How To Upgrade Your Brain And Learn Faster with Jim Kwik

Coming up on this week's episode of the Doctor's Pharmacy.

You know, it's not our muscle power, it's our mind power. And really, the faster you can learn, the faster you could earn. Not just financially, that's obvious, but all the treasures of our life.

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Welcome to the Doctor's Pharmacy. I'm Dr. Mark Hyman, and that's Pharmacy with an F, F-A-R-M-A-C-Y, a place for conversations that matter. If you care about learning, care about your brain, care about getting smarter, faster and better, and being a superhero, then our guest today is one you're gonna love, Jim Quick, who didn't make up his name. His actual name is Jim Quick, and his company is Quick Learning, which is fantastic. He's been a friend of mine for a long time. He's a really extraordinary, humble guy who's helping the world fix their brains in ways that I can't as a doctor, but are essentially needed for us to live in an engaged, fulfilled way. He's the founder of Quick Learning, which is an incredible company educating people from all over the world in how to be better with their brains, how to speed read, how to improve their memory, how to enhance their brain performance, how to accelerate their learning. For two decades, he's served as a brain coach to many of the world's leading C-suite executives, celebrities, just the who's who of people, actors, actresses. It's been an astounding career for you. I watched you grow over the last 10 years. We've known each other. And like many of us in this field, we came through a crucible that wasn't fun, that taught us what we know so we can go teach others. And you were a kid who had a brain injury and it left you really challenged. You couldn't learn and you had to adapt and you created strategies that enhanced your mental performance and you've dedicated your life to helping other people unleash incredible brain power to learn faster, perform smarter. You've got incredible techniques for doing this. You have incredible entertaining presentation style. You're kind of shy in person, but then you get on stage and you just kill it. You actually can go into a room with 100 people and remember everybody's name. It's pretty impressive. You're a trainer for clients like Google, Virgin, Nike, Zappos, SpaceX, NYU, G, Fox Studios, Caltech, USC, Harvard, Singularity. You're the host of an incredible podcast called Quick Brain, which everybody should subscribe to. And it's pretty much the number one training show on iTunes. And your courses on quicklearning.com have been used by students in 180 countries.

And I'm so excited to have you on the podcast, Jim. Mark, I'm so excited. Thank you for that introduction. And before we get, began this and we talk about all these ways of becoming limitless, I just want to thank you for the work you do. I remember one time we were playing tennis and this was years and years ago.

Much better now.

Yeah. So we have to, we have to resume that, but it's, tennis is a interesting metaphor for life because those who serve well tend to win. And I want to, you're, you're winning.

Because of, I served wasn't that good back then.

Yeah, but you're serving so many people and even with food food fix. I know we've had this conversation on my podcast. You are unstoppable force of nature. You're a force for good. So thank you and thank you for everyone who's listening to this because I know like attracts like and yeah, I'm excited to have this conversation.

So the reason I wanted to have you on this podcast was because you wrote a book called Limitless. This is it, Limitless. Upgrade your brain, learn anything faster and unlock your exceptional and there's a quote from somebody on the front, There's no genius pill. Jim gives you the process for unlocking your best brain and brightest future, and by none other than Dr. Mark Hyman. I feel honored to be at the top of your book. And this book is the first book you've written.

It is, 28 years.

28 years of learning, work, study, practice, refining your techniques, and you simmer it down into this incredible soup of knowledge that is a map for anybody who wants to live their life better. Because in order to live your life better, your brain has to work and it has to work well. And you've been part of my Broken Brain docuseries and that's about fixing the biology of your brain. But once you do that, how do you get a better brain in every other way? And that's what limitless is. How do you take off the limits that limit you from having the love you want, from doing the work you want, from being on mission, from the limits of your health, because you do talk about food, you talk about lifestyle, there's a way to upgrade your brain. So you got started on this, not voluntarily. You told me a story many times and I've heard the story about this teacher that was so terrible and rude and he's like, that's the boy with the broken brain. And it really was traumatic for you. Tell us about the accident, how it impacted your cognitive function, your memory, your focus, your concentration, and then, you know. Let's go into this. Flunked out from college.

Yeah. So tell us about all that. I mean, the quick of it, quote unquote. Quick story. Quick story. Quick really is my last name. It's my father's name, my grandfather's name. I didn't change it to do my Dharma, my mission. A-W-I-K. That's correct. You know, I had to be a runner back in school. I have to be careful of driving because you don't want to get pulled over for speeding. speeding because the worst name in having a driver's license is quick. Because you're not gonna talk your way out of that speeding ticket. And I get to do my mission, which is teaching people.

But you talk slow and you talk. Yeah, you're the opposite of what I.

Think about when I think of quick. So it's teaching people how to learn quickly, focus more rapidly, remember things better, solve problems more rapidly. And it's absolutely true. When I was five years old, I was in public school. in kindergarten, I had an accident, a very bad fall, and I was rushed to the hospital. And my mother said I was never really the same afterwards. Whereas before I was very energized, very curious, I was shut down, you know, and I was not understanding things. Teachers would talk to me and I would pretend to understand, but in reality, I didn't understand. I had poor focus, a poor memory, It took me an extra few years to learn how to read, and that was a big challenge.

Now you read a book a day or something?

I mean, for four years, I read a book a day. Now I'm doing about a few books a week. We have online, we have thousands and thousands of our students reading one book a week, hashtag one book a week, because I believe leaders are readers. Because if somebody like yourself, you have decades of experience and you put it into a book like Food Fix, and somebody could sit down in a few days and read that book, they could download decades into days. And that's the biggest advantage I could think of in the 21st century, where knowledge is not only power, knowledge is profit. And it's like this knowledge divide, those who know and those who don't know. I mean, how can you make good decisions if you don't have all the information?

