50 Tricks to Study Better, Faster and with Less Stress

Studying isn’t one task, it’s many. You may need to memorize facts or just understand the basics. You might need a broad conceptual base, or just skills. To add even more variety, each person has different learning styles and preferences.

No one tool is the right one. But with fifty here, you’re bound to find something that might help.

**Authors Note: I realize this article is fairly long, so you may want to bookmark it to finish it later**

1) Visualization

The idea here is that you want to put abstract information into a picture. If you are struggling to understand a concept, visualization is a good technique to start with.

2) Rote Memorization

I’m not a huge fan of this method, but sometimes brute force is required. Rote memorization involves pounding information into your brain by repeating it continually. Works best when the information is arbitrary and fact-based, so applications won’t go beyond simple memory.

3) Interlinking

Take two ideas and ask yourself how they relate. They can be ideas within a specific field (short roads) or between two completely different fields (freeways). By doing this you create a roadmap for traveling between information in your brain. I suggest reading my article on holistic learning if you want to find out more.

4) Metaphor

Take a more complex idea and compare it to a simpler one. When learning computer programming, I found it helpful to look at a function like a pencil sharpener. A parameter was a dull pencil, inside processes sharpened and returned a sharp pencil. Some metaphors have limited applications while others can be used for deep understanding.

5) Diagram

Draw it out. I love using diagrams for sorting large pieces of information. When I used to write computer programs fairly heavily, my desktop would have pieces of paper with hastily scratched diagrams. I consider creating a diagram to be the upgraded version of visualization.

6) Fluid Notes

Most people take notes in a linear fashion, writing one statement after the next. Fluid notes may look less organized, but involves you drawing connections between ideas and writing in all directions across the page. Remember the point of note taking is to encourage learning, not just record what was said.

7) Acronyms

A bit more efficient than rote memorization is to use mnemonics. Acronyms simplifying memorized information are a great way to do this. When I used to lifeguard, I had memorized all sorts of acronyms for various procedures such as RED or ABC. Make up your own acronyms to store arbitrary info.

8) Link Method

This is an advanced memory technique. I’ve found it works surprisingly well, but it takes longer to set up and requires practice if you want to do it quickly. The basic idea is that you link two ideas together by forming a bizarre picture that involves both of them.

If I wanted to memorize a grocery list that had apples, milk and beans, my goal would be to create two images that linked apples to milk and milk to beans. The first could be a picture of a giant apple milking a cow. The second could be a milk container that poured baked beans.

9) Peg Method

A variation of the link method, this one helps you memorize numbers. Instead of linking two pictures together, you use a system of phonetics to remember all the digits. From that you create short words and sentences to encode numbers. This article isn’t enough to fully explain the technique, but a Google search should give more depth if you’re interested.

10) Retracing

Another technique that works well with holistic learning is retracing. Basically this involves you starting with one concept in your class. From that you find a relationship between that idea and another idea. You continue doing this path until you get back where you started or reach a dead end.

11) Zoom and Check

Skim through any material you have to learn. Your goal isn’t to learn the information but to notice what you don’t already know. If more than one or two ideas pop out in a chapter, you should probably stop and go back.

12) Self-Test

Give yourself a test. Testing is a good way to see if you know what your doing, so try it out.

13) Anthropomorphize

Sounds complicated but isn’t. Anthropomorphizing is the process of taking non-human things and giving them human characteristics. Describing a rock as being lonely would be an example. You can use this tool by giving abstract ideas human qualities so they become easier to remember.

A great example was given by my psychology professor. He showed how signals are conducted along a neuron by describing it as people running down the hallway of a hotel, as doors opened and closed.

14) Visceralize

Similar to visualization except you use all your senses. This one is harder to explain, but you can create a feeling, sound or sense that corresponds with an idea. I remembered how to do basic matrix determinants by linking the feeling of my hand moving through a box.

15) Leverage Previous Understandings

What do you already know that could be useful? Make use of the information you already have. Many times the specifics between subjects are different, but founding principles are similar. Look for connections.

16) Gap Avoidance

I’ve made use of this technique to pass tests I didn’t study for. Although I always recommend actually learning information first, this can be a booster to help in a crisis. The basic idea of gap avoidance is that you become aware of what you don’t know and collect everything that you do.

I once won an inter-province chemistry test where one question was to write an essay on soap. I know very little about soap, so my first step was to collect anything I knew that could be remotely related to soap. Next I made note of what I did not know, so I could consciously avoid displaying my ignorance when writing the essay.

I’d like to point out that this technique isn’t magical. If you don’t know something, you’ll still probably fail. But it can help if you are missing pieces of information and can’t go back to study.

17) Brainstorming

Get a couple people in a room and think it out. I find one or two other people to be ideal, although some experts recommend up to six.

18) Mindstorming

Consider this individual brainstorming. Write down all the ideas, thoughts and information you can think of. A brain dump to get it all out on paper.

19) Relationship Diagrams

Diagrams that focus on the relationship between information are a great tool. Instead of just displaying information, show how it links together. Combined with fluid note taking, this is a great way to piece all the information together.

20) Give it a Hand

Use your fingers and thumbs as a memory tool. Link different words or names to specific fingers and memorize which go where. There are limits to this application, but it can be useful if a good acronym doesn’t come immediately.

21) Imaginary Room Method

A reader sent me this one and it builds on the link technique. Imagine a room you are familiar with. Now visualize all the major objects in this room. The next step is to individually link specific information or details to each object in your room.

Another variation on this technique uses your body instead of a room. I suppose it depends on whether you are more visual or visceral in your learning style.

22) Make it Interesting

Sounds obvious, doesn’t it? You’ll remember information you find more satisfying to know. Find ways you can use the information beyond just getting a grade and it will become more real to you.

23) Teach It

Find someone and explain it to them. Nothing forces you to learn better than teaching.

24) The Kindergarten Rule

Similar to teaching, the kindergarten rule proclaims that you should be able to explain your subject to a six year old. While this isn’t going to work for your advanced level calculus or biochemical courses, the idea is that you should dumb down the information so it becomes obvious.

