If I look back, the brain fog was the scariest part for me. I was on television at that time. I would look at a word and I couldn't it wouldn't come out of my mouth. I really think there's no such thing as a good or bad memory. There's more of a trained memory and untrained memory.
Do you think it's possible for people to learn a new language, learn a new instrument, learn a entirely new career? I I beyond a belief. It's a conviction. Nobody could tell me otherwise. Your brain is pliable with neuroplasticity to the day we expire.
But it requires challenge. Just like building a muscle, it requires novelty and nutrition. Jim Quick has taught people around the world how to strengthen our memory and learn faster. Today, he's explaining what's happening when we lose our words, forget why we walked into a room, or feel our focus slipping in midlife, and what we can do now to keep our brains strong for years to come. And so, I always say mind before media.
Direct your mind, right, before the world does for you. Hi friends. I am so glad you're here. Well, apparently one of the rights of midlife is walking into a room and having absolutely no idea why you went in there in the first place or open your phone to do one thing resurfacing 20 minutes later and realizing you somehow did everything except the thing you picked it up for. We joke about it, but underneath the joke is a real question.
Why does my own mind sometimes feel less reliable than it used to? And how much of that is really about memory when we're asking our brains to absorb more information, switch between more demands, and compete with technology designed to interrupt us all day long. Jim Quick has spent more than three decades teaching people how to learn, focus, and remember. His own path began after a childhood brain injury left him struggling in school and believing he had what he calls a broken brain. He went on to build quick learning, host the QuickBrain podcast, and write the best-selling book, Limitless.
His new book, Limitless Daily, turns that work into 366 short practices for training the mind. Today, I want to understand what it takes to trust your brain again, how memory actually works, and what our phones and AI may be training us to stop doing while learning new things matters as we get older, and which small habits can help us stay sharp for decades to come. Well, Jim, we have known each other a lifetime, I think. Yeah. No, no.
Congratulations on everything. Congratulations for you. I'm I'm sitting here thinking like, how long have Jim and I known each other? And it's really been We're all grown up now. Yeah.
What's What's that about? Well, you know, I've interviewed you for my book. I've interviewed you before. You've interviewed me before. And I was thinking about you coming on the show and I was just thinking about kind of the feeling underneath everything of of where we are right now during this time in life.
I just, you know, I turned 55. I'm going to be 56 this year. And I think a lot about women in this community and we we talk and we you know, we laugh about things like, "Oh, I've lost my words or I went into this room and I I don't know why I went into this room." And I feel like you have so many of the answers for these women that we're going to get into. But I I want to talk about this. You know, we reach midlife and we we hear things like, you know, my brain is just not what it used to be.
Are you hearing that all the time from people these days? Yeah. And and I I don't want it's I don't I want people to know that a lot of this is normal that people are going through I feel like sometimes we're so fearful that we're going through it alone, but it it helps and it's I kind of gives you grace knowing that we're in this, you know, people are in this together and they're not alone. That doorway, it's called the doorway effect, psychologists call it. When you go through a doorway, you're switching contextes.
It's kind of like when you open up a tab on your computer, like a new one, because you you have an idea and you open up a tab and you forget why you open that tab because the con that context from the previous tab is not going with you to the next tab or and that's why when you walk back into the room, usually it helps trigger the previous room. It helps trigger why you're going into the kitchen or or what have you. I like that you say we're not alone in that though because I do I open up a lot of tabs all day long on the computer and off of the computer and I think that sometimes I think it's a memory problem and then my question is is it a memory problem or is it an attention problem if you're doing that over and over again well especially when phases of parmenopause menopause it's also like you know things things are changing estrogen could affect the brain you know even the hippocampus or memory also sleeps could change could be changing also as Well, also the mental load that women are carrying also as well and sometimes their attention is just fully overloaded, which could certainly be, make it more difficult to remember things. But yeah, focus and attention is is really key. What determines whether or not something actually makes it into the memory in the first place?
Because I I got to be honest, you know, when you were talking about brain early on, I'm like, "Oh, my brain. Okay, I'd love to learn how to read a little faster and I'd like to memorize a list of things. Yeah. But when we actually talk about memory, it's it's now something that takes up a lot of my time and attention to really to focus on and practice. Yeah.
I I think I really think there's no such thing as a good or bad memory. There's more of a trained memory and untrained memory. You know, the challenge is we're just not exercising our memory as much. You know, in life, I find that you have to whatever you want, you have to use. It's like if you want more energy, you have to use your energy.
You can't just sit on the couch and eat potato chips and binge watch things. You're not going to have more energy. If you want more strength, you have to use your strength, right? To be able to lift lift heavy things and then you have more of it. Same thing with with focus.
If you want if you want greater focus, you have to utilize your focus. If you want a better memory, you have to use the memory that you already have. And so, it's it really is use it or lose it. Is it could be a perishable skill when we're relying on other things to remember things for us like technology. But yeah, doing a little bit of mental exercise each day could sharpen your memory.
You you know I I found that especially with my learning difficulties growing up in my broken brain that it's it's it's it's fragile but it's resilient. Let's talk about that because your story is really something and this goes back to when you were 5 years old. Can you talk about what happened to you and how you got to where you are today? Yeah, my inspiration was my desperation. I had an accident in kindergarten class.