It's the new wealth, really.

It really is. And not just financial wealth, I mean, all the treasures of our life. And so I had these challenges. So my teachers back then would I wouldn't think I would finish reading a book, much less write a book. And so I'm really excited about this. Basically what had happened through school is I hit a tipping point at 18 where I just couldn't take it anymore. I worked harder than anyone I knew and I still wasn't having the grades to show for it. And I was like living in the library. I wasn't eating, I wasn't sleeping, I wasn't working out, I wasn't having any time with friends. and I was just wasting away. And it's not very sustainable. I end up passing out as a freshman in the library. I fell down a flight of stairs. I hit my head again. I woke up in the hospital two days later, and at this point I thought I died. And it was the darkest time in my life. Maybe part of me wished I did. And I was down to 117 pounds. I was hooked up to all these IVs. I was malnourished. But it made me, I hit a wall, but it made me ask a new question. thinking about like, you know, what am I doing all this for? You know, why am I such a slow learner? And I was like, well, you know, maybe because I have this broken brain, I don't learn like everybody else does. And I started, it's like, well, maybe I can learn how to learn. And I thought like, how do I do that? Well, maybe school could teach me. So I asked the nurse for a course bulletin. I started looking through all the pages.

Good luck.

And they're all classes on what to learn and what to think and what to focus on and what to remember, but there are zero classes on how to learn. how to focus.

I actually took an extracurricular class when I was in high school that was like offering the community on speed reading.

Right, right, right. I mean, those would have been useful skills to have back in school because school teaches us what to learn but not necessarily how to learn those things. And so I started making that my study. I started studying adult learning theory. I wanted to study what intelligence is, multiple intelligence theory. How does my brain work so I could work my brain? I started studying ancient mnemonics. I wanted to know what did ancient cultural do before there were printing presses and where we have external storage devices for our memory before there were smart devices.

And I used to remember so many telephone numbers.

Yeah, and we talk about this in this book, you know, where technology is driving, you know, amazing innovation, amazing evolution and progress, communication, and also it's also amplifying some of the challenges that we've always had, you know, like information overload. Now we carry, we have access to the world's information. We have more information on tap than Clinton did when he was in office, right? We have so much information, but it feels like it's taken a sip of water out of a fire hose. So one of the super villains is digital deluge. It's like we're drowning information, but we're starving for practical wisdom on how to keep up with it all. Besides that, technology also is creating this digital distraction. Think about all the app notifications, social media alerts. We're getting all these dopamine fixes that goes along the nervous, the learning motivation centers of our nervous system. And it's hard to have a conversation nowadays without us being distracted. It's hard to, I'm sure a lot of people could identify. You read a page in a book, you get to the end, and then you forgot what you just read. We can't have the focus and the concentration, so that's digital distraction.

I mean, you talk about the four super villains in your book that stand in the way of learning and how actually to overcome them.

Yes. And this is digital deluge is one, digital distraction is another. I would say the third one is this thing called digital dementia, which you just mentioned. Digital dementia, where, yeah, how many phone numbers did we know growing up? We knew all of them, right? But how many phone numbers do you know now?

That's true.

And it's hard. And people listening are like, well, I don't want to memorize 500 phone numbers, and honestly, either do I. But we've lost the ability to remember one. I mean, even directions.

I mean, I, you'd have to find your way through a map, you'd figure out where you're going, and then you would actually memorize the route. Right. And I just was in New Zealand, visiting my wife, and I like to play tennis every day, so I was playing tennis every day, and I had my Google Maps, I used to stick it up, and I went to the same place every day, but I actually needed the map, because I wasn't really paying attention, except to the map, and I easily could have, found my way around. It wasn't that many turns, but I didn't really care to pay attention. And it does have an effect because unless you do it, you lose it.

And exactly, because our brains act more like a muscle than anything. It's use it or lose it. If I put my arm in a sling for a year, it wouldn't grow stronger. It wouldn't even stay the same, right? It would atrophy. And a lot of our brains, digital dementia is where we're outsourcing our brains to our smart devices. It's keeping our calendars, our to-dos, it's telling us how to get from here to there. They're not getting early I heard recently that we're not getting early detection of brain aging challenges. And one of the reasons why is GPS. Like if you're relying on technology to take you from here to there, you're not realizing when you would have a memory lapse. So you're not going to get checked out and get looked at. And so these are the challenges, digital dementia. And I'm not saying-- and by the.

Way, in terms of medical research on actual dementia, people who use their brains get less dementia.

Right.

Who are learning and lifelong learners who read, who do mental puzzles, who do brain learning exercises, who follow the work that you do, don't get dementia at the same rate as everybody else. And it can stave it off because.

