so, and so we do all kinds of physical activities like that. So I move and then I hydrate because

your brain is, you know, 70 plus percent water. And most people, when they have mental fatigue, they have brain fog, they're just not hydrated. Right. And so I make sure I have the best water ever during that break. And then I do deep breathing because your brain, most people who have that fog or that mental fatigue and everything else, because they have reading fatigue or whatever it is, a lot of times they're just not getting oxygen because their posture is so bad. Because everyone, when they're reading, they're collapsed. And when they do, they collapse their diaphragm. And people don't realize that the lower one third of your your lungs absorbs two-thirds of the oxygen. So you wonder why you're tired all the time. So I set my alarm. They call it the Pomodoro technique. The Pomodoro technique says that your attention span really dips after

about 25, 30 minutes. And so I set my, knowing that science, I set my alarm to go off every 30 minutes. I take a five-minute brain break to move, to breathe, and to hydrate. And then I get back to work. Also, just on the thing you and I were talking about, focus with our devices. So many people try to multitask. I just want to make it really clear that the research is very clear that multitasking is a myth. People think they're able to do two cognitive activities. Not walking, chewing gum, and having a conversation, but two thinking activities. We're not able to do that.

The more accurate term is called task switching. And you're actually switching tasks. And every single, here's the cost. Every time you switch a task, it takes anywhere from five to 20 minutes to regain your flow and regain your focus. So you're actually losing ground and time, which we talked about is your most valuable asset.

But the other thing is they did these studies with doctors. They find they make more errors also as well. People are trying to multitask, make more mistakes. And so you don't want to do that. You want to focus on one thing until it gets done. Let's unpack routine because so many people, especially younger people, I think the issue here is that in work, in school, in having the daily duties of life, we're told what to do and when to do it so often that we want any of our free time to be spontaneous. We want to have this flexibility of fuck it. I just want to do whatever I can do. And it's going to be on my terms and I'm not setting up a schedule on my, on my free time to do certain things. And I just want

to go with the flow. And then you look at that mindset and then you look at every book that's ever been written about somebody that's doing special shit on this planet. They have a routine, they have a system. And it's not just a morning routine or a bedtime routine. It's often a daily routine that starts with a morning routine. and you have a daily practice on how often you're going to work and for what duration when you're going to take breaks they talk about the pomodoro technique and the productivity journal i mean everywhere as you take a deeper dive into these things people are setting up routines with intention and conscious planning of how they're going to go about their day and And then that affords them time to be in nature,

to meditate, to do whatever they want to do, to play with family because they are better and more efficient at getting things done. Can you break down what you do in the first 12? Is it 12 steps? You got a 12-step program? I don't do every single thing every single morning because like you, I have travel and responsibilities.

But I think having something is better than, you don't have to do everything that's there, but the more you can do. I also don't believe in a magic bullet, that there's no magic memory pill, for example, but there is a magic memory process, for example. So I put everything into processes. So yeah, I believe that first you create your habits and then your habits create you. That structure will lead to freedom, That people, that has to be consciously designed. Otherwise, we're at the whim of everything. And that's not where I feel like the most successful, fulfilled, happy people are. It doesn't happen by accident. It happens by design. And so how I designed the first hour of my day, just a few things.

And I did a whole episode on this. It was the most downloaded episode. I wake up and the first thing I do, I go through a process of remembering my dreams. So everything I do is brain-based to help set me up to win that day. Because I feel like nobody listening to this is paid for their muscle power. You're paid solely your muscle power. You're paid for your mind power. You're not paid for your brute strength. You're paid for your brain strength because your brain controls everything. And so today's economy, knowledge is not only power, right? You're not paid for your brute strength, you're paid for your brain strength, because your brain controls everything. And so today's economy, knowledge is not only power, knowledge is profit. And I don't mean financial profit, that's obvious. The faster you can learn, the faster you can earn, right? But I mean all the treasures of your life, your relationships,

your health, everything. The great thing about this, and you have a lot of these experts on your show, is someone has decades of experience they put into a book, and you can read that in a few days. You can download decades into days. Even conversations like this is sometimes even better than reading a book. You get so much knowledge. Even when we were talking this morning, I got so many ahas after our conversation and that's everything. So I wake up in the morning and the first thing I do is I remember my dreams. And now why is that important?

