“Readers are Leaders”, as the amazing Jim Kwik is fond of saying.
Jim Kwik is best known for his memory skills. A close second is his ability to speed read. He teaches the average person how to do both (although not at the same time).
It is well known that leaders and the wealthy attribute reading to their success. By reading a book you can learn what it took someone else decades to learn. This greatly reduces the learning curve. It is also an excellent way to obtain an education without having to spend a dime.
This is not to say that you should not attend college and/or obtain a degree. If you want to enter a specialized field you- and others- will want that diploma hanging on the wall. But, many super successful entrepreneurs never graduated from college. They learned from others, and worked with massive dedication, to slingshot to the top. Others may find it useful to take a college-level course in strategic areas to learn what they will need to make themselves successful.
Once you find a good book that really seems to speak to you, consider reading it again and again over the years. I have heard it said that when you read a book for the Xth time and you notice something new in that book, it is not that the book is any different, but because you are a different person. Learning helps you grow, and as anyone who has had a garden understands, if you are not growing, you are dying.
The average book is 64,000 words. Jim Kwik says his students learn to read an average of 200 words per minute. At that rate it will take you 320 minutes, or just over five hours, to read a book. This means if you read 45 minutes per day, you will read approximately a book a week. Think of all you can learn in that amount of time!
If you cannot find the time to read 45 minutes per day, cut it in half- just 25 minutes per day- and you will read a book every two weeks. That is still a lot of information!
Another option is audiobooks. Most books can be found in audio versions. Audible is well known for its selection, but Nook, Amazon, some libraries, and many others offer audiobooks as well. You will find you can easily listen at 1.5X and still understand what is being said. 2X takes a little more focus, but is also an option for those without much time. The human brain can understand the spoken or written word much faster than the human tongue can speak.
You can find a number of audiobooks on Youtube. One that I particularly recommend is “Think and Grow Rich”, read by an unknown man with a really good speaking voice, with many interesting excerpts from the author, Napolean Hill. It is the culmination of Mr. Hill’s decades of research regarding the science of achieving personal success, financial independence, and spiritual riches, originally commissioned by Andrew Carnegie, the self-made millionaire of the early twentieth century.
For more information on Jim Kwik, please visit his website at www.jimkwik.com or check out his many videos on Youtube, including this one:
