39. Nick Velasquez: Author of Learn, Improve, Master

Hello, Book Thinkers family, and welcome to episode number 39 of our personal development podcast, Book Thinkers: Life-Changing Books. During each episode, I interview one of the world's top authors, and as a listener, you can expect to discover new books, new mentors, and new resources that you can use to achieve more and to live better. In this episode, I have the pleasure to interview the author Nick Velázquez. Nick is a passionate learner. and devoted student of mastery, also one of my favorite subjects. He is the author of the popular blog unlimitedmastery.com, where he writes about learning science, peak performance, creativity, and mastering skills. His writing has been featured in outlets such as Time. And Nick speaks multiple languages, spends his time between Tokyo and Montreal, but he's originally from Colombia. Our conversation today is all about his book, Learn, Improve, Master: How to Develop Any Skill and Excel at It. Nick and I have a lot in common, and you'll find today's episode is very relaxed and conversational. So without further ado, please enjoy this amazing conversation with author Nick Velázquez. Well, Nick Velázquez, thank you so much for joining the Book Thinkers Life-Changing Books Podcast. How are you doing today, man?

Hey, Nick. Thanks for having me. Doing great.

I'm excited for our conversation. We've been in touch back and forth for quite a bit, and I just finished reading up your book. Today actually was the final day that I finished reading it in preparation for our conversation, and I've got a ton of good questions for you. But for those in the audience that aren't familiar with you or your work, could you introduce yourself to everybody?

Sure. So the book is called Learn, Improve, Master. And it's precisely that. It's a book that teaches you how to learn, improve, and master any skill. So if you have the dream of becoming a writer or a chef or an athlete, then it shows you the process to develop those skills and refine them.

Yeah, I love it. Right in chapter 1, or right before chapter 1, you talk about the brain's capacity to adapt. And so that was what you kicked off the book with. I'd love to have you talk a little bit about neuroplasticity and maybe define it for the audience.

Sure. So neuroplasticity is our brain's capacity to adapt and to change itself given certain stimulus. So for example, if you play guitar, you play string instruments, then the part of your brain that is in charge of your left hand, which would be like your fingering hand for most people, then it becomes overdeveloped. And so we've seen that in musicians, that's what the studies show. And it's not that they were born with a bigger capacity for movement in those fingers. So they develop it through playing the instrument. So in reality, neuroplasticity is just our brain will adapt depending on the needs that we push on it. So any skill that you want to develop, that's what's going to happen. Your brain is going to change and adapt to that skill to make you better at it.

One of the reasons that I first got into personal development is because I had a fixed mindset about virtually everything in life. I came from a place— everybody hears me say this, but I came from a place of ego and insecurity. And during this transition where I started to read a couple of good books and I started to listen to a of good podcasts, I learned about this concept of neuroplasticity. I learned about the fact that your brain can change over time and that that's kind of relatively new science. And so when we're talking about brains changing, we're talking about neural pathways. And you have this great metaphor in the book about grass. And so I'd love to have you explain that one to everybody.

Sure. So you imagine that you come across a field of high grass and then the first time you were trying to cross this field, You're just making your way through it and it's difficult. But if you come the next day to the same path, then you're going to see like a trail of tamped down grass from the steps you took the day before. So it becomes a little bit easier to walk this time because you can go through the same path. And if you keep doing that every day, then that rough path becomes a trail and it's just easier and smoother to walk. So it's kind of the same idea with our neural connections. So at the beginning, we're creating this connection or associations. between things, but as we reinforce them, they become stronger and easier to navigate, like the electricity from one to the next one. And that's kind of what we're doing in developing any skill. At the beginning, we feel clumsy because our brain is learning how to move our hand, for example, if you're playing guitar. And that's the rough trail, like from neuron to neuron. But as you're getting— as you're practicing more, then those connections straighten and they become faster and insulated. Not going too technical, it's a process called myelination. It gets surrounded by myelin. And that allows for easier and stronger exchange of information between neurons.

See, that's so exciting for me because that is— it brings hope and faith into my body. I know that I can become anything that I want. I can adopt any skill set that I want and become whoever I want. So that's one of the reasons that I really love personal development. So thanks for taking the time to explain that to everybody. Yeah.