It'S just, you know what it is if it's not just about mental intelligence. You know, in this book, I show you how to learn languages, how to be able to focus, how to read faster, and remember facts, you know, figures, all that information. But it's also about mental fitness. and mental health. And then that's a conversation that I'm glad that we're having because more and more people, because our brains control everything, right? You write whole books on brain health and optimizing our brain's potential. So digital dementia is a challenge that wasn't there previous generations. And the last one I would say is this thing called digital deduction. Meaning that now with technology, and again, technology is not good or bad, and in a lot of ways it serves us. It helps us to be able to connect. It helps us to be able to learn, to be able to inspire, to be able to educate ourselves. But digital deduction is where technology is just doing all the thinking for us. We no longer have to use critical thinking or use our own reasoning or using our own analysis because everything is being spoon-fed to us. Everything is like, this is what you should be buying or reading or anything. It's all these algorithms that are there. And so in this book, you know, to overcome those four super challenges that we have, and I think through challenges could come change and positive progress. Where sometimes, you know, in the Hero's Journey, and this book is written in the Hero's Journey as an homage to Joseph Campbell's work, you know, where there's a call to adventure and we leave the ordinary world that we're into this more extraordinary world and we face trials and we find mentors and you learn techniques and strategies, and then you come home and then you bring that back in the return with this magical treasure of elixir. Because I believe the life we live are the lessons that we teach. But it starts with the brain. And you and I have had this conversation where metaphorically our brain is like a computer. You have the hardware, which is you want to optimize that, because more people upgrade their phones and they upgrade their brain. You need stress management, you need to sleep, you need to, to be around positive peer groups. Because as you've mentioned, it's not just your biological networks or your neurological networks, it's our social networks. Because who we spend time with is who you become, which is why it's so important to really do an audit around the people that you give them the power over how you feel and how you think. Because you have these things called mirror neurons where we're always imitating the things that are around us. When you watch a movie or you watch sports. You can feel what the players or the actors are feeling because that's how we learn things. And whoever we're spending time with on a regular basis, that's why I watch.

Tennis a lot so I can get.

Better to beat through osmosis. Because we're always adapting and adopting the language patterns of people around us, the habits, the routines, the behaviors. They say who you spend time with is who you become. That be careful. If you're spending time with nine broke people, you're going to be number 10. Right? But all these things play a role and especially, you know, the thing that you're on a mission for is food because what you eat matters, especially for your gray matter. So that's all on the hardware part and what a lot of the book is about is really the software of it and like, you know, how to be able to read faster, how to be able to pick up another language, how to memorize poetry or your, or your, that TED talk or that toast you have to give at the wedding or to give a sales presentation or have, how to have laser focus so you could get through your, your your to-do list, all the things that, you know, we've really honed over the past three decades.

I mean, that all sounds fun. People are like, well, so why do I care about speed reading or do my to-do list? But it is a bigger framework here because, yeah, everything that happens in our life is a result of how we grow. And how we grow is connected to how we learn.

Right.

And learning literally physically changed our brain. It changed our intellect. It changes the possibilities we have in our life. and there's an old Chinese proverb that says, Learning is a treasure that will follow its owner everywhere. What we learn becomes part of who we are and the tools that we can access them are so important and you teach those tools. I read an article in the New York Times recently about Jewish community and why there's so many Nobel Prize winners and scientists and leaders in society and part of the reason is that We were persecuted. We were slaves. We were chased around the world. There was the Inquisition in Europe. We were chased out of Europe, chased out of Russia. And so the only thing that we had was knowledge. No one can take that away from you. It's portable. It's in your head. And it's why Jews have focused on that. I remember my mother, the drumbeat was education, education, learning, learning, learning. Why? Ask why? Learn and learn and learn. And I think that's really what you're gift is to humanity is reawakening people's enthusiasm to grow and learn because the result is possibility, advancement in your life is being able to actually have deep and connected relationships and do the things you want.

An investment in knowledge pays the most dividends, especially in today's age where we live in the millennium of the mind. Nobody who's listening to this is paid for purely their physical strength. Right, it's our mental strength, our ability to solve problems, our ability to be creative, our ability to imagine new things. You know, it's not our muscle power, it's our mind power. And really, the faster you can learn, the faster you could earn, not just financially, that's obvious, but all the treasures of our life. And, you know, the reason why I'm so excited about this conversation is because, let's say, To the person who's listening to this right now, if there was a genie could grant you any one wish, any one wish, just one wish, what would you wish for? You would wish for millions of wishes, right? Infinite wishes. That would be the hack, if you will. Well, if I was your learning genie.

But in Latin, Genie said you can't wish for more wishes.

Right, right. But if I was your learning genie and I could grant you any one wish to learn any subject or any skill, but just one. What would the equivalent be for asking for infinite wishes? What would in that same spirit, it would be, I would want to learn how to learn. Because if you can learn how to learn, everything gets easier. You could grant all your own wishes. It could be Mandarin, martial arts, music, marketing, management, anything that you're excited about.

-Memorize the entire stock market.

-Exactly. Anything that would be able to serve you better, it's a meta skill. They call it meta learning. learned the science of learning how to learn. And that really, I believe, is that if knowledge is power, learning is our superpower. And it's a superpower we all have. So in this book, Limitless, it used to be, when I wrote this, a book purely on methods, all the things that I was telling you about, on how to remember people's names, on how to give speeches without using notes, on how to remember facts and figures, and to venture.

Why haven't I hired you yet to work with me?

Right. But what I realized was.

I think Jim's my friend. I'm like, well, but I didn't forget.

Like, you know, we, we need to, we, we need to do this. So one of the things is people know what to do, but they don't always do what they know. Right. And this is the reason I wrote this book is because just knowing something is not enough. I believe one of the lies, and I talk about all the lies in this book around learning. like seven lies specifically that keep us from moving forward. And one of the lies is that knowledge is power. People believe we've heard this so long ago that knowledge is power. I even said it just a few minutes ago, right? But if you think about it, it's not really true. Knowledge alone is not power. Knowledge applied becomes power. Knowledge is potential power, but when you use it, it becomes power. And so here's the thing. All the books and podcasts, online courses, conferences, none of it works unless we work. And I've always been curious, what's the difference that makes the difference? What's the difference that takes the common sense things that you know we should do, eating whole organic foods, meditating each day, journaling, having emotional bonds and social connections. exercising. We know what to do, but we don't always do what we know because common sense is not common practice. So after I had all Mark Twain.