I had an unfortunate fall. Rush to the emergency room. I was unconscious. I remember coming out of it. I was just having migraines every day.
I just thought it was normal as a kid. I had a balance coordination issues. Wow. Always pick last in sports because of it. Took me three years longer to learn how to read.
That was a challenge. I mean, I mean, it really affected, as you can imagine, as a five, six, sevenyear-old, my self-esteem, to see other kids be able to do something, you know, passing around that book. I had to read it out loud. It's very embarrassing. So, it affected my self-confidence, my self-worth.
When I was 9 years old, I was slowing down the class and a teacher came to my defense cuz I was being teased. I was always called slow. My last name really is quick. Said, "leave that kid alone. That's the boy with the broken brain." And, that label became my limit even though it only took her 5 seconds to say that sentence.
And I'm sure it's good intentions. I had that conversation with myself, that story playing for the next 10 years, you know, and so while the the brain injury was one limitation, I think a greater limitation was my story about that injury because I felt like that was who I was. And at such a young age, that's that's implanted in there, right? Like that's it. That's what you're thinking.
You've said before, though, my brain wasn't broken. It just needed a better owner's manual. Did you actually believe that? Did you actually understand what that meant? At the time I didn't, you know, I I would play with my toys and always has instructions, which was interesting, right?
You know, everything that gives you instructions on how to use it. It was interesting that our minds didn't have that. So, I didn't know how to fix myself and there was no internet or anything like that. I think you know, it's it was a challenge, but I my my parents really they they worked really hard, you know, and and they I never felt like I there was a lack. You know, we live in the back of a laundry mat that my mom worked at.
My parents worked many jobs. My grandmother raised me when I was a kid. She was my my superhero. She started showing early signs of dementia when I was five. Also she passed of Alzheimer's when I was when I was seven.
So this was just you know a lot again kind of put me on a path of curiosity. But I but I also wanted to make my parents proud. I'm the oldest of three siblings. So I wanted to do right by them and you know it's I realized it's not about the resources you have as much as your internal resources, your resourcefulness. But my parents believed in me.
You know I feel like I won the the the jackpot there. That's amazing because that love that love does a lot. It does because we're also social creatures. I want to remind people like one of the ways to have a a really strong brain is community and and deep relationships. You know, on our podcast you we had the the director of that longitudinal the long study at Harvard 80-year study on happiness and longevity.
They said diet is important, you know, exercise is important, but what's more important is the depth of your connections, you know, and because we borrow on on on people's you you you borrow courage based on someone's belief in you, right? You you regulate emotions, your nervous system around people who are really calm, right? And you kind of get in sync. And so, yeah, being a restaurant with the right people and I was very blessed that way. You know, I I think about what you've done for so many people, for so many millions of people who have not had that confidence in themselves.
I think you've regulated them and made them feel calm like they can they can move forward and learn and it's not impossible. And I I think that I learned that in your first book and certainly in this book, you know, by midlife, a lot of us have spent time feeling becoming very confident in whatever it is. Yeah. And now we hit midlife 50s and we say, "Hey, I want to do something a little bit different. I'm maybe not as good as these other things that I, you know, I was before or maybe there's something new I want to learn." Are our brains comfortable with being uncomfortable or discomfort?
I think uncertainty, you know, change can be scary and growth can be hard. I also know that nothing is as scary and hard as being stuck somewhere that you don't belong. And I feel like [clears throat] I somebody was telling me about menopaus is they were using a metaphor of like climbing a mountain. And I and I and while that could be parts of it accurate, I feel like it's almost working with a lot of clients and that would identify with this like kind of walk climbing up to a ridge where it's you know you can honor the strength and the sacrifice that it took you to get there. But I also feel like from there it helps you to be able to see a new point of view.
The air is cleaner there. You could look back and see how far you've come and you could also choose a new path. And so I don't see midlife you I'm in my 50s as well. I don't see midlife as an ending as much as a beginning of fulfilling the promise and the preparation your younger self put in. You know what I mean?
It's like it's like the beginning of that stage that the younger version of you prepared you for this this moment. When you talk about menopause, there's all these years that are kind of this uncertain part, right? It can be four to 10 years where you're experienc hot flashes and the the drops in your hormones and the brain fog. And I I think out of everything, if I look back, the brain fog was the scariest part for me. I was on television at that time.
I would look at a word and I couldn't it wouldn't come out of my mouth. And even to this day, I always have notes with me, which I never had before because of what that did to a lack of confidence. My memory is different. It's it's, you know, it's back to where it was. But it can be really scary for for somebody.
If there's a woman that's listening right now, it's like, "Yeah, I get it. Brain fog is scary. I've never had it before. It caused me a severe lack of confidence. So, I don't even think I could do anything I want to do if I want to learn a new language, learn a new instrument, do these other I just want to get through the day." Do you have some advice for that person that's feeling like they're in the middle right now and not yet gone over to that next horizon to see what's ahead?
I would say my message is that of hope. You know, we we do have memory students in every country in the world. We get a lot of feedback. We can get older, but in a lot of ways we could get wiser. I think it's very important to know that we're not alone.