Yes. There's something we can talk about that. I just make an extra point on this. I was writing recently about distinction between becoming the best and then becoming one of the best and then becoming your best. And these are different. So many times when you talk about and you tell people like you can learn anything you want because we all have this amazing capacity to learn and this neuroplasticity is just something that we're all born with. They're like, well, I can't be the next Mozart. And like, well, first of all, why would you? You're not Mozart. You can't really be the next Mozart. You can only be you. But there's always this obsession with, could I be the next Michael Jordan? And the idea is to become the very best at something in the world, then you need a combination of luck, yes, genes, and a lot of hard work. So there are like different parts that come into play. Then the other one is becoming one of the best. So not the absolute best, but one of the best. Now we have to remember that, for example, Michael Phelps was not the entire swimming team of the United States. There were other people in the team, okay, who were really good swimmers as well. So for that, you also need some luck, some good training, kind of your genes on your side, and a lot of hard work. So maybe less on the luck side, maybe less on the gene side, but still the same of a lot of hard work. And then becoming your best, that's completely within your control. And why is it not as noble? Why is it not as honorable to just see how far you can take yourself? So many times people just get obsessed and think, well, why would I go into this if I could never become the best? So maybe they're not tall and they decide not to go into basketball because like, oh, I could never be the greatest. That's not necessarily the point. You could be a great basketball player, not necessarily the greatest, or you could be the best basketball player you can be. And if you love that sport, you wouldn't think about it twice. You would still go after it. So for example, Michael Phelps, when he started swimming, he couldn't know he would become Michael Phelps. There was no way. No one could have told. He just loved swimming. And if someone else loves swimming just as much as you, just do it. So one of the examples I was given there is, let's say that there's a machine that could tell you with all certainty that you could never become the best. Hell, not even top 100. Okay? But your absolute love in life is to swim. So would you stop swimming? No.

Probably not. No.

Just keep swimming. Just do it and keep going and see how far you can take it. So there's this beautiful quote from philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche. It says like, I'm just going to paraphrase it. I'm going to butcher it. But he says like, there is a path that only you can take and do not ask where it leads you. Just walk along it.

I love that. Yeah, I love that. Well, everything that you just mentioned, I went through an experience, I think, during that transformation that I mentioned earlier where I cared way too much about what the external world thought of me. And when I started to just compare myself to myself, my version of myself yesterday and the version of myself that I can become, things They were more fulfilling. And I was also more excited about pursuing personal development books and these different skills and everything like that, because I'm not trying to be the next XYZ personal development guru. I'm just trying to be a better version of myself. So that's a really cool distinction. And I like the 3 categories. It's a good system to reference.

Yes. And you make a good point that we should be focusing on progress. How do I become better? It's not necessarily how do I become the next X or Y, but it's like, how do I get better? And one of the strategies I'm talking about in the book, and I'm getting ahead of myself, but this is towards the end talking about mastery. Like when you focus on the process and on progress, that's what will lead you to the greater results. So if you're thinking just how do I become better today and then the next day and then the next day and next week, and eventually that compounds over time and that's what leads to greatness. So it doesn't just happen overnight. You have to put in the work and just go in step by step. And no one knows how far you can go. So I cannot tell you that you can be anything you want. No one can. But at the same time, I cannot tell you where your limits lie. So that's the other point. The only thing you can do is just go through the process and see how far you can take it.

Yeah, progress is— it's my one word. It's what motivates me. And I know that if I've made progress in my life, in my health, in my wealth, and in my communication with friends, family, and loved ones on a daily basis that when I put my head on my pillow at night, I'm fulfilled and I can go to sleep. That internal self-talk, the self-criticism sort of goes away when I know that I've made progress. And so progress is definitely a very important piece of mastery, which we'll get to in a few minutes. But there are some myths that you dispel in the beginning of the book, and I'd love to have you talk a little bit about these.

Sure.

One is the 10,000-hour rule. So we just talked about hard work.

Yeah.

But why was Malcolm Gladwell incorrect when he stated that it was the 10,000-hour mark that made you a master?

Yes, that became so popular. And yes, you're right. So it was in the book Outliers and it was Malcolm Gladwell. But to his credit, he came out a couple of times and said like, well, I didn't present the whole story. So he has tried to set that right, but unfortunately it's out of his hands now. So it's just— and it took fire on its own and it's very catchy, it's a marketable idea. You say, well, the 10,000 hours. But this comes from research from K. Anders Ericsson, who's an expert in expertise and performance and peak performance. And it was a study done on musicians, to be precise violinists. And what the study found is that the best musicians in that school, it's a prestigious school in Europe, they had done at least 10,000 hours of deliberate practice, which is the other main point we're going to get to, of deliberate practice by the time they were 20 years old. So a couple of things there. So one, it was done on a particular skill, which is music. 2, it didn't try to set a universal timeline for mastery. It was just an average of these people and how long they have been doing deliberate practice to the point that they were 20 years old, which number 3, it takes us there, is to the point until they were 20 years old. So they were on the path of becoming really great musicians, but they were not there yet. So they were the best at that moment, and it only took into account how long it had been until that age. Other thing is that it reported an average. It's not the same for everyone. And last thing is that it was looking at deliberate practice, which is not the same as just mindlessly going through the motions or mere repetition. Many people call repetition practice, and it's not the same. If you show up At your practice, let's say if you're swimming or you're playing guitar and you're just doing what you know how to do and you're not pushing yourself, that's not practice, that's performance. So if I sit down with my guitar every day and I play the same song I already know how to play, I'm not really getting much better. I'm just executing what I already know. For practice to be delivered, it needs certain characteristics and we'll get to that after. To the defense of Gladwell and also like to the study from Ericsson, This was very— it was a study done mostly asking the students about their experience. So they were looking back and thinking how long they have been practicing and doing deliberate practice because it's very hard to control these things. But the point that Ericsson wanted to make is not that, well, here's the time limit for mastery. What he wanted to prove is like, look, whether you have innate talents or not, that's not what matters. Even if you were born with some advantages, everyone has to put in a lot of work You get really good. So he was trying to say talent is not as important as we've been led to believe. So there are immense opportunities that are open to us if we're willing to do the hard work. So his point is like, look where deliberate practice can take us. Look how much we can achieve with deliberate practice. The point was not it takes 10,000 hours to become a master at anything, which is what they graded it into. So that's a big one. And that's why I wanted to put it there because I hear a lot of people saying, well, you got to put the 10,000 hours. Like, that's not it. That's not how it works.