25) Song or Story

Another memorizing technique, this one links information together by placing it in a sequence of a song or a story. You could list all the bones in your hand by creating a story in which you meet each of them in sequence.

26) Chunking

Learn for fifteen minutes at a time. Take frequent breaks and let your mind absorb what was learned. I never do creative or learning work for more than an hour or two without a change in pace.

27) Watch the Recorder

Are you learning or just reading sentences off the page? Be conscious of when your mind has slipped but your eyes are still gazing down. When the recorder stops, go back and restart.

28) Learn it Once

What would you do if you could only look through your textbook once? The learn-it-once philosophy basically states that studying is a waste of time. You should learn things immediately as they come to you rather than delegating them to future study sessions. It may be slower, but it forces you to learn instead of just skim.

29) Define Quality Information

What information is important? Define your goals for learning and the expectations of any examiners. By doing this you can figure out what information is critical to memorize and what can be skimmed.

30) Cram

I hate cramming, but it seems popular enough for me to include it anyways. Put on another pot of coffee and expect little sleep.

31) Immersion

This involves learning way more than you need to. The equivalent of diving into the deep end of a pool full of sharks it can be one of the fastest ways to learn (if you don’t get eaten alive). I know many people who have used this method when trying to learn new languages. Basically you become obsessed with the subject and hope that if only a small fraction of it sticks, that will still be more than you could have learned by any other method.

32) Learn as You Need It

Opposite to the immersion method is the learn-as-you-go method. This works great when the learning is for a field where mastery isn’t important. I used this approach when learning the technical matters of blogging.

33) Pop Quiz

My grandfather used this to teach my multiplication table when I was little. At random points during the day he would say something like, “Quick! What’s 8×12?”. This method might require an understanding friend or a complex computer program, but it can force you to remember information in any situation.

34) Give it Form

Don’t let an idea sit as an abstraction in your head. Give it a shape, form, color and meaning. Use your hands to describe it as a potter would sculpt a bowl on a potters wheel.

35) Sleep on It

Sleep has been shown to impact memory. Take time to rest yourself and get enough sleep so that you can remember what you have learned.

36) Complete Focus

Occasionally I’ll see people “studying” while listening to music or watching television. Although they may have a gift in multitasking I wasn’t born with, I think it is more likely that they are fooling themselves. Turn off all the distractions and focus completely or don’t focus at all.

37) Ask Why

Ever sat next to one of those annoying kids that asked “Why?” to everything you said? Maybe it’s time you became that annoying kid and started asking why to more of the information you are supposed to learn. When information forms a logical pattern it becomes far easier to remember.

38) Find Your Peak Mental Hours

Everyone has different creative peaks. Mine tend to be early afternoon and late morning. When I try to work late in the evening I’m restless. When I try to work early in the morning my mind is usually too fuzzy to think. Find your peak mental hours so studying works for you.

39) Exercise

Cal Newport, mentioned these next two on his blog. This first is exercising. Healthy body, healthy mind. I’ve found the stereotype of the dumb jock to be fairly inaccurate. Usually the people who keep fit are able to stay sharper mentally.

40) Burn Off Stress

Party, mediate, socialize, whatever you need to do to relax. Being in a depressed state won’t help your studies, so have fun and find a balance. Then again, hangovers aren’t the best way to write an exam so know where to draw the line.

41) Create

Learning and creating are, in essence, the same activity. Don’t let learning become a passive activity where you try to absorb information. Instead create information. Form your own relationships, descriptions and examples.

42) Get a Tutor

Get personalized instructions that match up with your learning style. Don’t force a square peg into a circular hole if you don’t have to.

43) Know Thy Weaknesses

Did you get a bad mark on that last test. Why? Was it just a lack of preparation. Did you not remember the information, or did you have trouble applying it? Figure out your weaknesses so you can develop tools (or use these) to work around them.

44) Post It’s

Place Post It’s all over your room with information from subjects. Mix them up every few days so that you will notice them as you walk around.

45) Organize

I must admit that organization has always been a struggle for me. I’m far more inclined towards total environmental chaos and lost files than robotic storage. But I have found that working on my organizational skills allows me more mental room to learn. Ordered environment, ordered mind.

46) Create a Learning Ritual

I can’t think of article ideas if I’m not sitting in my chair. If I try going for a walk or sitting somewhere else, my mind doesn’t focus. I’ve developed a ritual for writing posts that makes it difficult to do anything else. The advantage is that when I go through this ritual, I can think of ideas fairly quickly. Creating a learning ritual where you study or read in the same place can create a similar advantage.

47) Performance Flow

I’m incredibly relaxed when I’m about to write tests. I’m rarely nervous, but I have a degree of tension that keeps me focused. If you get too nervous during performance situations, try breathing and meditation exercises to slow yourself down.

48) Eat Light

Digestion uses a large amount of energy in your body. By eating light before studying or a test you can ensure you don’t feel groggy.

49) Write it Down

Writing is one of the best ways to learn. I use it for problem solving, brainstorming and working out ideas. Thinking is a rather inefficient process where distractions easily push you onto a tangent. By writing things down you can record your position and think more clearly.

50) Grades are Just Letters

My final suggestion is to stop thinking about classes in terms of grades and degrees. Think of school as just one facet of the larger self-education in your life. Find reasons to learn

information for its own sake, instead of just to pass the class. While this may sound obvious, I believe it is the most important tip on this list and the one few people actually use. Study to learn, not just to pass.

How to Become a More Effective Learner

Tips from Psychology to Improve Learning Effectiveness & Efficiency

By Kendra Cherry, About.com Guide

See More About: memory learning educational psychology

I'm always interested in finding new ways to learn better and faster. As a graduate student who is also a full-time science writer, the amount of time I have to spend learning new things is limited. It's important to get the most educational value out of my time as possible. However, retention, recall and transfer are also critical. I need to be able to accurately remember the information I learn, recall it at a later time and utilize it effectively in a wide variety of situations.