Said, the problem with common sense is it's not too common.

And that's the truth. So this book was all techniques and then I was like, this is great and I'll keep these here because they'll help people to advance their careers and do everything better. But then I was like, what keeps people from doing these things? And I created over the past three decades a model, a model that I call the Limitless Model, that really explains how to learn and achieve anything faster. And it's, if everyone could picture a Venn diagram, right, three circles that intersect. Yeah. Right, so you have three circles that intersect and there are three Ms, and this is the key to be limitless. usually if there's a gap between where you are and where you want to be, let's say it's a, it's a your current reality and you have this desired reality for your health or in your relationship or in your career, whatever area it happens to be. If you're not making positive progress towards it, and that's how I Define Limitless. I do not Define Limitless as being perfect. I don't, I don't believe in Perfection. Limitless is not about being perfect. It's about advancing beyond what you believe is possible. I believe the ultimate quest that we're all on is to be able to realize, reveal our fullest potential. That's what I think we're here to do. And I think it starts with learning because learning is the grandmother, grandfather of all transformation. You can't do anything unless you learn it first. So, 3Ms and if you're not achieving or making progress towards your goal, usually there's a constraint and it's usually unconscious, a constraint in one of these three areas or more. So I want everyone to think about the first circle. The first M is the M of mindset. Now, I define mindset as these assumptions and attitudes we have about the world and ourselves. So what would fall under mindset is what you believe you deserve. what you believe you are capable of, what you believe is possible. Now, you could have that positive mindset, this growth mindset that you hear Dr. Carol Dweck talk about, right? Versus a fixed mindset. Now, that alone is not going to get you your goals and your dreams, just having an empowering mindset. You need the second M, and the second M is motivation. Now, when I say the word motivation, it's a little bit loaded. Because some people believe motivation is they associated to being hyped up, getting excited for a couple of minutes, you know, while they're at that seminar jumping to music, right?

Yeah.

And it's kind of like that metaphor of a warm bath. It's nice in the moment. And yes, I'm going to, I'm going to journal every day. I'm going to do Pilates three times a week. I'm going to eat the best food ever. And in the moment, you feel like that's the case. but then it cools down. I'm not defining motivation like that. For me, motivation is having a purpose. And I'm not talking about a life purpose. I'm talking about having a reason. So, for example, I I was talking to an entrepreneur, Tom Bilyeu, and he wakes up every morning at four something, and he works out at 5 a.m. and I was like, do you enjoy this every single day? He's like, no, I hate. I I hate working out. And because some people feel like that if they're motivated about something inherently means you find joy in it. And I haven't found that to be the case. Like occasionally I do these ice baths or these cold showers to lower inflammation. It helps me reset my nervous system. I have a video online that has 10 million plus shares just on my morning routine. I don't enjoy, I hate the cold. Like I despise the cold. I grew up in the Northeast here. and it's not for me and I've done it for years and I still don't find joy in it, but I still do it and I'm motivated to do it every single day because I have a reason. So for me, motivation has a three-step formula. Motivation for me is not about being hyped up and excited for the moment. It's about reason, right? Purpose.

That's your reason.

Yeah, having a clear reason and purpose times energy times small, simple steps. Now let me just break this down for everybody. I want you to think about something that you want to be motivated for, where the opposite in the book is procrastination. I teach people how to smash procrastination. But think about something you want to be motivated to do, something you know you should do, but you're still not doing it. Now first, the reason is, like for example, remembering names. A lot of people do not remember names, not because They're not capable of remembering names because the truth is 95. If I was to ask your audience right now, who has challenges remembering names, 99% of them will say, if they're honest, I do. I'm bad at remembering names. And then I will say, okay, well, let's say Mark has a suitcase of a million dollars cash for you. If you just remember the name of the next stranger you meet, who's going to remember that person's name for a million dollars cash, tax free for your favorite charity, everybody. So all of a sudden, your whole audience is full of memory experts now. So it's actually a lie, a lie, or, you know, and these are the lies we tell ourselves. I'm not good at remembering names.

We have to be present to it.

Exactly, and you need a reason because here's the thing. Not everybody remembers everyone's name, but we certainly don't forget everyone's name either. And if you reverse engineer it, you'll find that there's a method behind what looks like magic. you didn't just happen to remember the person's name. There was a motivation. There was a motive for taking action. There was a purpose.

But you've got special tricks.