Well, that's a great distinction between deliberate practice and repetition. And so we'll dive— maybe we'll go back into that subject in a few minutes. But the other myth that I wanted you to dispel on the podcast today, the other one that I thought was really interesting, was that people normally say learning should be fun, but it doesn't always have to be fun. Like, I'm not having fun every day when I'm reading these books. So what Why doesn't learning have to be fun?

Learning is not required to be fun. Learning stretches the mind. It makes us focus and work hard at improving. And that's not always enjoyable. So what I talk about in the book is that the condition we're after is enthusiasm, is like embracing the learning process with all its difficulties. So even in Ericsson's studies, he noticed that most top performers, they describe practice as grueling and difficult and they're stretching. They never say it's fun. So in fact, if you're having too much fun practicing, most likely you're not working hard to improve, which at that point you're kind of falling into performance. So again, the example, if I sit down and I'm playing guitar and I'm playing my favorite Iron Maiden song or Metallica song and I'm just having fun with it, executing, I'm performing. And it's okay to have fun at that point. That's why I learned to play guitar. But if I'm trying to get better, then most likely I'm putting out some exercises with a metronome and I'm being frustrated because I'm pushing myself like 10% more or 5% more of what I'm capable of at that point. And that's what's forcing my brain to like make those connections better. And that's not fun. It's difficult and it should be difficult. That's what it is. So it's just concerning to me that a lot of the things that we do these days is just geared towards making it enjoyable. And we lost touch with all these other emotions that people start calling negative. They're not necessarily negative. They're there for a reason. Most innovation, most inventions, they came from frustration, from difficulties, from sadness, from a lot of the so-called negative emotions. They were there for a reason. They serve us as well. So the struggle, it's important when we're practicing. So it's the idea that They made us think that if we're struggling or we're having difficulties, then we must be doing something wrong, and we feel bad about it, and it's not like that. It's part of the process, and a lot of it has to do with marketing. So learning how to learn is becoming a popular subject, so more people are writing about that. Same with languages. So you see many times like, whoa, learn to speak a language in a month. No, no, you won't. It doesn't happen that way. Learning languages is difficult. So what happens is that you don't learn it in a month, Then you're frustrated by it and you think it's you that has a problem instead of the person that is marketing in a not very honest way. So it's like in this intention of selling things to people and like making them feel like it's easy. Look, like develop a 6-pack without effort. No, that does not exist. It does not exist. So I'd rather someone to tell me, look, it's going to be difficult, it's going to be hard, but let me show you how to achieve it.

Well, I thought that was a— I thought it was a great point in the book. Like, there's a difference between fun and enthusiasm. And so a very easy example, which we kind of talked about, is the gym. Like, no, you won't get abs overnight. But if you go to the gym for a very long period of time, you might have fun at first and then the fun will go away, but you're still enthusiastic about it. It should be difficult. You shouldn't just be having fun. And then you can wake up with the six-pack abs, but it's probably years down the road, not overnight.

Yeah.

Or whatever the case may be for you. So that's a really cool one. Now, you just talked a little bit about meta-learning becoming more popular. That's something that you touched on in the book. Why do you think that our traditional education system, especially the one that everybody talks about in the United States, why don't we start with learning how to learn? Like the same way that in sports we never think about how to run, we just start running and we just start learning in school.

Well, it should be taught and it is a problem that it's not. So Learning should be the skill that precedes all others. It's like there's certain skills that we all need at the beginning of our lives that are gonna set our way for everything else— reading, writing, speaking— and then the following one is learning, um, because it makes us better at everything else. Then at any point, if you know the learning process and how to optimize it, anything you want to pick up, you're going to learn it so much faster. So yes, the subject is picking up, is mostly picking up just by Not the educational system, not the formal system, which is a very old system. It goes back to the Victorian period and it was intended to educate the masses. So it had to be like this assembly line of things. And over the years everyone has realized this has so many flaws. I don't know if you ever, ever watched the Ken Robinson TED Talk on education, on the educational system. I definitely recommend it. I'll send you the link and you can add it to the notes as well.

Yeah, I'll add it to the show notes.

It's like one of the things that he talks about is like, why did they decide that the thing that should bind us together is our age? Why do we put people of the same age in the same group?