1. Memory Improvement Basics

I've written before about some of the best ways to improve memory. Basic tips such as improving focus, avoiding cram sessions and structuring your study time are a good place to start, but there are even more lessons from psychology that can dramatically improve your learning efficiency.

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2. Keep Learning (and Practicing) New Things

Learning and practicing new skills helps your brain retain new information. Image by Mysid.

One sure-fire way to become a more effective learner is to simply keep learning. A 2004 Nature article reported that people who learned how to juggle increased the amount of gray matter in their occipital lobes, the area of the brain is associated with visual memory.1 When these individuals stopped practicing their new skill, this gray matter vanished.

So if you're learning a new language, it is important to keep practicing the language in order to maintain the gains you have achieved. This "use-it-or-lose-it" phenomenon involves a brain process known as "pruning." Certain pathways in the brain are maintained, while other are eliminated. If you want the new information you just learned to stay put, keep practicing and rehearsing it.

3. Learn in Multiple Ways

Focus on learning in more than one way. Instead of just listening to a podcast, which involves auditory learning, find a way to rehearse the information both verbally and visually. This might involve describing what you learned to a friend, taking notes or drawing a mind map. By learning in more than one way, you’re further cementing the knowledge in your mind. According to Judy Willis, “The more regions of the brain that store data about a subject, the more interconnection there is. This redundancy means students will have more opportunities to pull up all of those related bits of data from their multiple storage areas in response to a single cue. This cross-referencing of data means we have learned, rather than just memorized.”2

4. Teach What You've Learned to Another Person

Teaching can improve your learning. ©René Mansi/iStockPhoto

Educators have long noted that one of the best ways to learn something is to teach it to someone else. Remember your seventh-grade presentation on Costa Rica? By teaching to the rest of the class, your teacher hoped you would gain even more from the assignment. You can apply the same principle today by sharing your newly learned skills and knowledge with others.

Start by translating the information into your own words. This process alone helps solidify new knowledge in your brain. Next, find some way to share what you’ve learned. Some ideas include writing a blog post, creating a podcast or participating in a group discussion.

5. Utilize Previous Learning to Promote New Learning

Another great way to become a more effective learner is to use relational learning, which involves relating new information to things that you already know. For example, if you are

learning about Romeo and Juliet, you might associate what you learn about the play with prior knowledge you have about Shakespeare, the historical period in which the author lived and other relevant information.

6. Gain Practical Experience

For many of us, learning typically involves reading textbooks, attending lectures or doing research in the library or on the Web. While seeing information and then writing it down is important, actually putting new knowledge and skills into practice can be one of the best ways to improve learning. If you are trying to acquire a new skill or ability, focus on gaining practical experience. If it is a sport or athletic skill, perform the activity on a regular basis. If you are learning a new language, practice speaking with another person and surround yourself with immersive experiences.

7. Look Up Answers Rather Than Struggle to Remember

Of course, learning isn’t a perfect process. Sometimes, we forget the details of things that we have already learned. If you find yourself struggling to recall some tidbit of information, research suggests that you are better offer simply looking up the correct answer. One study found that the longer you spend trying to remember the answer, the more likely you will be to forget the answer again in the future. Why? Because these attempts to recall previously learned information actually results in learning the "error state" instead of the correct response.

8. Understand How You Learn Best

Another great strategy for improving your learning efficiency is to recognize your learning habits and styles. There are a number of different theories about learning styles, which can all help you gain a better understanding of how you learn best. Gardner’s theory of multiple intelligences describes eight different types of intelligence that can help reveal your individual strengths. Looking at Carl Jung’s learning style dimensions can also help you better see which learning strategies might work best for you.

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9. Use Testing to Boost Learning

Testing can be more beneficial than studying alone. Image by Clinton Cardozo.

While it may seem that spending more time studying is one of the best ways to maximize learning, research has demonstrated that taking tests actually helps you better remember what you've learned, even if it wasn't covered on the test.3 The study revealed that students who studied and were then tested had better long-term recall of the materials, even on information that was not covered by the tests. Students who had extra time to study but were not tested had significantly lower recall of the materials.

10. Stop Multitasking

Multitasking can hurt learning effectiveness. ©Paul Kline/iStockPhotoFor many years, it was thought that people who multitask, or perform more than one activity at once, had an edge over those who did not. However, research now suggests that multitasking can actually make learning less effective. In the study, participants lost significant amounts of time as they switched between multiple tasks and lost even more time as the tasks became increasingly complex.4 By switching from one activity to another, you will learn more slowly, become less efficient and make more errors. How can you avoid the dangers of multitasking? Start by focusing your attention on the task at hand and continue working for a predetermined amount of time.

11. References

1 Draganski, B., Gaser, C., Busch, V., & Schuierer, G. (2004). Neuroplasticity: Changes in grey matter induced by training. Nature, 427(22), 311-312.

2 Willis, J. (2008). Brain-based teaching strategies for improving students' memory, learning, and test-taking success.(Review of Research). Childhood Education,

83(5), 31-316.

3 Chan, J.C., McDermott, K.B., & Roediger, H.L. (2007). Retrieval-induced facilitation. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 135(4), 553-571.

4 Rubinstein, Joshua S.; Meyer, David E.; Evans, Jeffrey E. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 27(4), 763-797.

More About Memory

Top 10 Memory Improvement Tips Why We Forget How Memories Are Retreived

Learning To Learn Faster: The One Superpower Everyone Needs

I have a new book coming out early next year, The Rise of Superman: Decoding the Science of Ultimate Human Performance. As the title suggests, my subject matter is the outer limits of human potential and the question of what might actually be possible for our species.

During the course of writing this book, I’ve been lucky enough to meet a lot of amazing people interested in this very same question. This is a story about one of them, a really nice guy named Jim Kwik. It’s also a story about learning and education, innovation and entrepreneurship, and, well, superheroes. Actually, mostly, it’s a story about superheroes.

Of course, since I’m telling you this is a story about superheroes, I now have to satisfy two additional requirements. There has to be a superpower; there has to be an origin story. Let’s take them one at a time.

Jim Kwik’s superpower is learning. He’s the CEO of Kwik Learning for a reason. Kwik is really, really quick. He can learn faster than mere mortals.