Because most people don't remember their dreams. And now why is that important? Because most people don't remember their dreams, but the dream state is very important, right? Because I have my hour at night that's all about sleep, right? So I have my evening routine also as well to maximize my sleep because I have a sleep apnea condition, which I don't talk about a lot, but I only sleep a few hours a night because I stopped breathing over 200 times. And every time is more than 10 seconds long. Do you use a CPAP? I have for years. And then I've had dental devices.

And I've had one-on-ones with the top experts out there. I even went to Brazil to meet with John of God. I biohacked the heck out of it with all our friends that you've had on the show. And sleep experts like Shawn Stevenson and Ben Greenfield, all the people have helped me keep, you know, keep me well. And I have a float tank and I do all the things and I do my cryotherapy and everything to keep me resilient and strong. But having that sleep deficit, it's just a breathing disorder. And I've had surgery, I've done all this stuff. It's, I always look for the gift. I believe that people talk about

traumatic, post-traumatic stress all the time. I also believe there's post-traumatic growth, that some people who are listening to this have gone through some really difficult adversity, challenging times, things that they wouldn't wish upon anybody. But the people that come out shining really have this post-traumatic growth where they found a strength, they found a mission, they found a life purpose, they found a meaning that wasn't there before, and they share it with the world. they found a strength, they found a mission, they found a life purpose, they found a meaning that wasn't there before. And they share it with the world, right? Because their mess has become their

message. And same with mine. But I also feel like they found a gift in that challenge. And for me, the two gifts that came from my sleep apnea, number one, it's forced me to double down on everything I teach. Because I live this stuff. I could literally roll out of bed at four o'clock in the morning and have this conversation with you with no preparation, just like yourself, because you've lived it through your life. I coach a lot of actors

on how to speed read scripts, remember their lines better and such, be focused on set. I was with Will Smith recently and he was filming every night from 6 p.m. to 6 a.m., night shoots. I always believed, my prime directive belief when it comes to learning

is genius leaves clues. That if somebody is extraordinary in some area, that you could find, that you could get similar results by unpacking what they do unconsciously. And I wanted to know, I was like, Will, how do you get ready? You're just waiting here all night, and then for the director to say, okay, ready to shoot.

How do you get ready at three o'clock in the morning and he looked at me he's like jim i don't have to get ready i stay ready i don't have to get ready i stay ready and i literally was just blown away because because he lives what he does now he's doing a lot on social media and i was on the set recently of gemini man there's a new movie comes out where he's he plays the world's best assassin and he's being hunted by somebody that's better than him and it's like a clone 20 year old version of him kind of thing it's really amazing um but when we're there we're talking um about this idea of preparation and i i

really do believe he lives what he's doing all this thing on social media and i was like why are you doing this and he was like well you know because when he does movies and television it's all pre-scripted for him but he has all this well, you know, cause when he does movies and television, it's all prescripted for him, but he has all this motivation and, and, you know, learnings that he wants to share and he wants to do it in a way that's not as produced and more raw. And that's what he's doing. That's more of his purpose. And that's why he's doing all his vlogs and his, you know, his YouTubes and his Instagram and everything else like that. But my point of bringing this up is he's living his message just like you are. And I believe the, the less, the, the life we live are the. And I believe the life we live are the lessons we

teach. The life we live are the lessons we teach. It's better well done than well said. And so many people talk about stuff and they can repeat other people's stuff over and over again, but they're not doing it in their life. And I feel like if you're not doing it, you don't truly understand it. You know what I mean? So many people could quote all the top experts and everything, but when it comes down to it, they're not living that stuff, so they're not getting the kind of results. And for me, the formula is be, do, have, share. That's how you win, right?

You be, do, have. Because so many people just want to have. But the problem is somebody winning the lottery. I saw on the way here, there's this billboard for the lottery. I was like, wow, $200 million lottery. That's crazy. And statistically, somebody halves, gets that level. What happens over time? They end up losing all of it and more because they have

millions of dollars, but at the B level, they were never being a millionaire. I believe there's a syntax to success, just like there is the phone number. If you have the same numbers but reverse two of the numbers, same numbers, but you won't get the same kind of result. Same thing with success. So living that is very important. So going back to my morning routine is I wake up, I remember my dreams. The reason why I remember my dreams is when you're sleeping, going back to sleep, the second gift I got out of having this sleep deficit all the time is number one, I double