I think it's very important that we don't that we're kind to oursel. I think self-compassion goes a long way in this process. Studies on self-compassion say that if you beat yourself up over something, you're less likely to be able to follow through, you know, as opposed to when you're kind to yourself knowing that, you know, we had a hard day, not like we have a lot of things on our mind, a lot of things going on internally and externally. So, I feel like part of it is looking at the mirror and seeing the reflection back and loving that reflection who's who's been through so much and still standing. So my message would be of hope and I also know that there are absolutely things that people could do to I mean because it could be a confluence of things you know not it hormonal certainly some people could also have thyroid challenges or or it's sleep apnnea you know there's there's this it's not there's not a magic pill but there's a magic process you know and I would go back to the basics you know it would be loving yourself cuz self-care is not selfish it would be things like pause like and I I think that and slow down I think it's it's very needed today especially in the world that's racing.
You know, when you pause a camera or a television or a computer, it stops working. You pause a machine, it stops working. When when women and men pause oursel, humans, we tend to work in different ways, you know, we start to recover, we start to rethink, we start to recalibrate, we start to restore, right? Maybe look at things through a new lens also as well. So, I think that pause and that grace is important.
And then the basics, you know, I always tell people meds RX, M is meditation, you know, which is that pause. It's a must for me. I think it's important to disconnect to reconnect. My meditation really is nature. E is exercise, which is so and and your audience has probably forgotten more about this than most of their friends and family will ever learn.
But just a reminder to move throughout the day. And I think that's important because sometimes we get stuck with words or, you know, thoughts because we're not also moving our body. And I feel like when we move our body then our thinking moves also. It's more piable. And also the BDNF the brain derived neurotropic factors.
Your diet which we know could affect a lot of our our memory and and certain [clears throat] things where we feel slow or stuck. So we talk about neuronutrition and then the yes to sleep. You know sleep is is is is for real and how's how's your how's your how's your sleep in general? I know especially with travel and the projects that you take on. It's okay.
I think it's good and then I'm like, "Oh, I'm so confident I can sleep. It's fine. I'm good." And then I have too much caffeine and it's shot again. So, I'm trying to focus on that a little bit more. And because I think about sleep was never a thing I talked about.
It's never a thing I even thought about until I hit menopause and I couldn't sleep anymore. And I was out on the couch every night with two to three hours of sleep to just to just get through. Yeah. That scares you, right? It it it does because it also wears on us like even especially [clears throat] for our mental health, you know, and so sleep prioritizing our sleep because our brains, you know, that's where you consolidate short to long-term memory.
It's what the lymphatic system kicks in. It's like our sewage system clean out that those proteins that could lead to brain aging challenges. And then the R and the X is relationships, you know. And then the X are the extras like all the biohacking stuff and the neuro feedback, the hyperbaric chambers, all the red lights. They're the things that matter though, or at least some of them to some people.
I mean, everything I think affects somebody differently, right? Like I don't know if I'm going to do a cold plunge anytime soon, but I definitely know I'm going to be, you know, trying to sleep and I'm big with red light. Yeah. So, I just I pick and choose. I want to ask you something.
I don't know if you remember this, but you taught me I don't know, it's probably like five or six years ago now when I had that panic attack on television. You taught me a grounding exercise to be able to focus. You mentioned focus a little while ago and I want to talk about that because I never forgot what you told me to do. There was three things to pay attention to if I needed to ground myself or focus myself. Can you walk us through that?
Yeah, this I think it's important because sometimes we're we we're have anxiety about the future or kind of stress about the past being present which is the time that we have and we people know that but really getting into our our our bodies and part of that is our senses. So what I what I do now is I if I want to get present if my thoughts are racing or wherever I'll I'll think about like I'll look at five things that I see like I'll see I'll see the camera and I'll see the lights and I'll see you. I'll name five things that I see in the present. And then I'll I'll name like four things that I maybe maybe hear also as well you know whether it's the air coming through or it's my own voice or the hum of of the lights or something like that. And then the third thing I'll do is like what do I feel like?
Maybe it's the ground on my foot, you know, sitting in this chair, the light breeze. And and people want to go deeper if there's a couple things they could smell or one thing they could taste. It's kind of 5 4 3 2 1. And it's an exercise that can only take, you know, 15 seconds or something. But I find that even saying those things brought me here, you know, and so yeah, I think I think it's very that that pause with oursel and getting back in our body is is so very important.
Sometimes we're disconnected. Yep. Right. I couldn't agree more and I feel like now more than ever before you you talked about the tabs and I could feel my heart racing. Like opening up tabs on a computer, I feel that I I know exactly what that is where I go from thing to thing to thing and don't know where where I've been or where I'm going.
Okay. Okay. So, I want to get back to what you were saying in in midlife that you really have a lot of hope for people, especially as they're kind of coming over that horizon and looking at the next 30 to 40 years. I we have a lot of time left, God willing. When you talk about that, do you think it's possible for people to learn a new language, learn a new instrument, learn a entirely new career?
I mean, we say the word reinvention a lot, but people don't realize there's there's a lot that goes with it. Do you have a belief that people can do that? And if they can, how do you start doing that? Because we don't have school like we used to. I I have beyond a belief.