A lot faster.

As learning requires reading, well, Kwik can read alright. Most folks put away text between 200-250 words-per-minute (wpm). Kwik fires through heavy technical tomes at about 500 wpm; he devours light fiction at upwards of 1300 wpm. And he can remember what he reads.

Actually, he can remember a lot more than that. If you’ve ever seen Kwik on stage or attended one of his seminars, then you’ve seen him memorize the names of every face in the crowd. Or long strings of random numbers. Most people struggle to remember all seven digits of a phone number. Kwik can remember phone numbers all day long. Hundreds of them. And this isn’t a parlor trick: as was mentioned before, Kwik also remembers what he reads.

Consider what this really means. Books are the best way to store and transport knowledge we have ever developed. Years and years of back-breaking research go into books. And we can access that research in hours? How crazy is that.

It’s also for this reason that leaders are readers. This is true for American Presidents (JFK, Carter, Clinton, etc.) and American business leaders. In fact, Bill Gates—also a voracious reader—was once asked what superpower he most wanted. What did he choose? “Being able to read superfast.”

Warren Buffett, who was sharing the stage with him at the time, agreed, saying: “I’ve probably wasted ten years reading slowly.”

Now, for those of us raised on Shazam and the Wonder Twins, fast reading and better recall may not seem like true superpowers, but that’s only because we haven’t done the math.

Kwik did the math:

“The average person reads 200-250 words-per-minute and spends 3 to 4 hours of their work day reading. That’s more than one-third of their time on the job. If that person makes $60,000 a year, then at least $20,000 of that money is paying for them to read. But proper training can easily double the average person’s reading speed (up to 400-450 w.p.m.). That cuts 3 to 4 hours down to 1 to 2. That’s a savings of over an hour a day. If you do that for 365 days a year, that’s 9 different 40 hour work weeks saved. That’s real time productivity. Imagine what you could do with all that extra time.”

But you can do more than imagine. Because there’s another side to superherodom that’s relevant here—Kwik’s origin story.

Kwik Origins

Jim Kwik wasn’t always a great learner. In fact, just the opposite. At the age of 5, he suffered a head trauma and afterwards felt broken. Like his brain was broken. Like he could never keep up.

And, truthfully, he never could keep up. Growing up in Westchester, New York, he was exceptionally challenged in school. His friends seemed to excel effortlessly, while Kwik had to struggle privately just stay in the game. Worse, this led him to be painfully shy. The combination almost proved his undoing.

Kwik was temporarily relieved by the chance to go college. “It was supposed to be great,” he recounts. “College was a place where no one knew me. They didn’t know I had trouble learning. They knew nothing about me. I thought I could be anyone—even a smart guy.”

On his way towards smart, Kwik overloaded himself with classes. Once again, very quickly, the burden proved too much to bear. Unwilling to let himself slip behind, Kwik sacrificed everything at the alter of study. He stopped eating, stopped sleeping, stopped exercising. The neglect took its toll.

One day, Kwik passed out at the public library. He fell down a flight of stairs and woke up in the hospital. He was battered and bruised, dehydrated and exhausted. A nurse brought him a cup of tea. There was an Albert Einstein quote printed on the side: “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.”

Old Al was singing his song.

The quote got Kwik thinking. Instead of thinking about what he was failing to learn, he started thinking about learning itself. The brain was supposed to be this supercomputer, right? So why did his supercomputer keep malfunctioning? Why couldn’t he focus? Why couldn’t he remember what he read? Why did he keep losing his damn keys?

And the longer he thought about it, the more he came to one conclusion: School—this place he had spent all these years trying to get smarter—is a great place to learn what to learn. But it’s not necessarily a great place to learn how to learn.

“If Rip Van Winkle woke up today,” says Kwik, “the only thing he would recognize is our education system. It was created for 18th century needs, to train people to work in factories or the farm. Today, we’re paid by what’s between our ears. We’re knowledge workers. We’re paid for our ability to learn. Yet we have an educational system that doesn’t teach people how to learn. How to focus, listen, innovate, think, remember, problem solve. Why do most people have poor reading skills? One reason is that the last time most people took a class called “reading” they were probably five years old.”

So, Kwik made the art of studying his study. He started pouring through tomes on neuroscience, adult development, and meta-learning—which is the science of how we learn. He discovered there was a lot to learn.

He also applied this knowledge. To his incredible surprise, progress came quickly. After spending less than 30 days working on new learning habits, Kwik could focus better, read faster, retain more. After 60 days, he was getting better grades and in far less time. His self-image started to change. His confidence started to soar. Hell, before long, he barely recognized himself.

For the sheer joy of sharing, Kwik started tutoring others in what he learned about learning. One of his first students was a young woman desperate to read more quickly.

The woman struggled with the technique. Speed reading isn’t skimming and it isn’t scanning. Done properly, and augmented with memory work, it’s very high comprehension and high retention. And not easy to learn

But this woman was incredibly determined. She kept at it. Eventually, something clicked. And it kept clicking. She read 30 books in 30 days—an absolutely amazing total. So amazing, that Kwik had to ask the purpose. Why 30 in 30? What could possibly be the hurry?

Her mother was the hurry. She was in the hospital dying of cancer. Doctors had given her 60 days to live. Kwik’s student was speed reading books on health and wellness. It was a last ditch effort to save her mother’s life.

Kwik was 19 years old at the time and this was not the kind of answer he was expecting.

“I didn’t even know what to say to that,” he recounts. “I also didn’t think it would ever work.

Six months later, Kwik got a call from the woman. Her mother had survived the cancer. “It was a miracle,” says Kwik. “The doctors had no idea what was keeping her alive. But her mother believes she’s alive because of all the great advice she got from her daughter when she was sick. The same advice, her daughter had gotten reading 30 books in 30 days.”

That was when it all came together for him. “If knowledge is power,” he says, “that was the moment I realized that learning is a superpower.”

More importantly, as Kwik himself points out, “I’m not special. I didn’t naturally have these superpowers. They were learned. And if I can learn them, anyone can learn them—regardless of age, background or education.”