down on everything I teach because I have to. Otherwise, I won't on everything I teach because I have to. Otherwise, I won't be efficient or effective. But the other second gift that came out of my post-traumatic growth, if you will, my sleep deficit of sleeping two, three hours a night, it's forced me to really commit to certain things and not commit to other things. Meaning if you're listening to this and you're overstressed and you're overloaded, I have a high hunch that it's because you guys are saying yes way too much. And people overcommit and say yes to everything. And you could do anything, but you can't do everything. And you have to say, what's the

quote? You have to say no to good so you can say yes to great. And most people are saying yes to all the good things. And then as they become more and more successful, they have more and more opportunities. And their fear of missing out and everything. But my thing is, it's forced me. Right now, I'm here because I want to be here. There's nowhere I'd rather be and nowhere I'd rather be with because I was really looking forward to flying out to Austin and do this because everything for me is heck yes or it's heck no. And that's my filter. And that's a gift that came out for lack of sleep. Because when you're tired all the time, you have to be very choosy in terms of what you commit to.

And you've heard this idea before that priorities only became plural only the past couple of decades. Before it was like priority one. It was like the one priority. And it's kind of like the person that takes a book, and I teach speed reading and comprehension and such, that highlights everything. But if you highlight everything and the book glows in the dark, if everything is important,

nothing is important. And that's the thing. So many people are making everything important, they're spread too thin, and they can't do anything really well done. So the first thing I do is I remember my dreams. But the reason why I remember my dreams and sleep is so important the night before is because people don't realize this. So many things in culture that you see around in your environment was created in people's dream states. So as an example, Elias Howe created the sewing machine in his dream. Mary Shelley came up with Frankenstein in her dream.

The periodic table came to a chemist. That whole framework came to a chemist in his dream, right? Like Paul McCartney came up with a song yesterday in his dream. So here's the thing, when you're learning all day or you're working your job all day, your brain doesn't shut off at night. It actually is more active at night and it's integrating short to long-term memory and you're coming up with great ideas. What ideas are you coming up with late at night that you're forgetting first thing in the morning, right? So I have a six-step process. I did a podcast on this, on how to remember dreams. So that's the first thing I do. The second thing I do is I make my bed. And you've heard this before from other people. But from a brain perspective,

I believe success breeds success. And that how you do anything is how you do everything. So you make your bed with excellence. That's why they do it in the military and such. And you build on that. And the great thing about it is when you come back and go to sleep, you're coming back to success also as well. Third thing I do is I brush my teeth. And you're like, Jim, why is that good for your brain? I actually have a twist on it. I brush my teeth with the opposite hand, right?

Because it gets me present and it also challenges my brain also. There's a study done by Dr. Lawrence Katz. And he was working with seniors, wanted to find out how to keep their brains alive as they grew older. And he came up with these exercises that are very simple, and a lot of them had to do with just brushing your teeth with the opposite hand, eating with the opposite hand, because there is a brain-body connection. But what science is proving right now, it's also a body-brain connection, that using your body in certain ways stimulate different parts of your brain. So for example, like if, God forbid, you

know somebody who has head trauma on the left side of their brain or stroke, if there's paralysis, it'll manifest on the right side of their body because there's cross laterals. But what science is showing that if you use your, like for example, your left hand, it actually stimulates your right side of your brain, which is more creative, imaginative, and so on. So we do that with reading exercises and such. So that's what I do then. And then after that, I hydrate big time because people don't realize they lose like what, like a pound of water every single night through respiration and perspiration. So I hydrate, I mineralize it also. I take my probiotics because I do believe your gut is your second brain in terms of nerve center and such. Then I take a cold shower. And a lot of, I know, you know, cold therapy,

you know, just for the inflammation alone. Like this morning before we got here, I took an ice bath because just like, you know, if you bump your knee, put ice on it to reduce the swelling and inflammation. You know, we have that and it's the beginning of a lot of disease and challenges that we have, especially in the brain. So I take a cold shower, which a lot of people, some people subscribe to. Do you take? Yeah, we actually have a standalone chest freezer that's 22 cubic feet. No way. Dr. Kelly Sturette and Matt Vinson, a good friend of mine, have been on the show. And they were telling me that get the chest freezer it's 500 bucks free delivery fill it full of water epsom salt uh luke story who you may know has a really good setup as well or he puts food grade hydrogen peroxide in and then it just keeps the water good longer without using chlorine and uh yeah it's between 33 to 55 degrees on average and if it's colder i'll go shorter you