It's it's a conviction. Nobody could tell me otherwise. You know, I work with so many people in their 70s and 80s that are starting a business that are start writing a book when in the age of 75 are starting new hobbies. I think there's this study done with these nuns that were living 80 90 and above and they wanted to find out what was the key to their longevity and their mental acuity and they found out half it was their their faith their community but the other half they were lifelong learners and they were always learning. They were they're reading, they're writing, they were having debates and conversation and discourse and because of it added years to their life and life to their years.
So it was on the cover of Time magazine called Aging with Grace. Your brain is is is pliable with neuroplasticity to the day we we expire. It's but it requires challenge just like building a muscle. It requires novelty and nutrition. We can absolutely do it.
It might be coming out in a different form. But I also I think it keeps us alive. Whether it happens to be a dance, whether it's happens to be a musical instrument, a new hobby. I feel like passion is what lights you up. And having those things, sometimes we feel like we're slowing down or burnt out because we're doing too much.
I think also we feel burnt out sometimes because we're doing too little of the things that make us come alive. So, God bless, you know, people at any age or stage that's willing to take on new new hobbies, new interests. I feel like it the science is showing that it'll keep you young and it the things that are interesting that move the needle are things like racket sports, right? Because the reaction time, the sprinting, pickle ball, pickle ball, yeah, all that ping pong, all all the the racket sports supposed to add nine years to your life. But it's also great cognitive exercise.
You know, there's strategy, there's memory. Dance is so so amazing. You know, ballroom dance or Latin dance, amazing because putting your mind into your muscles and and that that's a key to cognitive reserve. So, if you could take two women who maybe they're in their, let's say, 70s, right? And maybe they have very close brain types, you know, on scans and similar genetics on that category, but one of them is fully independent and the other one is relies on assistance shows cognitive decline and these kind of challenges.
And so scientists wanted to figure out like what's the difference? And they their hypothesis is it's something called cognitive reserve. Mhm. And cognitive reserve, you know, some of your listeners know, it's kind of like a retirement account that we're depositing every single day or we're withdrawing from. And so what makes those deposits to have a reserve for when we're older like a retirement h like cognitive retirement account are things that are mental certainly.
So mental activity, physical activity, and social activity those are things that are going to add to your cognitive reserve. And it's interesting when we talk about raet sports or dance that's used that's social also. So it's all three. It's physical, it's mental and and it's social. And so yes, I would say anybody who wants to, you know, I think it's important to have a to to list and but also to learn list.
Like what do you want to learn that's new? Where do you want to challenge yourself and kind of see where your passion, you know, where you feel drawn to and what lights you up? It's funny. My dad's 86 and he took up pottery about nine months ago. Oh wow.
And his work is now being shown in Tampa Museum of Art 86. Yeah, he's really great at it. He's he was an architect and so, you know, he's got the artistic gene already, but it's really been fascinating for me to see him thrive at that age when he could just be s he could be sitting there watching Netflix. So, you know, a lot of people I've noticed reading has gotten kind of popular again. I don't know.
I feel like it went away for a while and it's come back. I do notice nowadays I read a book and a week later I couldn't even tell you what it was about. Can we talk about that because speed reading was when I first met you initially when I met you and what you were really talking about and helping teach a lot of big celebrities and actors and memorization. Can we talk about how to have that work in in real life? We're not memorizing lines, but we want to read and we want to recall.
I think you have to read to succeed isn't it's reading is your mind would exercise your body. So, it's great to enhance your focus. I I'm very particular on reading like physical books. I do read screens cuz I don't want to carry like seven books with me on a trip. And I do listen audio books also as well.
But there's something about holding a fresh book that's very it's it's it's amazing. So, it it also helps. I just want to encourage people to read more fiction. Really? Why?
Why more fiction? It's been shown to enhance emotional. You need to write fiction. Oh, yeah. Oh, I I I have some I have some I have some children's books I really want to put out.
Oh, good. But I would say that it helps with your emotional quotient, empathy, storytelling, narratives, points of view, your imagination, your problem solving also as well. I I tend to read fiction before I go to sleep because I don't want to read like a business book or a neuroscience book before I go to sleep because then I'll get into my like kind of like more awake and think and ruminate. But it's it's it's been shown even just u a little bit of reading at night could reduce your stress levels like over 60% reading fiction which would support better sleep also as well. So I I like I like that.
I I tend to read also u more non-fiction and you want to remember what you read certainly it is concerning while I think there is a rise of their of a reader it's the baseline is still pretty low. Atlanta came out with and I don't know how accurate this is but they said 16% of people read every day. Not social media or emails but like like a book or magazine. Only 50 51% of individuals don't read one book a year. Wow.
So, and there's difference based and this this this happened to be in the Atlantic saying it was independent of gender, age and, ethnicity, but, but I would always encourage more people. We could always do more reading. Even if people reading 30 minutes a day, it sounds like a lot, but it's 2% of our day. Which I feel like there's a huge benefit, especially like yourself, you have, you know, if you have decades of experience, you put into a book and somebody can read that book in a few days and download decades and is a huge advantage. So how you know if anyone's ever read a page in a book got to and forgot what they just read that could be a challenge.