A School for Superheroes

After college, Kwik kept on teaching people to harness this superpower. He started Kwik Learning, has trained students at over 30 institutions (Harvard etc.), and worked with companies like Nike, Virgin and Zappos. Along the way, he also started to realize that having a superpower meant using that power for good. It might sound corny. Kwik was serious.

Education and the environment were his core issues, so he and his wife, Alexis, started saving the rainforest; they built schools in places like Guatemala. It was a significant (and ongoing) effort, but, for Kwik, not nearly enough. But what would be enough?

This was about the time Kwik started thinking about building a school for superheroes.

His thinking was straightforward. Every animal has been optimized by evolution; thus every animal has a superpower—that thing they do best in the world. Birds fly. Fish swim. Spider’s weave. So what can humans do? Well, studies show that human’s have a near-infinite capacity to learn—it’s what neuroplasticity really means. In Scientific American, Northwestern psychologist Paul Reber explains it like this:The human brain consists of about one billion neurons. Each neuron forms about 1,000 connections to other neurons, amounting to more than a trillion connections. If each neuron could only help store a single memory, running out of space would be a problem. You might have only a few gigabytes of storage space, similar to the space in an iPod or a USB flash drive. Yet neurons

combine so that each one helps with many memories at a time, exponentially increasing the brain’s memory storage capacity to something closer to around 2.5 petabytes (or a million gigabytes). For comparison, if your brain worked like a digital video recorder in a television, 2.5 petabytes would be enough to hold three million hours of TV shows. You would have to leave the TV running continuously for more than 300 years to use up all that storage.

In other words, Kwik wasn’t wrong: learning really is our superpower.

He also figured, to effect real change in the world—the kind that might be enough—the easiest way was teach everyone in the world how to develop their superpower. Simple really. Make the planet smarter.

And, seriously, why not? Why not build a school that teaches all how-to-learn stuff not taught in school. A school that shows us how to optimize brain performance, mental math, rapid recall, that heighten problem-solving, elevates creativity, enhances flow, increases innovation, this list goes on and on.

Of course, this school should also be free; and available online.

Superhero You was born.

The Largest Citizen Science Project In History.

Superhero You has since grown into a community over 100,000 strong. It is a collection of free videos. It is an ongoing series of live events. It is an eclectic assembly of top experts in all things brain optimization. Sir Ken Robinson on creativity; Dr. Peter Diamandis on innovation; Dr. Daniel Amen on brain health. My organization, the Flow Genome Project, has also been involved since nearly the beginning.

At the heart of this community are a trio of important ideas. The first is straight-forward: the ability to learn quickly is a distinct and powerful competitive advantage in business. It enables all success in a fast paced, fast changing world.

The second should also be clear by now: human performance is hackable. Learning is hackable. The brain is hackable. Literally.

The term “hacker” originally described someone interested in tinkering with technology in an attempt to improve performance. Our biology no different. When Kwik teaches memory he tells people to exaggerate the things they are trying to remember. Why? Because the brain craves novelty. If you are trying to remember where you put your car keys, having an image of them 60 feet tall and dressed in drag helps. Exaggeration, then, is a simple memory hack.

But exaggeration is also one of the keys to building memory palaces which is one of the keys to remembering everything you read. It’s what the road to mastery looks like from the inside.

More importantly, exaggeration only one example. There are millions more. Honestly, barring violations of the laws of physics, just about whatever superpower you desire, someone out there has figured out how to hack it. My organization, in fact, the Flow Genome Project is dedicated to hacking flow states—check us out here.

And that brings us to the third idea at the heart of Kwik’s message—we can teach each other these hacks. We can build schools for it. We can have conferences. But most importantly, we can do it online—which means we can do it at scale.

The Internet gives us the ability to open source ultimate human performance. We can turn hacking our better selves into the largest citizen science project in history. We can, collectively, try to figure out how to become superheroes.

Stay Tuned: Superhero You just teamed up with Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh’s downtown Vegas Project to put on a super-learning super-summit.

Steven Kotler is an author, journalist and Director of Research for the Flow Genome Project, an organization dedicated to decoding the science of ultimate human performance. His books include “Abundance,” “A Small Furry Prayer,” “West of Jesus,. and “The Angle Quickest For Flight.” His articles have appeared in over 60 publications, including The New York Times Magazine, Atlantic Monthly, Wired, Forbes, GQ, National Geographic, Popular Science, and Discover. He has a deep interest in the intersection of science, technology, and culture, with specific focus on the extreme edges of the discussion—both larger philosophical implications and completely personal applications.

How to Learn Fast – Comparing Speed of LearningYou can learn faster than you are learning now, almost certainly. The trick to learning fast is that  you skip the learning and start doing the thing you want to learn. In the process what happens is kinesthetic learning – that is learning by doing.

The distance from  San Francisco to London is approx. 5500 miles.

The result is better for two reasons. One is you get a job done. It goes into your virtual portfolio – you can tell about it to your future employer, impress friends, and brag at parties. Because you’ve done it, not just studied to do it. The second benefit is that learning by doing is free. You pay no tuition. So what is the catch? You have to be brave. Don’t be scared of not knowing, take it as an opportunity to show what you can do.

Either way you have to learn something in life. You can take years to do it, or you can learn fast. MIght as well just learn fast and get on to the big stuff.

How do others learn fast?

Learning by reading is like walking. If you walked 24 hours a day, and wore levitation boots you would arrive in London in 1833 hours.

Learning through school is like biking. If you bike 24 hours a day, you will make it ti London in 366 hours.

Learning from a mentor is like driving. If you drive 24 hours a day, you will be in London in 85 hours.

Learning by doing is like flying a plane. In 11 hours you will get there. Learning by taking big risks – it’s like flying a rocket. And that is, in fact, what the a

lot of successful entrepreneurs do. Richard Branson does it literally.  If flew a rocket, you will be in London in 33 minutes.