How do you remember 100 people in an audience? Well, even here, and we'll go through the methods, even here, a simple trick would be asking yourself, why do I want to remember the person's name? Because a lot of people's names you remember are people you're attracted to, people who could be good for your brand or your business. There's an inherent motivation. And so when you're meeting somebody, and you want to remember their name, ask yourself, why do I want to remember the person's name? Because write this down, as I know a lot of people are taking notes, reasons reap results. If you do not have a reason to do something, you will not do it. Reasons reap rewards. And so the first part is, like a lot of people, they can't get themselves to read, they want to read a book a week. You know, we know if the average person reads two or three books a year, but a book a week, 52 books a year, that will transform your life. But a lot of people can't get themselves to read 10, 15, 20 minutes a day. because they're not associating themselves to the reason. But let's say they do have a clear reason. The second part of the formula besides having a purpose is energy. What keeps people from, and this is never really talked about in books, because you'll get books on mindset, you'll have books on motivation, but a key element to motivation, your motive for taking action, like the proof that you're motivated is your acting, right? And so what I'm thinking about is energy. Some people could have a clear reason to read, to work out, but they have no energy. Like they didn't sleep the night before, right? Or they're super stressed, so they lack the vitality to do that action. And that's keeping them from doing those sales calls or taking that road trip or to do the things that they need to be able to do. And so you need to look at energy. So in here, I talk about 10 ways of jumpstarting your mental vitality. which includes maximizing your sleep, stress management, and I quote you in there also a lot about the brain foods. Because as we talked about on your show, what you eat matters especially for your gray matter. And then once you have, you're motivated, see my question is always critical thinking. I'm thinking, okay, is the person, if I'm programming this robot, for example, if it has a reason, is it going to do it? Not necessarily. It needs energy. Okay, so let's say it has a reason and energy. Is it motivated yet? The one thing I could think of that it won't take action on is because the thing that they're thinking about is too big. Meaning that you think about, oh, I want to start a business. Like how do you, like that's not a task or a step, right? So the third part are small, simple steps. Because this is motivation for me is about, you know, time management. This is energy management. Having a clear purpose gives you energy and clarity because something that's not clear takes away energy. You know, having energy and energized brain gives you energy. And then finally, small, simple steps require very little energy. They require very little effort. So my thing with getting people to really make functional change, like to put down this food and pick up this junk, pick up in this food, is to break it down in a small, simple step. meaning that instead of thinking your goal is to have the perfect relationship or the perfect body, how do you break it down into the smallest step where you cannot fail? It's.

Like the BJ Fogg framework, right?

Exactly. So in here we talk about reverse engineering your habits and I take Dr. BJ Fogg who heads the behavior lab at Stanford University and he talks about tiny habits. He's saying, Hey, flossing your teeth, we all know it's good for your longevity. Floss one tooth. Floss one tooth. Same thing with reading. If you want to read a book a week, don't focus on that 45 minutes a day that it takes to read a book, or if you learn speed reading, do it 15 minutes a day. Hey, read one sentence. Because nobody's going to stop after one sentence. It's not like, oh, I got to.

Do this one hour soul cycle. It's like, I got to get myself out the door. I did that because I hated weight lifting and push ups and all that stuff. I love to run and bike and tennis and all that. And I decided, okay, I want to start doing more strength stuff. So I'm gonna start with push ups. I can do that. I'm like, well, I really can barely do 10 push ups, but I'm gonna start. And I realized, well, what do I need? Well, I'm motivated. I have a reason.

I'm aging.

I want to age well. I'm motivated. You have energy.

And I have the energy.

So I realized I shower pretty much every day. Okay, and I turn the shower and it takes like a few minutes to warm up so I do push outs before I walk so the trigger is the turning the shower on and then I do my push-ups and I want.

From 10 to 50 push-ups that's amazing.

Just by just these little steps and.

It works and here's the thing it's it's really if you're persistent you could achieve it, but if you're consistent you could keep it you know, I believe consistency compounds that little by little and a little becomes a lot. And that's how you create a transformation in an individual or in a culture, like the movement that you have with food fix. It's these little things that add up, that add up to big things, you know, over time. So that's motivation.

And the third part.

And then the third circle on here, once you have the mindset and the motivation, are you getting the result? Not necessarily. What's the one thing that's missing? The third M with the, which is the method. Right, the methodology. You need to know how to do it. So the mindset is the what, the motivation is the why, you know, your reason, and then the methods are the how. Now here's the thing. This is where the magic comes in. I want everyone to think about something they want to be more limitless about, meaning progress, make progress, make some advancements that are measurable. The mindset in this Venn diagram crosses over with motivation. that's where you have something called, I call inspiration. And because I alliterate everything, 3Ms, here are your 3 Is. So mindset crosses over with motivation, you have inspiration. And there are books on mindset and there are books on motivation, right? And there are books on inspiration or social media posts or speakers or something. That's inspiration. Now, that doesn't mean that you're gonna have the result because what are you missing? You're missing the methods.

Right?

Now, if you have the motivation and the methods, then you have the second I where that crosses over, you have implementation. But the problem is you're doing it, right? You're motivated and you know what to do, but the ceiling in your results is your mindset. What you feel like you deserve, what you feel like you're capable of. Because all behavior is going to be belief driven. If your mindset is, I have a horrible memory. You can be motivated and know what to do and you still won't remember because the behavior will be limited by the belief.

So show me the money. What are the methods?

And then so we're getting, so in the book we show people how to unravel these negative beliefs that hold them back. Now finally where mindset crosses over with methods, that's where you have, this is where you have ideation. So you have inspiration, you have implementation, and then you have ideation. You have the right mindset. You have this winner growth mindset. Anything is possible. I deserve it all. And you have the methods, right? But you're not motivated. So it just stays as an idea. This is ideation, where people just analysis, paralysis, think about all these different things where all three of these intersect, where mindset, motivation and methods intersect, where Inspiration, implementation and ideation intersect is a fourth I, which is integration. Because ultimately real transformation is a full integration and that sweet spot where all three connect is that limitless state. And that's really, I believe this limitless model is an explanatory schema for anyone for themselves, their team, their family, if there's a gap between where they are and where they want to be. They, we, this is, this book is about redrawing the borders and boundaries of, of what we have. So give us some practical tips.

How do you, how do you, for example, read 25 to 50% faster? Remember names or numbers or bullet points? And how do you, how do you, what are those methods?