So a couple things I would say a lot of people aren't remembering things or understanding because they don't have questions. So I just want to remind everyone that questions are the answer. It's kind of like the standardized test preps. You you can read pages of reading comprehension all these paragraphs and then they ask you 10 questions and then you're [snorts] like oh that's what they wanted to know. As opposed to going the questions first and then when you're reading you're like oh there's an answer there's an answer.
There's the answer. I feel like some people are passive readers and they don't they're not having a conversation with the author, right? They're not asking questions cuz if you ask questions like, "How can I use this? When will I use this? Why must I use this?
How does this relate to what I already know? Is this true?" Then we'd be more engaged, right? We're not going to forget as much because it's learning is not a spectator's board and neither is reading. Even if it's fiction, what happens next? Where is this character going?
Yeah, absolutely. The the who, the what, the where, the the when, even the context. Like some people like if I ask that question, they don't know, but then they'll start looking for clues of what time period it is, right? Or where it is in the world. And so the questions activate part of your brain called your reticular activating system, your RA.
So your brain primarily is a deletion device because if you let everything in, we would be overwhelmed. What you decide to shine a spotlight on is really directed by your questions. And so, you know, the example I use is I have a younger sister. Years and years ago, she would send me postcards and email a very specific breed of dog. It was a pug dog.
And I would get these daily. And then my question was like, why did she keep on sending me these dog pictures? And then funny and I realized her birthday was coming up and she's a great marketer and she's seen her birthday gift. But I started Tam started seeing these dogs everywhere. Like I'd be at the supermarket and someone in front of me was holding like a pug dog at checkout or I'm in my neighborhood jogging and someone was walking six pug dogs and my question for everyone listening is did those pug dogs just teleport into my neighborhood?
No, they were always there but I was deleting it cuz it wasn't important. But then I started asking questions. I started seeing them everywhere. Same thing as if you have more questions when you read then you're like, "Oh, there's a pug dog. There's a pug dog.
There's a pug dog." Right? There's an answer. Answer answer. And so asking more questions will give you better answers. It's and and I think also even in life I think we're optimizing a lot for the wrong questions.
You know even like when we prompt AI you would never go in there and say oh why can I you know you know lose this weight or why can I refine? They don't give you all the evidence right probably not the most powerful prompts but we've been asking our own human intelligence these prompts all the time also. So you know asking better questions will lead to better answers. Ask questions no one's ever asked before. You'll get answers you know you haven't gotten before also but I think that's important and I was also say just a lot of people don't read very well because they don't have a focal point sometimes they'll back skip or reread words read whole lines and just having a visual pacer a pen a highlighter just not where you're underlining it but just helping you keep your focus could boost your reading speed 25 to 50% they called a visual pacer because your eyes are attracted to motion so even if you just went margin to margin underline not don't you don't have to touch the screen or the page, just underline it.
Your eyes are attracted to emotions, so you're being pulled through it as opposed to back skipping and regressing. And is that how to speed read a little bit? We we we graduate people reading three times faster with our online programs with better comprehension. I don't even consider that speed reading. I think that's normal reading, but we just we just weren't taught how to I mean, the last time we took a reading class, we were probably six or seven years old.
And so, that I feel like is snailing. It's just it feels like you're going, you know, going through it. You're falling asleep, you lose your mind wanders. And if you don't give your brain the stimulus it needs, it'll seek entertainment elsewhere in the form of distraction. So some people are read so reading so painfully.
Like if I went one word at a time, everyone would just tune out. They would their mind would think about something else. They would fall asleep. And that that's what happens when people read because they're reading so slow. Now if you're reading a little bit faster with a more of a tempo, it's like driving faster.
If you're going slow, you could be texting or makeup or having a coffee conversation, whatever, five different things. But if you're going fast, you have to focus on what's in front of you and the act of driving. And that's like reading, right? If people read so painfully slow, it's like riding a bicycle slow. Yes.
You'll just wobble and and and fall. So, I want to break the myth that if you had to read faster, you would understand less. A lot of times, you understand more because you have better focus. That makes so much sense. Yeah.
But the other the other thing with reading though, this is what I'm doing with Limitless Daily, the new book, is because I had such a problem reading there. There I would make notes in the margins. I don't know if you ever did that like back in school. I still do. Yeah.
And this is called marginelia. It's actually an art that's been used for hundreds of years. And people even in libraries, they would pick up and and comment on what other people wrote, right, before they returned. So there' be this whole discourse u I think it's marginelia. Marginalia or something.
I think the pronunciation's right, but it's it's putting like like I would when I was first teaching myself how to read better would read a paragraph and I would write like a one-s sentence summary of that paragraph. And that forced me to be to be active. It forced me to pay attention to see what I knew and what I didn't know. And then it's great cuz I don't have to reread things. I could just re read the summary, you know, sentence each time.
And with a daily book, it's kind of even more powerful for me because there's a date for everyone on the same page around the world. But you put your notes there based on that day's lesson. And you come back a year from now and you're still reading it and you see the book is exactly the same, but we're different. Yep. Right.