Great question. Yeah.

Yeah. So there are all these problems. I was lucky enough that I attended a very different school. We didn't have teachers, we had tutors and we had study guides. So there were no classes. We will go to school and then we'll be studying on our own. So we'd be using these guides and then doing research on our own, and whenever we had a question, we would go to the tutor and say like, look, I don't understand this subject, and they would help us figure it out. So the school is based on Socrates' methods, so it's called the Socratic method, in Spanish, magéutica. The idea is he believed that we came with all the knowledge to the world, but it had to be drawn out through questioning instead of being imposed.

Mm-hmm.

So this school, like, all the study guides are based on questions, and the questions like progressively get harder, and then you're trying to deduce the knowledge. And that was kind of the whole idea, but it was a very different school, and I had the chance of being there. The other thing about the school is that they put a lot of emphasis on excellence. So for every single subject that we studied, let's say you're studying 7th grade math, there will be 13 different subjects for 7th grade, and we'll have to take an exam for every single one of them. And the exam we could only pass with 90% or more. And the idea is like you have to master every subject you study. And if you fail the exam, doesn't matter. Go back to the material, see where you made the mistake, improve, and then take another exam for the same subject. So it was the idea of never leaving gaps in knowledge. So everything I studied, I had to master it to a degree. And that's kind of what led me with this just passion for learning because it never felt like it was being pushed on me. It was always something that I was discovering. It was a process of discovery. And that's why I find learning so fascinating. I've been obsessed with it ever since.

It's really interesting. Where was the school based that you went to?

So that was back home. I'm originally from Colombia, so Medellín. But it's only one school like that in the whole city and maybe in the country.

I don't know.

It was just a very special system.

Yeah.

We didn't even have to show up at school. So they will give you levels of autonomy depending on how well you do your work and if you follow through the rules. So by the time I graduated, I was at the highest one, which meant I didn't have to go to school. I could study at home if I wanted. I could take breaks whenever I wanted. My work was the first one to be graded, and that's it. And I could take vacation for as long as I wanted. If I wanted to take a 3-month vacation, like, fine, do it. Like, we know you do the work. We don't need to be on top of you, like, making sure, looking over your shoulder. So this school worked on this idea of developing your interests and also your discipline and just a passion for knowledge.

So yeah, that's, that's really interesting to me. And I've always— now I'm not a parent and I'm not going to be a parent anytime soon, but I've always thought to myself and I've socialized the idea that I don't want my children, my future children to go through the traditional assembly line, you know, US education system and that there's probably a better system out there. And I figured, hey, I would delay that research until the time becomes necessary. But that's, that's really cool that you brought that up now. What other philosophers do you study? You reference a lot of different schools of thought within your book. So who are you the most interested in and who do you study?

Oh, Nietzsche. Yeah, he's amazing. He's dark and bright at the same time because it's the idea of like, yes, at the beginning he fell in love with Schopenhauer and kind of that very negative view on life, like this is all suffering and it's horrible and we should just try to make it the least horrible we can. But then after that, he refused to believe that that was the whole purpose, and he spent the rest of his life trying to negate that from Schopenhauer and saying, yes, it is a struggle. Yes, it's difficult. But because it is difficult, there is a point. That's why it matters, and we can find something that is worth struggling for. And then he put out all this belief about becoming Superman and just personal development. I think the greatest personal development philosopher, Albin Nietzsche. He's like, we can be better and it's going to be difficult and there's struggle, but there's value in that struggle. So I find that to be the most attractive one. I love reading Nietzsche. It's one of my favorites for sure.

Yeah. Funny enough, I haven't read any Nietzsche. I mean, been referenced in tons and tons of books that I've read. So I've sort of studied him from a second-degree level, but I need to dive in and learn a little bit more.

Well, the problem with Nietzsche is that late in his life when he already became kind of mad, he was delusional, and his sister took a lot of his work and published it without his permission. And she turned his ideas around, and then he became associated with the Nazi Party because they took it as like the— that the Superman was like a master race, and that's not what he was talking about. So this has been debunked many times by many philosophy professors, like prominent professors from universities in the States. I think one of the main ones is the philosophy professor at University of Austin who has a book. It's called What Nietzsche Really Said. So I think that's why a lot of people don't come across Nietzsche. It's like there was like this tainted thing, but it's been proven again that he was not an antisemite. In fact, he had a fight with Wagner, who at one point he admired, because Wagner turned out to be antisemitic. might. So, and he had a fight about that and he could not believe that a person he admires so much would have those views. So that has been debunked many times and that's probably why many people avoid it.

Yeah, well, I'll do a little bit of homework and maybe I'll read that book. That sounds really interesting.

I would recommend you another one. So one is What Nietzsche Really Said. The other one's Hiking with Nietzsche. Funny thing, like reading Nietzsche is difficult. It's very difficult for me too because English is not my first language. So his works are translated in kind of this Old English. And for some reason, it's easier to first read about his work from other people and then delve into his work. So read Hiking with Nietzsche and then What Nietzsche Really Said, and then you can read his actual work because you're going to be primed to learn what he has to teach you.