Entrepreneurs have the fastest speed of learning. You can learn faster if you:

Jump in the water, then sink or swim – if you swim it took you 1 minute to learn Sell a product you don’t have to a big corportation (like Bill Gates did) Quite your job and use all your savings to start a company

Related: How To Never Give Up Becoming an Entrepreneur

Read more on: entrepreneur, mindset, productivity

How to Learn Fast: Clever Tips from Tim Ferriss

Tim Ferriss is a New York Times best-selling author, widely known for his book The Four-Hour Work Week. Not only has he cracked the secrets of productivity, he's figured out how to learn things super quickly! Mental Floss' own Chetan Nandakumar managed to snag a few minutes with him.

We're interested in this notion of rapid learning. What sort of things have you been able to  master?

Things like Argentine tango, for example. I went from my first class to the world championships in Argentina in about five and half to 6 months, something like that. What else? Yabusame.

Yabu-what?

Yabusame is Japanese horseback archery. I learned it for a pilot with the History channel. These Yabusame riders will generally train 10 "“ 20 years before real competition where they are galloping full speed on a horse with no hands, shooting at three targets.The most dangerous part is you are flying on this horse galloping full speed. There are roughly three foot poles on either side of the horse every four feet or so and those can be made out of iron. If you fall off the horse you could hit those or get trampled by the horse itself. In any case, I had five days to prepare. I ended up doing my final test with two targets instead of three, but I ended up hitting both targets.

I've also read that you became a National Chinese Kickboxing Champion in almost no time. But your learning method isn't just limited to extreme sports, right?

Sure. I have studied probably a dozen or so more esoteric languages like Gaelic Irish, and languages of many different varieties including Japanese, Mandarin Chinese, German, and Spanish.

Are there some overarching principles that apply across domains?

The first is that material is more important than method. There is a focus and over focus on methodologies of learning. What's most important is the material and the sequence of the material. So, for example, when I learned Japanese, I was forced to develop my own

approach. If you can use the Ministry of Education word frequency studies and identify the most frequently used words in both conversation and in written language, there are 2000 words. If you group those properly and sequence them you can achieve conversation fluency in three or four months, in some cases faster.

Point two is association, basically the power of associative memorization. Since you have this pre-existing base as an adult of idiomatic English, idiomatic expressions, and inclusive grammatical knowledge, you can associate that with your new language through translation or association. That association applies to physical activity as well. For example, I was an all American wrestler in high school in 1995.  So I might look at how wrestling principles could potentially apply to tango. You actually find that certain basic physiological principles apply whether that is related to posture or the male lead.

The third important thing is self-observation, which is critically important. It's something I did none of for a very long time until I realized how important it was. With tango for example, I recorded almost every lesson that I did.  We are talking about hundreds of lessons and hundreds of training sessions. In tango a dance partner cannot tell you what you look like as they are dancing. They just don't have the necessary vantage point, so what I found is that I thought I was dancing really well two and a half months into practice and then I saw a video of myself -- my posture was horrendous and I also had my knees further apart than I should have which was extremely unattractive! I looked really, really bad. So I started recording all of my sessions and I created a critical shorthand. If I saw a new move I could say, "Ah! this looks like the left foot open, but it's with a slight, like 90 degree rotation of the upper torso."

Your rapid learning approach seems to require a lot of analysis and self-observation. Can anyone do this?

I have an unusual level of focus when I decide that I want to learn a particular skill, but many other people do the same thing. I know people who have gone from nowhere to the Boston Marathon in a span of a year and it requires that same level of analysis.

Are there any limits to what someone can learn?

I think there are certain genetic limits to what you can achieve in a given field.  So if you look at the national level of swimmers in a swimming competition, you will find that the higher you go the more homogenous the body types are. When you get to the finals in the Olympics everybody looks pretty much the same.  They are all like 6' 1" pretty much built for optimal hydrodynamics. For that reason I would only be able to reach a certain level in that field.

Has your approach been influenced by findings from neuroscience and psychology?

Well, there are a few. Like if you start learning a language for example, with a box of high frequency placards ordered from A to Z, people will then be learning from A to Z. Unfortunately that type of learning often times create a serial dependency -- if I ask you what letter of the alphabet is K, you will have to go A, B, C, D, E, "¦ etc. You will have to go through each alphabet in order to recall. If I am using a textbook, the vocabulary for a given lesson is in a particular order and you are susceptible to the same problem. So I will always

randomize everything. And all of this has been studied extensively in laboratories. They are very fond of doing serial versus randomized testing, because it is relatively easier to measure.

Any thoughts on education in schools? Do you have any insight in how we could better structure our education system?

Education systems should first and foremost educate students how to learn and not just teach specific subjects. While the latter is obviously important, the former is of paramount importance because you enable the student to be able to acquire knowledge and skills beyond what can be presented in the classroom. The main problems plaguing the US public educational system are political and legal as opposed to based on curriculum.

To rapidly learn more about Tim Ferriss, click here.

Got any leads for who we should interview next? Drop them in the comments. And if we end up one, we'll be sure to include your name in the next piece!

Electrical Brain Stimulation Helps People Learn Math FasterJust about everyone wishes they were better at math. But studying and practicing is so difficult and boring that very few people do it. If only there were an easier way.

Now there may be, suggests a new study in which scientists stimulated volunteers’ brains with mild electric current while they learned new arithmetic operations based on made-up symbols. People who received brain stimulation during training sessions on five consecutive days learned two to five times faster than those who received sham stimulation, and they retained a 30 to 40 percent performance edge six months later.

The study is not the first to show improvement in mathematical cognition with brain stimulation. In 2010, scientists reported that people can learn a new set of numbers based on arbitrary symbols more quickly when a mild current is applied to the right parietal lobe of the brain, a region implicated in previous number-comprehension studies.

The new research goes a step farther by showing that electrical stimulation can also improve the ability to perform calculations, says cognitive neuroscientist Roi Cohen Kadosh of the University of Oxford, who led both studies.

The new study also uses a different type of stimulation. In the 2010 study, Cohen Kadosh and colleagues used transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS), which delivers a weak but constant current to the brain via electrodes placed on the skull. In the new study, they used transcranial random noise stimulation (TRNS): current that fluctuates randomly within certain bounds. People sometimes feel a slight tingling on the scalp with tDCS, Cohen Kadosh says, but with TRNS they usually feel nothing.