So, we see things that maybe we need to hear or we missed the first time or where we are in life. This is so perfect for it because I told you what I thought. I think this is going to be a book that people have for 20 years that they're going to come back to and back to and back to. I want to get into the book. I want to ask you one question because you brought up AI.What do you think that AI is doing to our brains right now? Yes, it enables us to ask questions, but is it making us think less, actively think less, or we have to just use it differently? I think it there are better ways of using AI for sure. I imagine a lot of your listeners are using AI for something, right? Technology for me, I'm very optimistic.
I'm very pro technology. For me, it's not good or bad. It's just how it's used. Like fires are probably the earliest form of technology. It could cook your food or it could burn down your home.
It's just how it's used. AI, what I'm concerned about is just like we talked about in Limitless in 2020, digital dementia where you're we can't remember phone numbers or to-dos or calendars cuz it technology does it for us. I also wrote about digital deduction which is the coin the term I coined around the high reliance on technology. Use a calculator to do math when we could do it in you know certain estimations of our head or we use a GPS to tell us when and where to turn so we don't have to develop our our visual spatial intelligence AI is challenging because a lot of people are going there to think for themselves like for them it's going to AI to decide for them to solve their problems and the challenge is just like with a muscle requires it requires effort but what happens when AI removes the friction from that what happens to those mental muscles right you wouldn't go to the gym and ask your friends to lift the weights for you. You would get no benefit from that.
But it's kind of like what AI is doing for us. So where the industrial revolution changed the physical aspects of labor. We didn't have to be so so as much physical cuz machines are doing it in the information age, right? It's kind of this AI AI age. It's kind of doing the thinking for us.
And that's a challenge. And I just want to remind everyone the AI could scale and amplify, but it only can scale and amplify what humans bring to it. Right? Right? If somebody's confused or incapable, it'll it'll it'll magnify chaos, right?
It'll make you feel good about it like you're so smart, even if you're not that smart. But if somebody is very clear and competent, it'll magnify that. And so, what I'm concerned about is this term called cognitive offloading. Cognitive offloading. We do cognitive offloading by putting things in our calendar, right?
Lower lower mental tasks. Now, I I use AI to automate things because I don't want to be focused on certain things like my inbox. But cognitive surrendering is what a lot of people are doing now where there's surrendering. And so you don't get that those mental muscles developed. Where do you draw the line in a day-to-day basis?
Because I I'll go to it and ask a question, get a quick answer, and it's good. Hey, can you write this XYZ email? Do you think that that's too much or too low? Yeah. And so it's it's a balance just like the metaphor would be where do we draw a line physically?
Right. If we're on the fifth floor here for the studio, the elevator is a form of technology. It's very convenient technology, but then we don't take the stairs, right? And we don't want to lose all mentality either. If you have to go, I have to go 10 blocks from here for my next meeting.
I could, you know, jump into a cab or lift and that's technology, but then I don't get my steps in. So, it's it's it's you want it to be convenience. The challenge I feel is the world is often optimized for comfort, right? Temperature control, lighting, Door Dash. I mean, we we could literally not leave or do or see another human being.
The challenge is is we all aspects of our character, of our biology, of our strength, of our bones. Bones, you know, get stronger through load, right? You know, muscles grow stronger through resistance. Same thing with cognitive load. And and so what I would say is what I my rule is you build your own intelligence before you borrow.
So, it's an acronym for me. And I I don't I don't teach this in a course or anything, but this is how I use it. Before I go to AI for a situation, so everyone could kind of do a thought experiment. Think about next time you go to AI before you do the B and build, brainstorm. Like brainstorm the situation yourself before you go to AI to give it to you.
The the the U and build stands for understand. Really understand the problem, the prompt itself. Because most people are using subpar prompts and they're getting subpar answers because of it. And most people are trying to solve for a problem that is not really the problem. Like they say Einstein he's a credit he's he's attributed the if he had an hour to solve a problem he would spend 55 minutes really understanding what the problem is right.
So really do your thoughts clarify the problem. The I is imagine three solutions. So before I go to AI I will imagine my three solutions for this problem right this clarified problem or I'll ask a question like what would a 5-year-old how would a 5-year-old look at this problem? So, I'll get a loss or how would how would Tamsen look at this problem, right? Or one of one of one of your guests on your show or how would this expert or how would somebody twice as smart as me look at this problem, right?
And I'll come up with three answers and then the L in build is leverage AI. Then I'll go to AI after I've done I've done some building myself. I build my intelligence before I borrow from technology. And what do I do? I don't just put in that question.
And what I'm looking for is pressure test my my theory here, my assumptions, right? Show shine a light on my on my blind spots, right? Spotlight my my cognitive biases, right? Pretend you're the world's expert on the exact opposite of what I'm talking about. Debate me on this, right?
And so I would use it more as a coach to be able to point out to make me better. Like it's like not artificial intelligence, more augmented intelligence, like a creative partner to make it better. Because I feel like that is would be a great use of of it because I I feel like sometimes AI will just can make the the not so smart person feel really really smart because it plates. It's like a sickopan, right? Yeah.
Tell me what to do. Exactly. Oh, thanks for such a great question. Right. And if you don't push back, you know, said, "I can't believe you thought that." And I'm like, "Oh, thank you.