Let's do it. So, so going to the, so, I mean, I want to get a free console here. No, no, no. Let's do it. Actually, we'll do it actual coaching here. So the book is breaking down is broken down in three sections. so it's actually three books in one, where we go through and dissect a mindset and we talk about the limiting beliefs that hold us back and the truth, because we talk about these seven lies. And lie for me is a limited idea entertained. It's not the truth, it's an idea that we give energy to, that we entertain, that we picked up. Because here's the thing when it comes to this, because I'm gonna talk about speed reading, Some people, I could teach them the method, but they could believe they're stupid, or they could believe they're a small, they're a slow reader, or they could believe they are a procrastinator and they won't do the method. So we debunk these lies because they're really BS, right? They're belief systems, right? So assuming people have the right mindset and they're motivated to read because some people, you could teach them what to do, they still won't do it because they're not, they know they could do it, but they don't feel it. like the benefits of what it'd be like. Like for me, an example I share in the book is the reason I'm here today is because when I was 18 years old, I learned these skills. My life transformed and I couldn't help but help other people and I started to teach this. And one of my very first students, she was a freshman, she read 30 books in 30 days. Honest to God, 30 books, not skimmer scan, she read. And I wanted to find out, not how I didn't want to know the method. I taught her the method. I want to know what her motivation was because most people who learned that same method did not do the same thing. And I found out, I wanted to ask her, how do you find out someone's motivation? You ask them why? You know, why were you doing this? You know, and I found out, I always get choked up thinking about this. Her mother was dying of terminal cancer. Doctors gave her just two more months to live. And the books she was reading were books like that you write. books to save her mom's life, books on health, wellness, alternative medicine, energy, everything. And I was like, I wish you luck, you know, prayers, you know, and I don't talk to her for months. Six months later, I had a call from this young lady, and she's crying, and she's crying, crying. And when she stops, I find out they're tears of joy that her mother not only survived, but is really getting better. Doctors don't know how, they don't know why. The doctors called it a miracle. but her mother attributed 100% to the great advice she got from her daughter who learned it from all these books. And then I get goosebumps. Yeah, I got the chills when you talked about it. I call them truth bumps, but I feel like that-- Truth bumps, yeah, that's good. That's when I realized that if knowledge is power, then learning is our superpower and it's a power we all have, we just weren't taught in this world. But I illustrate this saying that I'll teach right now, I'll share with you some great tips on how to read Faster, but you have to believe it's possible and you need a reason to do so. Be just like going to the gym. You don't have to enjoy it, but, and I feel like you'll enjoy it once you get good at it. For example, a lot of people do not read because they're not good at it. And if somebody didn't, wasn't good at tennis, it wouldn't be a very enjoyable process. Like, if you're not, I'm not very great at golf. So I really don't find a lot of joy in playing golf because it is, it is a struggle, right? But if I was great at it, like Tiger Woods or whoever, then I would be wanting to play all the time. It's fun because your competence confidence is looped together. So that being the case, find your why to read. Now to read a book a week. Yeah, that's how. So this is the key. Having just written the book, the average book on Amazon has about 64,000 words, the average one. Now I know yours are larger, but 64,000 words. Now the average person reads about 200 words per minute. Now, if you divide those two numbers together, it takes about 320 minutes to get through one book. That sounds like a lot, but break it down into seven days in a week, that's about 45 minutes a day. So that means 45 minutes of reading a day. You could split it up 20 minutes in the morning, 25 in the afternoon. You could get through one book a week, 52 books a year. That would transform you. I mean, what books would you read over the course of a year? That's like having a PhD in any Category, you think about the you know what you would study in terms of entrepreneurship or wellness or anything else like that now that's 45 minutes a day now if you read youd know we graduate people we have students 195 countries They triple their reading speed on average that means 15 minutes a day. We'll get you through a book a week amazing so how do you do.

The same level of comprehension and with.

The same it better so it's so insane because I got a lot of.

Books on my shelf over there. Yeah, I'm like I'm dying to get.

Through them so here's the thing and that it doesn't even take time because that that's a mindset Good issue. Here's the thing, because I filter everything through these 3Ms. And so when you're coaching your patients or somebody who's listening to this, their spouse or their teammates, whenever they're talking, you can see where the constraint is. Is it in a belief or is it in a motivation?

How was the technique to go from.

45 to 15 minutes? This is how you do it. The faster readers tend to have better comprehension in actuality. that's the truth. So if we're gonna unravel these myths, faster readers tend to have better comprehension. And I know this because we have students in 195 countries, so we have a lot of data. And I've worked with kids with learning difficulties to seniors, and so genius leaves clues. One of the keys are what keeps us from reading faster? I'll tell you. Number one, lack of education. We're not born with the ability to read. We learned it. But the last time we took a class called reading, What, how old were you? Yeah, exactly. You were seven years old and so everything has changed since then but we're still reading the same way. Right, so that's the challenge. So this is the education part. The second reason why is lack of focus. Some people will not read faster because they lack the focus. They'll read a page in a book, get to the end and then just forget what they just read. And then go back and reread it. Now, but if when reading is done well, it doesn't take time, it actually makes you time. Because if I could double everyone's reading speed, I'll show you how right now, if I could double your reading speed, that means what takes an hour only takes 30 minutes. The average person has about four hours of reading a day. Think about it. Think about the text messages, the emails, the magazines, the journals, everything you need to process information. By the way, the reason why we do so much corporate training at Google and GE and WordPress, Space X, all these things is because if the average workday is being spent four hours a day processing information, that means half of their salary is being paid just to read. That means if someone's being paid $50,000, they're being paid $25,000 just to do something so ubiquitous like reading. Yeah. And they're reading like they read when they were seven years old. Yeah. Right. So here's the thing. If you could just double your reading speed instead of four hours.