I've followed that roadmap for quite a few other philosophers. I really love Stoic philosophy. And so for me, the best introduction is Ryan Holiday.

Oh yeah, for sure.

Summarize, he could talk about things from a third-party perspective. And then when you read a book like Meditations by Marcus Aurelius, or you're, you know, you read a book by Seneca or something like that, you can understand things a lot more, you know, a lot faster and more efficient.

Funny you mentioned that. He's one of my favorite authors, and I acknowledge him in my book because he was such an inspiration And his book Perennial Seller motivated me to keep improving my book. I had finished my book maybe a year earlier, and then I read Perennial Seller and I was like, no, I need to make this thing better. And I went back to it and just rewrote and rewrote the whole thing. And I also like his philosophy books. They're amazing. The Obstacle Is the Way. And I just finished Lives of the Stoics.

Yeah. Very good books. Ryan has been on the podcast. He was like a big goal for me because I'm such a big fan as well. I think I've read Yes. Probably 8 of his books, and I read The Daily Stoic every day. So yeah, it was—

It's great. It's great. Love his work.

Hello, Book Thinkers family. A quick word from today's podcast sponsor. Today's episode is sponsored by Audible. Audible is the leading provider of spoken word entertainment and audiobooks ranging from bestsellers to celebrity memoirs, business, and my favorite, personal development. And as part of Audible's partnership with us, we're actually offering listeners a free 30-day trial. This trial includes one credit good for any premium selection titles you'd like on the whole platform. So that's pretty much any book, including the one we're talking about today. That book is yours to keep even after the trial is over. Now, this trial also includes access to Audible's Plus catalog of podcasts, audiobooks, guided wellness programs, and Audible Originals. You can listen all you want, no credits needed. Now everyone on the Book Thinkers Instagram knows that I love physical paper books. There's nothing better than having a book in your hand, scribbling notes everywhere in the margins. I kind of tear those things up, but I've been completing an additional 20 to 30 books every single year using Audible by listening when I'm in the car, doing chores around the house, Or while I'm on my morning walks or runs. You could take advantage of this free trial by clicking the link in today's show notes or going to www.bookthinkers.com/audibletrial. You will not regret it. Now, back to today's episode. Well, like I said, I love applying that methodology of learning from maybe a more updated modern-day third-party perspective and then go into the actual philosophy itself. So that's awesome.

Yeah, that sounds like a great idea. And from a learning perspective, it makes a lot of sense. You're priming your mind for what you're going to learn. So let's say if you're picking up a book about anything, you can go through the table of contents and then skim— skip a little bit and then go back and read the whole thing. Or if someone uses Blinkist or any app that has like summaries for books, I know you have one, so you can read that and then you can read the entire book. You're just priming and kind of having an idea what you're getting yourself into.

Well, you mentioned languages a couple of minutes ago, so I want to go off, off into this for a little bit.

Sure.

Pack the languages. How many languages do you speak?

3 and change. So Spanish is my first one. Then English is my best one. Then French. I live in Montreal. And I'm learning Japanese because I spend as much time as I can in Tokyo. I just love Japan. It's the best. Yeah.

I can't wait to visit. I have a friend and he always tells me every 6 months or so, like, hey, I'm getting ready to buy my tickets. And I say, okay, once you do, let me know, 'cause I'll go with you. And then he never does. So maybe I'll have to come visit you while you're out there.

Oh yes, man. I'll show you around. To me, Japan is really my favorite place. I don't— I could live there for sure. It's just that they make it really difficult for someone to move there and stay there. So I just go for as long as I can. But Japan is just something else. Of all the places that I've been to, Japan is the only place I felt like I was dropped in another world. This doesn't make any sense. What's going on?

I love that. I mean, intentionally embracing the discomfort and broadening your own horizons. That's really cool. I had a buddy who was in the Navy for 4 years and he was stationed in Japan and they would go into the city all the time and he really loved it. You really loved it.

It's the people that make it so amazing. They're like the nicest, most polite people you ever meet, and that makes life easy because you, you don't feel stressed. You're— it's just comfortable. Everyone kind of greets you with a smile, and it's very crowded. Tokyo is very crowded, but you don't feel rushed. You don't feel like people are pushing you around or anything. It's like a very different experience. I lived in New York, and I love the energy, Sometimes it can be very stressful. Tokyo is just as crowded, if not more, but you don't feel stressed out.

It's really interesting.

Yeah.

So you're learning Japanese. I'm in the process of learning Spanish and it's, for me, it's a very slow— it's very slow. It's very difficult for me. So what are some things that you're doing to learn Japanese that maybe I could apply to my Spanish?