They may also get a different kind of cognitive boost.

The researchers applied TRNS to a different brain region thought to play a role in mathematical cognition, the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex. When people received TRNS during training sessions spread across five days, they memorized new “facts” more quickly (such as 4 # 12 = 17, an arbitrary equation that had to be learned by rote). Compared to subjects who got sham stimulation, those who received TRNS also learned more quickly to do calculations with novel operands (the symbols like + and – that tell you what to do with the numbers on either side, but in this case the new symbols required somewhat more complicated operations).

The researchers also monitored blood flow in the stimulated region of cortex with a non-invasive method called near-infrared spectroscopy. TRNS appeared to make metabolism more efficient, co-author Jackie Thompson wrote in an email to Wired: “That is, metabolic levels in the TRNS group were actually lower whilst doing the same mental calculations (the same amount of “work”) as the sham group.”

That physiological change, as well as the improved calculation performance, persisted 6 months after training, the researchers report today in Current Biology. (The improved memory performance did not).

“If I put my sci-fi hat on, what I can imagine coming down the road is even more sophisticated combinations of stimulation and cognitive training,” said Peter Reiner, a neuroscientist and neuroethicist at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver. Reiner sees the performance improvements reported in the new study as a nice incremental advance over what’s been shown previously, but he predicts that bigger things are on the way. ”There’s a huge amount of potential there.”

But before you run off to RadioShack and fire up the soldering iron in an attempt to build a TRNS kit, Cohen Kadosh has a few words of caution. “Do not try this at home,” he said. Although tDCS is fairly simple, TRNS requires more sophisticated equipment and protocols. The electrodes have to be attached in just the right place and the cognitive training has to be done right too, Cohen Kadosh says.

Also, although his team didn’t see any adverse effects in this study, they recently discovered that tDCS can cause cognitive impairments as well as benefits in some cases.

Study and practice is still the surest and safest way to kick your brain into a higher math gear. At least for now.

Unlock Your Inner Rain Man by Electrically Zapping Your Brain

By Tanya Lewis 07.20.12 6:30 AM Categories: Brains and Behavior

Electrically stimulating the brain could make you smarter. Image: Allan Snyder

Imagine a creativity cap. A device that would free you, if only momentarily, from your mindsets, from your prejudices, from the mental blocks to creativity.

These words are emblazoned on the website Creativitycap.com, and they represent the vision of neuroscientist Allan Snyder. Snyder believes we all possess untapped powers of cognition, normally seen only in rare individuals called savants, and accessing them might take just a few jolts of electricity to the brain.

It sounds like a Michael Crichton plot, but Snyder, of the University of Sydney, Australia, says he wouldn’t be surprised to see a prototype of the creativity cap within a couple of years. His research suggests that brain stimulation improves people’s ability to solve difficult problems. But Snyder’s interpretation of his findings remains controversial, and the science of using brain stimulation to boost thinking is still in its early stages.

“I think it’s a bit of a minefield,” said psychologist Robyn Young of Flinders University in Australia, who has tried to replicate Snyder’s early experiments. “I’m not really sure whether the technology is developed that can turn it into a more accurate science.”

Snyder has long been fascinated by savants — people with a developmental brain disorder (often autism) or brain injury who display prowess in a particular area, such as mathematics, art or music, which far exceeds the norm. Kim Peek, who provided the inspiration for Dustin Hoffman’s character in the movie “Rain Man,” was a savant who could memorize entire books after a single reading, or instantly calculate what day of the week any calendar date fell on. But he had a severe mental disability that prevented him from performing simple actions such as buttoning his shirt.

Wisconsin psychiatrist and savant expert Darold Treffert describes a skill like Kim’s as an “island of genius that stands in stark contrast to the overall handicap.”

Other savants acquire their abilities after a severe brain injury or illness. Alonzo Clemons suffered a head injury as a toddler that left him mentally disabled, but endowed him with the ability to accurately sculpt beautiful clay animals after only briefly glimpsing them. And patients with frontotemporal dementia have been known to suddenly display artistic and musical abilities, like the successful businessman who developed dementia and started doing award-winning painting.

But not all savant abilities come with a trade-off, says Treffert. Sometimes it’s possible for otherwise normal people to have savant skills.

Snyder hypothesizes that all people possess savant-like abilities in a dormant form, but that savants have “privileged access” to less-processed, lower-level information. In a normal brain, top-down controls suppress the barrage of raw data our brains take in, enabling us to focus on the big picture.

“We all have that information,” Snyder said, “but our brains are deliberately wired not to see it.”

The nine dots problem. Image: Blleininger

Using brain stimulation, he thinks it’s possible to temporarily remove that mental suppression and unlock the savant inside each of us. In their latest study, published in April in Neuroscience Letters, Snyder and graduate student Richard Chi tested people’s performance on a geometric puzzle called the nine dots problem (right).

The goal is to connect all nine dots using just four straight lines, without lifting your pen up or retracing a line. It’s a classic problem that researchers have been giving people for a century, but in the majority of experiments, no participants are able to solve it, even with plenty of time and many attempts. (If you have tried and failed, here’s the solution.)

Snyder and Chi had their subjects attempt to solve the problem while wearing an electrode cap. After a few minutes without brain stimulation, half of the subjects received stimulation while the other half received no stimulation. Here’s the interesting part: Whereas none of the subjects solved the problem before brain stimulation, more than 40 percent of subjects in the stimulation group solved the problem after being zapped. Talk about being struck by inspiration.

In case you’re imagining some kind of Frankensteinian setup for electrifying people’s brains, it’s nothing like that. The technique, called transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS), involves applying a weak electrical current to the scalp through a pair of electrodes on sponges. It’s a widely used technique that is considered safe, with minor side effects. Other researchers have shown cognitive improvements using the same method applied to other brain areas, but Snyder and Chi are the first to use stimulation to mimic savant brain physiology.