How do you do it?

Do it in two hours. I'm going into the motivation so people will do it. Because the strategy is really easy. Two hours a day, if you save two hours a day over the course of a year.

You're not gonna tell us you're gonna make us five bucks?

No, no, no, no, no, no. I'm gonna share with you. But the reason why I do this is because it's not, I'll tell you what it is and most people won't do it, until they realize they could save two hours a day over the course of, even if they say one hour a day over the course of a year, is 365 hours. That is nine 40-hour work weeks.

Yeah.

You get back two months of productivity. So I want that to be your why. What would you do with two extra months a year?

Every company should send all their employees to go to do the training.

Right, but everyone listening should make this a priority when I'm about to teach you the method because the motivation is there. What would you do with an extra hour a day or an extra two months a year? Most people kill themselves to get an extra two weeks of vacation time a year. And so that's the why. Now, the technique is very simple. The faster you read, the faster readers have the better focus. The reason why, when you read slow, you're feeding the super brain one word at a time. Metaphorically, we're starving our brain. And if you don't give your brain the stimulus and needs, it'll seek entertainment elsewhere in the form of distraction. And that's why you distract yourself. It's like driving. If you're going 20 miles an hour in your neighborhood, you're not really focused on it. What are you doing? You're doing five, you're drinking your coffee, you're texting, which you should know you shouldn't. You're having conversations, you should think about the dry cleaning because you're going slow.

That's like reading.

Most people are reading 100 miles an hour. You're darn right. Exactly. If you're racing cars, taking hairpin turns, you're only focused on two things. The act of driving and what's in front of you. And you're not thinking about the dry cleaning, you're not trying to text, you're not trying to check your makeup, you're doing just those things. that's why just like with reading, when people are reading faster, they're just focused on the act of reading and what's in front of them, right? And I'm dispelling these mindset beliefs because if I don't dispel them, people will think like, oh, I'm not gonna read faster, I'm not gonna understand what I'm gonna read. And if I don't tap motivation, they're not gonna do the method. But here is the method. One more obstacle that we're gonna fix with the method, subvocalization. Subvocalization is this act of saying the words as you read. read, right? You notice that when you read to yourself, you hear that inner voice inside your head, hopefully it's your own voice, it's not like somebody else's voice. The reason why it's a challenge is if you have to say all the words in order to understand them, you can only read as fast as you could speak. That means your reading speed is limited to your talking speed, not your thinking speed. I bet you a lot of people are listening to this show right now at 1.5 or 2x, right? Because they can understand it at that much, but they can't talk that fast. Right. And here's the question, the question of mindset belief. Do you have to say the words in order to understand them? The truth is you don't. Any more than you say comma, question mark, you don't do those things. You don't have to say a lot of words. The, there, and because they're filler words. 95% of the words you see are words you've seen before. You don't have to pronounce them. So the fastest readers don't pronounce all the words. And then finally, it's the last obstacle that we'll fix right now is regression. A lot of people are slow readers because they unconsciously re-read words. Have you ever read like a line and found yourself rereading the line again or going back? It actually 25-50% of our time, sometimes unconsciously upwards of, can be spent rereading words and it's very taxing for the eyes. Because in speed reading, there are these things called fixations. A fixation is a fancy word for an I stop. When you're reading a word, your eyes fixate on the word and then the next word and the next word. And there are about 10 words per line in the average book. So it's making 10 stops. Now, the equivalent would be for kids when they're reading, they're very slow readers first learning how to read. They don't see words, they see letters and they're looking at each individual letter sounding them out. So they're making like 40 stops going through the line. That's why it takes them so long to read. Now, the equivalent of how kids read that make 40 stops to adults reading, you know, 10 stops, speed readers actually make three, maybe two or three or four stops, right? Because they see groups of words like adults, normal readers see groups of letters. So they're only, they're seeing three chunks at a time, so their eyes only have to stop two or three times. And that's the equivalent of driving in traffic, you know, having to make 10 stops over instead of just two or three that other persons get there a lot faster. So the goal here to read faster One of the ways of teaching yourself to read in groups and to subvocalize less, now this is the method part, is by using a visual pacer. Now this is so simple. When people read using a visual pacer, it could be a pen, a highlighter, a mouse on a computer, your finger, a pencil, when you underline the words, not skip anything, because I bet in your traditional speed reading class, skip words. You skip words or you go down the page or you make fancy S or Z forms, but you miss big gaps. That's why you get the gist of what you read. So traditional speed reading, it's not for comprehension, it's skimming. Yeah, that's what I learned. Yeah, exactly. But you don't want your doctor to get the gist of what he's reading, right? That wouldn't make any sense. And so for me, what we've tested is if you just underline the words, don't skip anything, and test yourself. Not with an actual pen, but just with Yeah, you don't under, you're not actually inking it up or anything. If you're reading on a screen, you're not touching the screen or touching the paper, you're just underlining the words and then test yourself. Read for 60 seconds without using a visual pacer, count the number of lines you just read, then set your timer to read 60 seconds using your finger while you read and count the number of lines you just read. That second number will be a 25-50% lift across the board. And now if you practice it more, it'll get even better. But here's the reason why, and I tell the why to increase your motivation because some people are like, oh, that's nice, but you don't understand why, so adults won't do it. Number one, kids do it. All children, all children, if you didn't teach them to do otherwise, they'll use their finger to help them to read because it helps their focus. It's true. Second of all, you do it, and you're thinking, I don't use my finger when I read, but if I asked you to count the number of lines you just read, a hundred percent of the people watching, listening will use their finger and use it as a pacer. One, two, three, four, or a pen. One, two, three. Because the third reason why is because your eyes are attracted to motion. Like if something ran, somebody ran past the cameras here, nobody would look at us because your eyes are hardwired as a hunter gatherer, your survival. You have to look at what moves the most in your environment because it could be a threat. You're a hunter gatherer in a bush. you're hunting lunch, you know, a rabbit or carrot, whatever your viewers eat. If the bush next to you moves, you have to look because number one, it could be lunch or number two, you could be lunch. So you have to look at what moves or your eyes are hardwired to look at what moves. When you're underlining the words, your eyes are being pulled through the information as opposed to your attention being distracted and pulled out. And then the final reason you use your fingers while you read is because It's how your neurology is set up, your nervous system, your senses. Like have you ever tasted a great piece of fruit, like from the farmer's market? Not something that's been waxed and sprayed. Yeah, wild strawberry. Yeah, something like right off the vine. Have you ever tasted a great tasting peach? In actuality, you're not tasting the peach. Your tongue is not capable of tasting what a peach tastes like. It's actually smelling the peach. But your sense of smell and your sense of taste are so closely linked that your mind can't perceive the difference. It could perceive the difference when you're sick, because when you can't breathe out of your nose, you can't taste stuff. Food tastes what? Bland. But that's because your sense of smell and taste are so closely linked. Just as your sense of smell and taste are linked, so is your sense of sight and your sense of touch. That literally, when people underline the words as they read, people will tell me all the time, I feel, I don't know what it is, I feel more in touch with my reading. In fact, if you go to a child, A toddler and say, Look at my keys, look at my keys, look at my keys. The child will what? Reach out and grab and touch, because in order for him or her to feel like they're seeing it, they have to touch it. It's equivalent of if somebody is blind, another example, if they can't see, how do they read? With their sense of touch.