Sure. So, well, I did study Japanese while I was in Japan, so I was going to a language school. Right now I'm using an app called Fluent Forever. I have no association with the app. I just love it. It's been the best one. So it's a lot of flashcards and then building sentences. And this comes from a book of the same name. So it's the same. So the author of the book then developed the app. And I found that one to be the best book on learning languages. I've read many of them. So languages is kind of interesting because it's very memory heavy. because you need to memorize a lot of things that have no— you can't reason your way into them. So let's say the word table. There's nothing from the sound table that indicates it's a table. You just have to create that connection.

Yeah.

Right? It's association, and that's how we learn any language. Like at the beginning when we were babies, like they will say mom and we wouldn't know what it was, but then we created that connection between our mother and the sound. And right now that connection is so strong we can't dissociate it. If someone speaks to us, you know, in a language we understand, we can't help but understanding what they're saying. We can no longer just hear noises. So it becomes completely attached, like our neural processes just become one with the noises and then the concepts behind it. So you need to memorize a lot of things. So learning languages, you start by vocabulary. Well, according to Fluent Forever, he works first on phonetics, so how to pronounce and then what your mouth is doing, because that's gonna make it easier. But after that, then you really work on building your vocabulary, because words are very much the essence of any language. If you know the words, you can speak without much grammar and people understand you. Then you start putting the grammar together. But if you learn grammar without having vocabulary, you have nothing. You have some abstract rules that you can't apply to anything because you have no content to put into it. So yes, you work a lot on the memory side, and then later on you'll be building on the grammar. The other point is like, we try to learn a language all at the same time. Like, how do I write it? How do I speak it? And then understanding. So a couple of things there. Understanding, so listening, is much easier than speaking. And people many times they say, well, I understand when people talk to me, but I can't really— Yeah, it's everyone because recognition is easier than recall. And then here we're going into the world of memory. So recognition is you've seen something in the past and then you're exposed to it again and you're like, well, I know what this is. So let's say a song starts playing on the radio. It's like, oh, I've heard this song before. So what your mind is doing is running that input against your database and saying, is there a match? If there's a match, it's like, I know this song. But if someone said like, can you hum the song from memory? Then that's completely different. Now you're trying to retrieve from memory without any aid, any help. So it's the same if you meet someone at a party and they say their name, then when you try to remember the name, you may see the person later and you recognize the face like, oh, that's the person, but you don't remember the name. It's the same thing. The name is not anywhere for you to make a match. You have to retrieve it from memory. But the face is right there in front of you, so you can say, oh, I recognize the face. So when people say I'm better with faces than names, yeah, it's everyone. They're completely different processes. And it's the same for languages. So it's like, first, yes, the listening, you're recognizing something, but when you have to speak, you have to retrieve it without any help. Interestingly, when you try to speak, so when you focus your language learning on speaking, then you're doing double the work. So you're getting like more bang for your buck because you're trying to retrieve from memory and then you say it, then you reinforce it. So ideally you should do as much conversation as you can. And then when you're on your own, just work on your flashcards and building— you're doing those building blocks of like all the vocabulary that you need.

What I really need to go do is live in a Spanish-speaking country and I need to take a class like you're— like you did when you were in Tokyo. I think that that would be a big step in the right direction. I always kind of joke that once Book Thinkers is over, whether that's a couple years from now or longer, I'll go live in a Spanish-speaking country and get a job maybe serving coffee or waiting tables or something so that I could just have as much conversation as possible.

Yes, it's just having as much conversation that you can. But you could do the same. You can find some practice partners. There are a lot of websites where you could do language exchange. Or you can hire a tutor at— what is it? italki. And it's not that expensive and you can do like 1 hour, 3 times a week. And then in the meantime, you're working with your app and then you're working with your flashcards. So you can really do it just about anywhere. The only thing about immersion is that you have no choice, but it might take you a little bit longer if you're not kind of moving to the other place, but many language speakers, they can learn or many people that are very passionate about learning languages, they can learn a language from anywhere. In fact, like I was talking to a guy, he has this website and podcast called Language Mastery. He has a book, like I think it's Learn Japanese, but his whole idea is anywhere immersion. It's like, how can you surround yourself with the language without having to move into the country? So yeah, I know there are many ways to do it. It's just putting the time and energy. Here's the other point. Like for you that you're learning a language, but you're very passionate about it. You were telling me that you've traveled to some Spanish-speaking countries and probably fell in love with the places. So that's why you want it. But I meet people that sometimes they say, well, I don't know what to do this summer. I might pick up some Italian. No, you won't.

Probably not.

It's not easy. It's not easy. So you need to have that drive. And here's the funny thing. I kind of— we're bringing everything back, back around and full circle when we're talking about learning how to learn becoming a more popular subject. So one of the things that I try to focus on and the message I try to transmit is my book and my work is not about learning faster. Speed is a byproduct. I'm focused on learning better. How can we become better learners?

Mm-hmm.

