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Jim Kwik23 November 2023

10 Hacks To Improve Your Memory, Focus & Attention - Jim Kwik - #710

3Frameworks
13Insights

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Frameworks in this episode

Peak Performance9 steps

The 10 Keys to a Limitless Brain

Move the two-thirds of brain performance you control with ten daily levers

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Self-Mastery6 steps

The CODE Brain-Type Model

Match how you learn and communicate to your dominant type: Cheetah, Owl, Dolphin or Elephant

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Peak Performance6 steps

The Memory Palace Method (Encode, Store, Retrieve)

Turn information into vivid images placed along a familiar route to recall it on demand

Read →

Insights & moments

The myth-busts, hot takes, explainers, and tools worth keeping.

Myth Buster· 1

Myth Buster

Reading faster can improve comprehension, not hurt it

Contrary to the assumption that slowing down aids understanding, Kwik argues reading too slowly starves the brain of stimulus, so it seeks distraction elsewhere. Data from his accelerated-learning academy shows faster readers often have better comprehension because they have better focus. Like racing a car versus crawling through a neighbourhood, speed forces monotasking on what's in front of you.

  • Reading too slowly leaves spare capacity for distraction
  • Speed equals focus, focus equals comprehension, then retention
  • Slow driving lets you multitask; fast driving forces focus
  • Faster readers in his academy comprehend better
  • Monotasking beats trying to multitask while reading

“the faster readers actually have better comprehension because they have better focus... speed equals focus, focus equals comprehension”

Jim Kwik
#speed reading#focus#comprehension#attention

Hot Take· 2

Hot Take

If you fight for your limitations, you get to keep them

Kwik's signature line: your brain is a supercomputer and your self-talk is the program it runs. Tell yourself you are bad at remembering names and you will forget the next person you meet. He reframes limiting beliefs by adding 'yet', and argues that if people truly grasped how powerful their minds are, they would not think anything they did not want to be true.

  • Self-talk programs the brain like software
  • Stated limitations become self-fulfilling
  • Add 'yet' to a limiting belief to shift it
  • You don't have to believe every thought you have
  • Stand guard at the doors of your mind

“your brain is this incredible supercomputer and your self-talk is a program it will run”

Jim Kwik

“If you fight for your limitations, you get to keep them”

Jim Kwik
#mindset#self-talk#limiting beliefs
Hot Take

The 'good shit sticks' filter for information overload

For recreational, self-improvement learning (as opposed to must-pass material like medicine), Chris uses Tim Ferriss's principle that the good shit sticks. Instead of castigating yourself for forgetting everything, your job is to discern what is specifically applicable to you: the idea you can't stop thinking about, that you have to screenshot. Then go narrow and deep on that one thing.

  • Separate must-learn material from recreational learning
  • The good stuff is what you can't stop thinking about
  • Don't castigate yourself for forgetting the rest
  • Discern what is applicable to you, then go deep
  • The brain is largely a deletion device by design

“the thing that you listen to... that you can't not take a photo or a screen recording of, you can't stop thinking about it. That's…”

Chris Williamson
#information overload#discernment#learning#filtering

Explainer· 5

Explainer

How chronic stress hijacks your brain and immune system

Kwik explains that chronic stress and fear flood the brain with cortisol and adrenaline, keeping you in a survival state that blocks executive function, problem-solving and creativity. Sustained fear can even suppress the immune system, a field called psychoneuroimmunology. Modern media that runs on 'if it bleeds it leads' keeps people locked in this state.

  • Chronic stress can physically shrink the brain
  • Survival mode blocks executive function and creativity
  • Chronic fear suppresses immunity (psychoneuroimmunology)
  • Whatever you engage with mentally, you see more of
  • Coping tools: body work, meditation, float tanks, mindfulness

“chronic stress could potentially shrink the human brain, puts you in fight or flight... you're held hostage from your executive functioning”

Jim Kwik
#stress#cortisol#immunity#focus
Explainer

Be a thermostat, not a thermometer

Kwik contrasts reacting to your environment (a thermometer) with setting a standard the environment reacts to (a thermostat). He ties this to radical responsibility, arguing you are one hundred percent responsible for your life and that with great responsibility comes great power. Meaning is a choice, and the meaning you assign to events shapes what you believe is possible.

  • Thermometers react; thermostats set the standard
  • Take one hundred percent responsibility for your life
  • With great responsibility comes great power
  • You can't be upset by results you didn't get from work you didn't do
  • Everything is figure-out-able with commitment and creativity

“When we take responsibility for something, we have great power to make things better”

Jim Kwik
#agency#responsibility#locus of control#mindset
Explainer

WATCH the peer group you're absorbing through mirror neurons

Because of mirror neurons we unconsciously imitate the people around us. Kwik uses the acronym WATCH for what we absorb: Words (language and slang), Actions (behaviours like smoking), Thoughts (recurring mental patterns), Character (integrity and standards) and Habits. He argues your social network shapes behaviour more than your biology.