So, your book is full of these practical tips. And it's the whole McGilI from mindset to motivation to method, breaking it all down and helping people become really limitless. And I always try to push against my limitations, but I think I forced my way. And this is sort of like a way to shift that and actually make it easier. And I'm just so glad you wrote this book. You have so many great things there. In there, you talk about a not to-do list. You have an incredible 10-day quick start challenge, which I think people are gonna love. It's about how, but it's also exactly the specifics of how to get it done, which is what I love about it. And I'm like, actually, I don't get excited about a lot of stuff. And I've known you for a long time and I know your work, and it's one of those things I'm thinking it's a nice to do someday, and I'm like, when can I get started on this? 'Cause I'm really jazzed, 'cause my life is all about learning. It's all about understanding, and I feel like if I can accelerate that, and read a book a week, it's the best news I've heard.

I'm saying we show up differently when we have that level of confidence. When you could walk into a room with 20 strangers and leave saying goodbye to every single one of them by name. You show up different. Especially in business. The number one business etiquette networking skill is just remember someone's name. How are you going to show someone you're going to care for their health, their wealth, their finances, their family, if you don't care enough just to remember them? And so very proud of. So great, Jim.

I mean, this book, Everybody Should Get a Copy, it's on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, every year, books. It's phenomenal, limitless. Upgrade your brain, learn anything faster, unlock your exceptional life. I wrote the forward. I don't write forwards too many books. I wrote the forward. I appreciate that.

It's out April 28th. Can I give everyone a challenge? A quick challenge to leave them off on this. You mentioned a 10-day challenge. I created a brand new 10-day quick start program to really harness your brain, get it set up to become limitless. And I like to, we could gift that to everybody who's listening for just as a thank you for getting the book. So people go to limitlessbook.com and just submit their invoice or receipt number and they'll get access to that program so that they could be a speed reader and remember everything when the book is in.

Super generous. Yeah, you want to You want to get started on this before you get going so you can remember everything in the book. Yeah.

And so people could take this episode, and I do this in my podcast, take a screenshot of it, this video or this podcast episode, or take a picture of your notes, tag Dr. Mark Hyman, tag me, post it on Instagram, Facebook, on Twitter, and share your one aha. If there's one thing in this conversation, I believe we learn so we could earn, so we could return. so we could be able to pay it forward.

Amazing.

The best way to learn something is to teach somebody else. So post it and post your aha in the description and tag us and I'll repost some of my favorites and I'll gift a copy of the book to some people also for doing that.

Thanks, Jim. You're so generous. Thank you for being such a great friend, for being such a contribution to humanity, for helping us all become smarter, learn better and faster and get quicker in our life. So if you love this podcast, Please share your friends and family on social media, subscribe wherever you get your podcast, thank you for listening, and we'll see you next week on the Doctor's Pharmacy. Hi everyone, it's Dr. Mark Hyman. So two quick things. Number one, thanks so much for listening.

To this week's podcast.

It really means a lot to me. If you love the podcast, I'd really appreciate you sharing with your friends and family. Second, I want to tell you about a brand new newsletter I started called Mark's Picks. Every week, I'm going to send out a list of a few things that I've been using to take my own health to the next level. This could be books, podcasts, research that I found, supplement recommendations, recipes, or even gadgets. I use a few of those. and if you'd like to get access to this free weekly list all you have to do is visit drhyman.com forward slash pics that's drhyman.com forward slash pics I'll only email you once a week I promise and I'll never send you anything else besides my own recommendations so just go to drhyman.com forward slash pics that's P-I-C-K-S to sign up free today.

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