And the speed is the byproduct of you becoming a better learner. So when you're learning martial arts and you want your kick to have more power and speed, your teacher will be focusing on your technique. Like focus on technique and then speed and power comes later, comes as a byproduct. So with learning languages, many people are like, how do I learn a language quickly? Like, how do you learn it better? And many times people just want to collect languages or collect knowledge, collect learnings. Like I want to learn this, I want to learn how to learn faster. So I can learn 1,000 things. And if everything became very extremely easy to learn, let's just imagine for a moment, let's go into this imaginary world that you can learn anything you wanted so quickly, like on the Limitless movie, then everything would lose meaning because too many options dilutes purpose.

Yeah.

Then you wouldn't know what you like. You'll be so distracted from one thing to the next, then you forget why you like one in particular. So if someone came to me and said, look, it's going to take you 5 years to learn Japanese. It's not. It's probably going to take a year. Someone said it's going to take you 5. Would I still do it? Yes. So for anything that you're trying to learn in your life, that's a question you should be asking. Like if we— if it took twice as long and twice as much effort as you've been led to believe, would you still do it? If the answer is no, you're probably just doing it for entertainment or because you don't know what else to do with your time. So I'm a big proponent of just focusing on what really matters to you. And I have to come to terms with that because I want to learn it all. And I have books on so many subjects. And every time I feel like I'm picking up a new hobby and having to reduce all that and say, I won't be able to learn it all in my lifetime. It just won't happen. Even if I learn, if I could learn super fast, I cannot learn everything I want. But actually, it's a good thing because not being able to learn everything, it makes me choose more carefully what I want to learn and then put my heart into it.

Yeah, I feel the same way. The more that I read, the more that I learn, the more I realize there's so much out there. Every time I read a new subject, I realize there are dozens of other little trails I could go down that I don't have the time to research.

Yes.

That's really fascinating. We've had a couple We've had a couple authors on the show, Howard Berg as well as Jim Kwik, that talk a lot about speed reading. But yes, I think speed reading is for the purpose of selling their course. They're really teaching smart reading. They're teaching how to learn. They're getting those fundamentals in place before they teach you how to improve your speed. And so it's a similar concept.

And one thing about speed reading, and when a lot of people that want to take on speed reading is like, you reading consistently already? Because if you're not, then that's the first thing. Because if you're not reading, learning to read at twice the speed, you will still not be reading at the same speed. So like, I prefer the idea you're already doing something and now you're trying to improve on it.

Mm-hmm.

But not because you learn to read faster is gonna magically make you read every day. It's like, if you don't have that habit already, if you don't enjoy reading already, than learning faster, you just probably read the same amount. So I have one example in the book when I talk about efficiency to get more, not to do less. So you're trying to get more instead of doing less. So let's imagine everyday example. Someone wants to get fit. So they find a program that requires them to train 1 hour a day and they'll be able to, let's say that they drop 3 pounds per week, just to make an example. And then they find another system that allows them to work out half the time. So 30 minutes a day, and they'll still drop the same 3 pounds a week. So most people would choose, oh, I want to work out less. It's less time, it's less energy. But someone that's really committed to fitness will say, this is great. I can still work for the same hour and now I'm maximizing my results.

Yeah.

So now I'm going to be dropping weight at a much faster rate. So that's the idea, is that you're not looking for efficiency to do less or like to get the same out of the time you're committing, or committing less time to get the same results. You're trying to get more out of it. So for me, if someone's learning, wants to learn to speed read, it's because they're already reading, let's say, an hour a day, half an hour a day. They're like, how can I go through more books? But if you're rarely sitting down to read, then that's just a waste of time. It's like if someone told me, hey, You want to learn a system that you can longhand write at twice the speed? Like, no, I don't care.

Ever heard of a keyboard? Yeah. Yeah. That's funny. I have friends that golf and I've never golfed before. And so, yeah, it's like me taking a golfing lesson. Like, why would I go to try to improve my swing when I'm never going to use that swing anyway? And reading is a skill just like anything else. You need to develop a baseline before Yes. I love that.

Yeah. And we go back to a point we were touching on before. If things become too easy, like if someone says, well, let me teach you how to swing in, I don't know, a month, and usually it will take 6 months. I don't know, I'm making this up because I don't know anything about golf. But, and then you take it on because it seems so easy. It seems like such a small commitment, but because you're taking that commitment, then you're not committing on something else. It's like people that buy things because they're cheap. Look, if you have no use for it, then you're still spending money that you should be saving for something else. So like, don't buy things just because they're cheap and then don't learn things just because they're easy. Put your time on what matters to you.

Well, I know we're going to have to wrap up soon, so I definitely want to talk a little bit about some travel. Yeah. Time flies when you're having fun.

I know.

Um, on the, on the travel subject, I just last week I posted an episode with Rolf Potts who wrote the book, Vagabonding. And that book talks about the art of long-term world travel. And it sort of dispels some of the Americanized generalizations of travel, that it needs to be expensive, that it's commercialized, that you can only travel once or twice a year on your vacation. And so I've really gotten into travel and that's how I've been able to visit your home city. I just love travel. So I want to ask you, other than Tokyo, what are some of the— what are some of your favorite places in the world?