  • Mirror neurons make us imitate those around us
  • WATCH: Words, Actions, Thoughts, Character, Habits
  • You become the average of your five closest people
  • Social influence can outweigh biology (e.g. smoking)
  • If you can't find an encouraging peer, be one

“who you spend time with is who you become, or the average of the five people we spend the most time with”

Jim Kwik
#peer group#mirror neurons#habits#environment
Explainer

Questions are the answer: aiming your reticular activating system

Kwik explains that the reticular activating system (RAS) decides what your attention spotlights. If you read a page and forget it, you lacked questions you were obsessed with. Feeding your mind deliberate questions - how can I use this, how does it relate to what I know, why must I use it - directs the RAS to surface relevant answers from the ~60,000 thoughts you have a day.

  • The RAS spotlights what you tell it matters
  • No questions means no focus and poor recall
  • Thinking is asking and answering your own questions
  • Use filter questions: how can I use this, how does it relate?
  • Note-taking with a right-brain column captures your own questions

“questions are the answer... You have a part of your brain called the reticular activating system, RAS, which determines what we're gonna shine a spotlight…”

Jim Kwik
#focus#attention#questions#reading
Explainer

Why what you eat matters most for your gray matter

Kwik notes the brain is only about two percent of body mass but consumes around twenty percent of the body's nutrients, making it an energy hog (chess players burn ungodly calories). Because the brain is mostly fat, monounsaturated fats like avocado and structural fats like DHA matter, alongside antioxidant berries, choline-rich eggs and anti-inflammatory turmeric.

  • Brain is ~2% of body mass but uses ~20% of nutrients
  • The brain is mostly fat, so fat quality matters
  • Avocado, berries, broccoli, eggs, olive oil, walnuts, dark chocolate
  • Get a food-sensitivity test; everyone is bio-individual
  • Prefer food first, supplement the gaps

“your brain is only two percent of your body mass, but it requires 20% of the nutrients, and it's an energy hog”

Jim Kwik
#nutrition#brain food#neuronutrition#diet

Story· 2

Story

Why elite performers throw up before every race

Chris shares how acute nerves blanked his mind during his first live show even though he created the material himself. Kwik and Chris connect this to Archibald Hill, who could predict runners' times precisely in training but had zero predictive power in competition, and to a champion downhill skier who vomited before every single race. Fear, stress and overwhelm can completely wreck performance no matter how prepared you are.

  • Nerves can block access to material you know cold
  • Hill's VO2-based predictions failed under real competition
  • A champion skier threw up before every race but never in training
  • Performance is context- and state-dependent
  • You need a pre-performance process, not luck

“it was like somebody had just put blinkers on my mind. And I'm trying to access the stories that literally I created”

Chris Williamson
#performance#anxiety#public speaking#state-dependent
Story

The counselor, the piglets, and why genius is built not born

Kwik tells the parable of a counselor imprisoned by a king for insisting genius is built, not born. Given two piglets to live with, the counselor carried them up and down the stairs daily; as the pigs grew, so did his strength, proving through progressive training that genius is built through dedication and deep work. Kwik argues genius is largely pattern recognition and method behind what looks like magic.

  • Genius looks like magic but has a method behind it
  • Progressive overload builds capacity, mental or physical
  • Part of genius is pattern recognition
  • Traits give an edge but genius can be built
  • Mindset, motivation and methods create momentum

“genius is not born, it is built through dedication, through training, through deep work”

Jim Kwik
#genius#growth mindset#practice#story

Tool· 3

Tool

Learn with the intention to teach (the explanation effect)

Kwik's fastest way to learn anything is to learn it as if you must teach it, even when you won't. Called the explanation effect, this sharpens focus, prompts better questions and notes, and lets you learn it twice. Chris shares his own hack of explaining one thing he read that morning to his training partner, combining retrieval with teaching and forced simplification.

  • Intending to teach improves focus and note-taking
  • Teaching lets you learn the material twice
  • Ask: how can I use this, how does it relate to what I know?
  • Explaining forces simplification and cohesion
  • You learn so you can earn and share it with others

“When you learn with the intention of explaining to somebody else, you're gonna learn it better”

Jim Kwik
#learning#teaching#retention#notes
Tool

Memory is repeated retrieval, not repeated exposure

Kwik stresses that active retrieval and spaced repetition, not passive re-reading, are what strengthen memory. Quizzing yourself after reading or listening recreates and reinforces the memory each time, because neurons that fire together wire together. Chris frames his morning teaching habit as turbocharged because it forces retrieval plus simplification.

  • Active retrieval beats passive consumption
  • Space repetition: review an hour later and beyond
  • Self-quizzing recreates and strengthens the memory
  • Neurons that fire together wire together
  • Common sense here is not common practice

“memory is repeated retrieval, not repeated exposure”

Chris Williamson
#retrieval practice#spaced repetition#memory#study
Tool

The 3-2-1 rule for protecting your sleep

A simple mnemonic for sleep hygiene: no food three hours before bed, no liquids two hours before, and no devices one hour before. Kwik and Chris note eating and alcohol close to bedtime are among the biggest sleep disruptors, and that lowering temperature and light cues melatonin. Give yourself a bedtime alarm because the brain loves a schedule.

  • 3 hours before bed: no more food
  • 2 hours before bed: no more liquids
  • 1 hour before bed: no more devices
  • Eating and alcohol late are top sleep disruptors
  • A sauna or hot bath drops core temp and cues melatonin

“three hours before you go to bed, no more food, two hours before you go to bed, no more liquids, one hour before you go…”

Chris Williamson
#sleep#hygiene#routine#melatonin