What a great idea this business is." And but they never like and but then finally the D in build you know once once you once you brainstormed you know you did understand the problem you imagine three solutions you leverage AI then the D is then you could decide what to do with that information because I remind everyone AI could compute and process an immense amount of data faster than any human but ultimately humans have to decide what's important what does this information mean and what are we going to do about it and AI doesn't have stakes it doesn't have consequence because it can recommend whatever it is and but humans have to take responsibility for those actions as opposed to AI which which has no stakes in and in anything it leaves it right on the screen and then you're dealing with the rest of it right whatever you decide completely whether it's misinformation or anything else you know so I want to talk about your book Limitless Daily gives people one short practice a day yeah 366 days per leap for leap I don't give anyone an excuse to missing a day per leap year I know I was like why 366 6 and then I went, "Oh, leap year." He was already thinking ahead. Well, first of all, I want to I want to ask you why why did you decide to do it like this? Because Limitless, the first book that came out in 2020. I remember that and and I have all the I marginalize that or whatever you call margin, what do you call it? Marchelia.
Marinelia, that book all over the place. But this is great because it has a short practices and I think that it makes it feel doable and not overwhelming. And then you remember what you're doing every day. So you have one thing to focus on instead of a to-do list of 50 things that you're never going to get to. Yeah.
So many people after Limitless came out were asking for another book. And and I honestly didn't think people need another book that they read for a few days and put on their shelf and it becomes shelf help instead of self-help. I I what people really need is a daily practice and to be able to make see the results. So, I took a lot of the core concepts in Limitless and put them into bite-siz little lessons that you start your morning with. And and the morning is very important.
I mean, obviously, you could read it throughout the day, but it's just one page to be able to win that day. And and it's there. So, in the morning, and people could use this whether they get the book or not, when you wake up, there's something called sleep inertia. You're transitioning from sleep state to waking state. It's kind of like you turn your computer on, it's rebooting, but then there's no tabs open, you know, and it's sure there's crystal clear.
Nobody else has opened up the tabs for you or sent you all kinds of messages that you have to respond to. It's like a clear winter like snow, right? Anything is possible. That time is very primed for attentional priming. And intentional priming is showing that during this window and that sleep inertia is about 15 to 45 minutes.
All right? Depending on what stage of sleep you woke up in your secret rhythm, your mental inputs during that window could have a disproportionate effect on the rest of your day. So this is high leverage specifically on what you focus on what how you feel and how you frame things in the day which is everything and what do most people put in that window you know they grab their device. So what are they magnifying and multiplying? Distraction, comparison, conflict, you know, just like nobody would invite 200 strangers into their bedroom.
They talk about whatever they want to talk about first thing in the morning, but it's kind of like what we're doing, right? And so we're magnifying that and we wonder why the day gets outside of us, right? And we can't catch up or keep up and get ahead. And good use of that time could be things like prayer or gratitude. Like if people had a gratitude exercise during that window, I guarantee you they'll focus and feel more blessings throughout the day.
Is that writing it down? Is that thinking about it? Is it just Yeah, it's the it's the mental input. Certainly you could you could you could put it into a journal which will more hardwire it for sure, but it's what it what it's doing. It's called intentional and emotional priming that first part of the day.
It's like if you ate during that window like a bunch of muffins or I don't know what people like like just food. Yeah. Like the food's like too too but it it affect those things. It'll affect your focus, you know, your blood sugar, right? It'll affect how you feel.
It'll probably affect how you frame and react to the day also as well. But, you know, we're putting the other empty calories from like I feel like we're it's kind of like overfed and undernourished digitally because there are a lot of empty calories that are out there depending on what what we're engaging with. And so I always say mind before media and this is so important before you grab your phone like take some of that time in that window to direct your mind right before the world does for you or you set your intention before interruption right set your direction of the day before all the distractions that that come your way. So I ask people to read Limitless Daily during that window because it intentionally and emotionally prime them to focus on the things that they need to to focus on. Well, I love it because, you know, and I I tab some of the some of the different parts of it, but attention is currency.
Train your focus like a muscle, which we talked about already today. The one that I tab was act how you want to be. Yeah. Which I thought was really, you know, is really great. And it's things we just don't think about doing, but every day gives you a different one of those daily lessons.
If there is somebody that is really trying to deal with the cognitive overload, are there three simple things that they could do or put into play right now to help with memory and focus? Yeah, the cognitive overload is real. You know, I I always say that, you know, if if if your mind feels empty, which is obsolet overload, then read, but if your mind feels full, then write. And I think it's very important. So having a writing like I write every morning and I have that's been part of my process of healing bouncing back from my traumatic brain injury is I write every morning.
It's I also feel I'm most creative in the morning. And so and it's interesting when I have a 3 and 1/ halfyear-old son and a one and a half-year-old daughter. When my daughter was born, she came early. And you know, it was a little bit jarring. But after I held her for the first time in the hospital and handed back to her mom, to my wife, you know, watching her and my 2-year-old son at the time in that hospital bed that morning, I I wrote instead of writing my gratitude and what I want to accomplish that day, I started writing to them.