Autism, left frontotemporal dementia, and savantism resulting from brain injury have all been associated with deficits in the left hemisphere of the brain. Though the left brain/right brain skill dichotomy is an oversimplification, they do specialize in function, says Treffert. The left brain, which is dominant in most people, is more heavily involved in language and reason, while the right brain plays a bigger role in visuospatial and artistic ability. Scientists theorize that in savants, limitations in left-brain function allow the right brain to compensate. In Snyder and Chi’s study, they applied stimulation to suppress brain activity in the left anterior temporal lobe while simultaneously exciting activity in the right anterior temporal lobe.

Often, our approach to a problem is shaped by our earlier experiences, making it harder to come up with new solutions. In a previous study, Snyder and Chi tested whether their brain stimulation method could make people more insightful while they performed “matchstick arithmetic,” in which they were given false equations written in Roman numerals with matches and had to make the equation true by moving one match. Solving each matchstick

problem required a different strategy, and those who had the stimulation solved them faster, they found.

Snyder’s earlier studies used magnetic, rather than electrical, stimulation to try to elicit savant abilities. One study showed a change in artistic ability, while another found improved numerosity, the ability to precisely estimate a large number of objects without counting them.

But as of yet, not many of Snyder’s studies have been replicated. Australian psychologist Robyn Young did a study in 2004 that examined the effect of magnetic stimulation on savant-type skills such as drawing, memory, mathematics and calendar calculating. In five out of 17 subjects, some improvement was observed, but most of the findings weren’t statistically significant. A follow-up study failed to show any effect of the stimulation.

Young thinks the idea of improving cognition with brain stimulation is plausible, but “there were so many variables involved,” she said, such as where to stimulate and how long the effect lasts, that she dropped the work to pursue other research.

Supposing a creativity cap ever does become available, it raises many questions. Can we truly achieve the mental equivalent of a free lunch, without drawbacks in other areas of thinking? Perhaps the genius effect will subside after repeated use. As with any form of cognitive enhancement, there’s the question of ethics. Finally, as Young put it, “If everyone could play music brilliantly or be brilliant artists, it would minimize diversity.”

Citations: Chi R, Snyder A. Brain stimulation enables the solution of an inherently difficult problem, Neuroscience Letters. 515 (2012) 121–124

Snyder,  A. Explaining and inducing savant skills: privileged access to lower level, less-processed information, Trans. R. Soc. B: Biol. Sci. 364 (2009) 1399–1405.

Snyder,  A. Explaining and inducing savant skills: privileged access to lower level, less-processed information, Trans. R. Soc. B: Biol. Sci. 364 (2009) 1399–1405.

Treffert DA (2009). The savant syndrome: an extraordinary condition. A synopsis: past, present, future. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences 364 (1522): 1351–1357.

How to Learn FasterWhen you want to learn something fast (especially a foreign language) you should take a few minutes before you start to learn how human memory works.

When you understand how human memory works, and when you use the right study methods, all your learning will be much faster and easier.

Here’s the key fact about human memory that will help you learn fast.

100 Repetitions Quickly Counts as 1 Repetition

If you do a lot of repetitions in a short period of time, your brain will count that as just one repetition and you will forget it quickly, but if you do say 10 repetitions at time intervals that start at about 15 seconds and then increase, you will remember what you learned much better.

You can prove this to yourself with the following party game.

When you meet an interesting man at a party, try to remember his name by repeating it 100 times in a row. Then don’t talk to him or think about him for the rest of the evening.  Just before the party is over, find him and see if you can remember his name.

You probably won’t.

What’s the problem?  You had plenty of reviews. You reviewed his name 100 times, why did you forget it so quickly?

Now try a different method. Go to a party, but this time take a stopwatch with you. Meet an interesting woman and get her business card.  Write a description of her on the back side of her card.

Take her card and your stopwatch and leave the room (or people will think you are strange.)  Thirty seconds after you met her, ask yourself, “What was her name?”. Look at her description on the card.  Say her name out loud, and turn the card over to check yourself.

Reset your stop watch for one minute and do the same thing.  Think about anything you want for that minute other than the woman or her name.  When the minute is up, look at her description again and say her name out loud.

Do the same thing 2 minutes later then again after 4 more minutes, then 8 minutes after that.

After five properly spaced repetitions, you will have a much more stable memory of the woman’s name, than if you had said her name 100 times quickly in a row.

Of course you don’t need to go to a party, and you definitely don’t need a stop watch to try this.  Just write anything you want to remember on one side of a piece of paper and a description of it using different words on the opposite side.   For example write the words, “Pam’s phone number” on one side and write 555-1212 on the other side.

Then remember and say her phone number out loud with increasing time intervals as described above.

What our online software does, is take this proven method and makes it really easy to use.

Two Essential Things for Making Memories

1.  You need to be asked the question (not told the answer)

2.  You have to be asked the question again at increasing time intervals.

You can do this with paper flashcards, but it’s a LOT easier with software.

When you study on our web site, our software tracks what you have studied, and when you studied it. The software then calculates when the word or phrase should be reviewed just before you were about to forget.  This makes a stable retrievable memory in the least amount of time.

Try Our Language Learning Program

Our language learning program is a very good example of how to use this concept.

Here’s what to do:

1.  Click on your language and watch the video.2.  Click “Try It” and watch the “How To” video twice.3.  Learn for 30 minutes right now!

Spanish – Danish – German – French

Irish –  Canadian French –  Russian

What if We Don’t Have Your Language?

If your language is above, try it now.  If not,  please use the contact us form below to tell us what you want to learn.  We can add new languages very quickly.

We strongly recommend Pimsleur if we don’t have your language.  Read our Pimsleur Review.  No we don’t get any money from them.  Their technology is obsolete, but it still works and most other programs don’t.  It’s also the best for the blind.

Great Articles on Language Learning

These articles will save you a lot of time, and make your learning a lot more fun!

How to Learn Any Language (over 20 articles)

Rosetta Stone Reviews – Why it Doesn’t Work

Please tell us what language you want to learn and why. Writing it down will make it more real -- more likely to happen!