know three to five minutes if it's a little warmer in the 50s and i'll go shorter you know three to five minutes if it's a little warmer in the 50s and i'll stay in you know 10 15 minutes but yeah it's incredible and there's that cascade effect where it you know a lot of people look at the physical thing like oh this i heard it helps me burn fat you know and they talked about that in the four-hour body with tim ferris but it's so much more than that you know truly you know now with the science done at harvard and and previous studies being done in the Netherlands on Wim Hof, we see huge spikes in dopamine and adrenaline. And those have wonderful effects on how we feel, how we process information, and how our immune system functions.

I mean, you're just tackling many things at the same time. So it is an incredible practice. I love that. I met Wim six and a half years ago. We did some ice baths together. I interviewed him six years ago. We were speaking at an event. But cold therapy has totally transformed my life, especially at the sleep deficit. It helps to totally reset my nervous system and it makes all the difference. So I take a cold shower. And then after that, I make some kind of like a brain tea, you know, with gotu kola, ginkgo, lion's mane and such, put a little honey and some MCT oil. And then I journal. You know, I go through it. And I noticed also that some of those genius, and again, not IQ, but they wanted to find

out, they did a study with geniuses. They wanted to know, you know, all these geniuses were journaling, but is it because they're geniuses that they're journaling or is it because they're journaling all the time that they become geniuses? And I have a whole note-taking process that I do where I'm capturing and I'm also creating at the same time. And it's very simple.

Everyone knows there's a learning curve, but people don't realize there's a forgetting curve that people can listen to a podcast or go to a conference or read a book but within 48 hours, 80% of it is lost on average. 80%, that's the forgetting curve which is insane but what helps to mitigate that is taking notes and using memory devices and such.

So when I take notes, I did a podcast episode on this. It's besides mind mapping. You've done some mind mapping before? It's a whole brain note-taking technique created by Tony Buzan, which basically says linear notes are not the way to go because you could take 30 pages. Actually, the worst way of taking notes scientifically is people would intuit this, but they might not show the reason why, is everything verbatim. Full transcripts are the worst way of taking notes. And then people say, should you do it digitally or handwriting?

I always prefer handwriting because anyone could type as fast as somebody could talk, or most people could. But when you're handwriting, you can't write as fast as someone could talk, so it forces you to filter what's most important. But they found that if you have 20 pages of notes, you can have something on page 20, you know, like 18, that's more important than what's on page one, but you don't see that. Mind mapping is a way of putting everything on one page view where you have the main idea in the center. Let's say it's optimal human performance or health. And then coming out

of there like spikes or branches from a tree, you have, okay, you have nutrition, you have working out, you have rest and recovery and so on. And then from those like nutrition, you have like, okay, from here you have your food, from here you have supplements and so on. And then from food, you have, okay, four food groups or whatever, you just break it down. All of a sudden you could have this obscure, you know, wild fish compared to this, this protein to the diet, to nutrition, to optimal health. You can see it all in one page view. For me, I take a different approach in note-taking. I take a piece of paper, put a line down the page, and on the left side, I capture information. On the right side, I create information, meaning that on the left side, I take notes. On the right side, I make notes.

So for example, on the left side, I would be like, oh, this is how you remember names. This is how you read faster. This is how you give a speech without notes. And I would write step by step. But on the right side, you would write your impressions of what you're capturing, meaning like, oh, questions you have, how does it compare to what you already know? How are you going to use this in the future? How are you going to teach it to somebody else? So if your attention is going to go somewhere else, right brain distracted, it might as

well go on the right side of the page. And I find that's an extremely effective technique. I do it at universities and companies all the time. So I go through my journaling. So I think making notes is very important and reflecting because I feel like all knowledge is self-knowledge and you could coach yourself because we know so much. And then from there, I do some rapid movement. It's not my morning workout, but for four minutes, I'll do something high intensity, like burpees or something like that to get my blood flow. And again, this is not in any specific order. I don't necessarily do every single thing every single time.