Well, I traveled Southeast Asia. I traveled to China. I did Beijing, Shanghai, Hong Kong. I went to Tibet. I had the fortune of going to Tibet because it was my father's dream and we went together. So that was a very special trip to Lhasa. Then Europe, some South America, North America. But my favorite place really, it's been Japan. I can't really describe it. I have only good things to say about Japan and Japanese people. And I went there when I've I was in a very dark time of my life, and it just brought me back to life that you have that feeling of community, even though it's such a big city and it's so crowded. You feel like you're part of something else, and people are so friendly and so nice. And also their attention to detail and to quality, that's something that inspired me to make the book better and to work every little detail. They're just like that. You go to their shops and everything's sparkling clean. They seem so in the present moment. They pay so much attention to detail and not for others to notice it, but because it matters to them. So it's their own standards. I remember seeing this guy who was vacuuming the sidewalk in front of his shop. Okay? It was like, that's another level.

Jeez.

And that's how they do things. They're just— and they're so committed, let's say, to crafts. I met this kintsugi master who has been doing kintsugi, which is the art of gold joinery for 60 years. And I was interviewing him and I was asking him about his art. He's like, I feel better about my art now than I ever felt before. And my issue right now is not inspiration for new pieces, it's the fact that I feel like I won't be able to do them all. I have so many ideas that I want to keep making. And I just find that so beautiful. And that gives a lot of purpose to life when rarely we see now people that commit to something for that long, that go through those long apprenticeship periods. We all want it quickly. We all want to be switching from one thing to another. And there is a drawback. At one point, we need to make those decisions and say, this is what I really like, and I just want to go deeper and deeper into this subject. I just love the way of living.

That idea of consistency and constant improvement, I think the Japanese call that kaizen.

Kaizen.

Kaizen. Yeah, I love that idea. And for me, my, if you want to call it a passion, my passion for reading and personal development and connecting with authors came from consistency. It wasn't a preexisting thing that just fell out of the sky and I said, hey, I love books all of a sudden. It came from the hard work. It came from the consistency. There was a lot of, you know, there was a lot of enthusiasm in the idea of learning this skill, but it was not fun for me at the very beginning. So Right.

And it shouldn't be fun all the time, and that's the point. So to that point, and probably we'll be closing right after, but it'll be a nice point to discuss for last, is, um, so people talk about how do I find my passion, and I don't think we find passions, we develop them. So it's kind of like a relationship. So at the beginning, maybe you see someone and you're attracted in the beginning. It's like there's attraction, but then to be love You have to work on that relationship. You have to develop it. And there will be times that it'll be difficult, that it'll be frustrating, but you'd rather have that than not have it. So it's kind of the same with anything else. I suffered so much writing this book and then learning how to write because I figured a big point for the book is that it needed to be well-written because it's a very dry subject. So that led me into studying creative writing and then reading about writing and practicing writing. And I suffer so much through it, and at the end it's like, I want to keep doing this because I never loved hating something so much. And it was that struggle that kept me there because it's difficult, it challenges me, it doesn't come easy to me to write. And I guess for most people, from what I've read, and, and it's in a different language and all these other things, and you're trying to put like this puzzle together, you're trying to build this paragraph in a way that expresses your point, but it keeps the flow and it's moving fast, so all these things, and struggle is such a big part of finding, or like developing a passion. So it's kind of that idea, you don't find a passion, you develop it. So the beginning, you just follow the attraction to see if there's something more, but you will have to put the time, you will have to put the effort, and you'll have to go through the struggles before you recognize that it's truly a passion and not just a fad, not just a superficial attraction.

Yeah, well, patience is a skill set just like everything else. I mean, the obstacle is the way, as Ryan would say. But wow, well, we had a really cool conversation. I know that the two of us believe in a lot of the same things and we're on a very similar path right now. For those in the audience that want to learn a little bit more about you or your book and want to find you, connect with you, where should they go? What should they do?

Sure. So for the book, it's called Learning Prove Master. You find it anywhere books are sold. Amazon's probably the easiest. And then for social media and all those things. So the easiest would be my blog, it's unlimitedmastery.com. And then I have all the links to social media, to Instagram, to Twitter, all that. But it's just easier that it's everything in one place. So unlimitedmastery.com.

Awesome, Nick. Well, thank you again. Really appreciate your time today. Thank you for having me.

That was great. We got to do it again.

I'm excited to come meet up with you in Japan sometime.

Yes. Oh, for sure. I'll show her around.

That is a wrap. Thank you so much for listening to today's episode of Book Thinkers, Life-Changing Books. It would mean the world to us if you could write a review and share this episode with a few of your friends. I mean, these books truly have the power to change people's lives, and by reviewing or sharing our podcast, you're helping us make an impact. If you have any recommendations for future guests or any constructive feedback for us on how we can improve our show, please feel free to submit a form on our website, www.bookthinkers.com, or send us a direct message on Instagram @bookthinkers. With that, I am signing off, and I hope you have a wonderful day. Don't forget, go read something.