Wow. That if god forbid 20 years from now I'm not there what would they need to hear from their parent to help them get through a hard day and I started writing about these topics and the next morning instead of writing what I usually done for years I started writing that another letter and it was about things like fear of failure things like if you feel burnt out if you feel like you're not enough if you're not believing in yourself negative self-t talk you know looking bad imposttor syndrome I mean this went on and on. And so Limitless I actually wrote in 2020 in 6 weeks cuz I had eight hours a day of just that content I had to get out of my head. This took me the full year. And then I had some friends read it and it helped them because it wasn't going to be a book.
And then I had a friend going through stage four cancer and a lot of that healing is a mindset you know giving having hope and help and it just made a big difference. And so then I went back and said this is the book and I put the science where you know de daily devotionals could pull on you know Christianity or Buddhism or Judaism or stoicism but this pulls from science of the mind which is psychology and science of the brain which is neuroscience since and it does all the things gives them one idea a story and science behind it one implementation that they can do in two minutes no excuses and then a new identity statement because like I feel like at the end of a year I think People overestimate what they could do in a day, but they underestimate what could happen in a year, right? And so I feel like there's a version of everyone that's patiently waiting a year from now. And the goal is we show up every single morning for five minutes until we're introduced. I would love to hear people's stories after one year of doing this from you.
I hope that they come in and tell you because I think that's going to be really really special. And the book is purple. It's like the purple book. I know. I love it.
Yeah. Purple, by the way, is like the rare was for thousands of years was the rare the rarest color because it was the hardest to create really like they had to go to the Mediterranean and extract it from these snail shells. And that that's why royalty would wear a lot of purple cuz it was very rare. And I feel like your listeners who read this book, they're rare cuz intentionality in your life is very rare. Yeah.
Right. Going on this path and owning it is is is you know going through tough times like going through storms you know with your head up and giving yourself grace is rare nowadays and so yeah and also purple color psychology means u sovereignty and wisdom and I just want to remind the readers which are mostly women is to the sovereignty they have you know that you know in the world and the the wisdom that they carry so I I like the color purple but it's not meant to be on your shelf it's meant to be on her nightstand. Well, that's where it's going to stay. I'll take a picture of it tonight.
For the person that wants to really implement what we've talked about today, is there one practice that you think is just so important? Would that be writing? Would that be reading? Would it be movement? I know it's hard to pick.
Is there one though that you say, "Listen, regardless of what a day brings, I'm on my, you know, my book launch today. This is your pub day." Is there something though that you refuse to leave behind? I I I really think self-care I I I don't know something more than that only because it's been my experience with family members and and and who also listen to your show cuz I've referred your show and your book to so many people I care most deeply for that they they're out there and they're taking care of so many people, you know, in in maybe their careers and their their they're the person people go to and their friend circle and their family and they're and they're they're holding a lot and while not all of it is are, you know, maybe theirs to carry, they still carry it and they carry it with grace. I always want to remind people that, you know, these individuals that are listening to this that, you know, that you can only care for people as much as you care for yourself, you know, and it's really hard when if you martyr yourself and you totally deplete yourself at the expense of, you know, then you can't be there for other people. So having some kind of self-care practice like I'm really into daily routines and daily practices because ultimately that's what life doesn't change through an occasional burst of energy and effort.
Like you can't floss for 3 hours and you're good for the year. It just doesn't happen that way. You don't work out all day Saturday and then you're fit for the rest of your life. You know, you don't have one great conversation with a stranger and you have this epic romantic relationship, right? It's what you do every single day.
So, I would say that have a non-negotiable routine for self-care. And it could be so simple. It could be just walking in nature for 5 minutes, you know, or it could be just like taking 10 minutes to do some breath work or whatever it happens to be. I feel like that anything can be built on top of that, right? I love that you make it sound so simple though because sometimes when we hear but when when we hear self-care, we think, "Oh my gosh, I got a list." And you're saying five minutes in nature.
I can handle that. I'm saying something small that you could commit to that is a non-negotiable where it's also evidence that you are this person that cares for themsel. You're doing something even though matter how small or inexpensive or not even that time consuming that you matter. And I don't know what's more important. Like I think if there's a meta belief habit to get into, it's doing what we say we're going to do.
It's building selfrust. Like showing up for oursel even when it's difficult, right? But then also if you don't follow through and work out or do the thing you say you're going to do, having having grace and kindness, you know, and and and giving yourself love in those moments also. But it's this negative selft talk that like we would never stand for somebody sometimes the way we talk to ourselves if somebody was talking to someone we cared about that way. We would [clears throat] never we would defend that person.
But it's interesting how we do that. So taking the critic inside your mind and changing the tone or the words to be that more of a coach like a coach is different than a critic, right? You know, there's this it's been rent free in my mind for decades that Theodore Roosevelt quote about the person in the arena and not listening from the the critics in the cheap seats. You know, it's the person that's doing the work. But I also feel that first of all not to take criticism from people that you want to take advice from.
That's kind of my mantra there. But when it comes to like that little those is showing up for yourself and doing what you say you're going to do because you create evidence that you are who you say you are. Cuz if you're in a relationship and that person is constantly saying they're going to do something and they don't, there's a breach in trust. But think about the conversation you have with yourself, which is the longest conversation we're ever going to have. When we don't follow through in the things that we say to ourel I feel that It is the purple book.
I love it. Thank you so much. Thank you, sir. Good to see you always. Appreciate you.