And then I make a brain power smoothie, similar to what I'm drinking right now, Genius here on it. And then I'll read. And I like to read 30 minutes in the morning. I find that reading is one of the best mental exercises. I did a whole episode on how to read a book a week without speed reading. People don't realize how easy it is. Not easy, simple it is because it takes effort. I looked at Amazon. There are about 64,000 words in the average book. The average person reads

about 200 words a minute. If you divide those two numbers, it comes out to about 320 minutes to finish a book, which seems like a lot. But if you divide that by seven days in a week, it comes out to about 45 minutes exactly. So 45 minutes of reading a day will get you through a book a week, which is 52 books a year, which is the average person reads about two books a year. So so what kind of advantage is the person it's like having three phds reading 52 books a year you know like um when people drive some people turn their university you know their books their cars into universities on wheels they listen to podcasts and but notice like when you listen to when i when i listen to your show or most people listen to our shows they listen to at a 1.5 or 2x. They can listen to

it faster. They just can't read that fast or talk that fast. And so it's kind of interesting. On a side note, I know I'm kind of going everywhere here because I want to deliver as much information usable as possible. The reason why people read slowly is something called sub-vocalization. That's the real challenge, sub-vocalization. Sub-vocalization is like when you're reading, you hear that inner voice inside your head reading along with you and you hear that voice you know hopefully it's your own voice it's not like somebody else's voice in there but david hettenborough exactly i have for me it's morgan freeman you know that's a fucking slow pace so he's uh he yeah i thought i came on the intro of our podcast it's all about like you, what if you could access 100% of your brain's potential?

But anyway, the reason why, if you have to say all the words inside your mind in order to understand them, you can only read as fast as you could speak. To say it another way, that means your reading speed is limited to your talking speed, not your thinking speed.

And that's why a lot of people read so slowly because do you have to say words like New York City to understand what New York City is? The truth is you don't, because you've seen those words a thousand times, just like as a computer, right? You don't have to say it. You know it by sight. 95% of all the words that you read are sight words, like a stop sign. Nobody says stop to themselves every time they see a stop sign, but do you comprehend exactly what it means? Of course you do. So fastest readers, they don't sub-vocalize or they limit their sub vocalization so i i read and i do my speed

reading and i and i read for about half an hour a day i think it's the best mental exercise brain hack there is is reading it's great exercise to wake up your mind first thing in the morning and again you're downloading decades of knowledge in just days and that's that's a huge advantage um and then you know i just it goes on from there oh yeah dude we crushed the hour we're we're uh obviously i would love to get links to the podcast you mentioned yeah we definitely want to turn people on your podcast people just go to quick brain my so the only thing is when people search my name it's k-w-i-k it's really my last name it's not i didn't change it to do what I do. It's my father's name, my grandfather's name.

With a name like Quick, my destiny was pretty much planned out. I had to be a runner back in school. There's a lot of pressure when your name is Quick. Can't read slowly. I have to be careful when I'm driving because the worst name to have on your driver's license when you get pulled over for speeding is the name Quick

because you're not going to talk your way out of the ticket. I get to do my passion, which is helping people learn, read, remember, focus, succeed faster. Amazing, brother. You're on social media as well? Yeah, at Jim Quick, K-W-I-K. They can access the podcast. Every episode is only 10, 15 minutes long.

They're brain hacks for busy people who want to learn faster and achieve more. What I would love for people to do is actually screenshot this episode that we just did, post it on your social media, whether it's Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram, or whatever. Tag both of us. I would love for people to share their big aha. If they got some value out of this, what the one thing that they took out of it. Because when you teach something, you get to learn it twice. I really do believe when you listen to something,

when you learn something with the intention of teaching it to somebody else, then you have better focus, you have better organization, you ask better questions, you take better notes. And when you teach it, you get to own it. And it becomes part of you. So what I would recommend to do right now, screenshot this episode, post it on your social media, tag us both, and please share your big aha

and teach your friends what you tag us both, and please share your big aha and teach your friends what you learned. Awesome, brother. Thank you so much. Thank you guys for listening to the podcast with our man, Jim Quick. We had this very special experience of having Jim do a lecture for the Onnit staff shortly after we podcasted together and again was thoroughly blown away by his expertise. Make sure you give his podcast a listen, Quick Brain, and give him a shout and do what he said on the podcast. Take a screenshot of this episode and tweet us both or throw us up on the IG and let us know what you gained from this

or what you wish to learn, what you'd like to take a deeper dive into. And Jim and I will be happy to get back to you guys. Thanks for tuning in.