What’s up everyone. Welcome to the fit to fat, to fit experience podcast, episode 67. Uh, today we got a special guest for you guys. I’m super honored to have this guy on. Uh, I met him in LA at a mastermind event about three months ago and was just blown away by his story and the type of person he is, his energy and how down to earth he is and the fact that he even considered coming on my podcast, I was super excited and it took a while to finally schedule him. His name is Jim Kwik. He’s the founder of quick learning. He’s a widely recognized world expert in speed, reading, memory improvement, brain performance, accelerated learning. He calls himself a personal trainer for, uh, the brain. So, uh, right up my alley, to be honest with you, because I feel like there’s a parallel between, you know, our bodies and our minds as well.
And you need to work out your brain, just, just like you work out your body, right. Jim McCoy, he’s amazing. He’s worked with will Smith, Elon Musk, uh, Wolverine, Hugh Jackman, um, all kinds of CEOs and celebrities. Uh, and he’s, he’s just has an amazing story. You guys, uh, he talks about his childhood brain injury that he had as a kid, which caused him to have a learning and, and educational issues growing up in the education system here in America and how he couldn’t learn. He couldn’t read yet Tom self, how to read through comic books and that’s his connection to superheroes. And he believes that we all can have the super powers that he has. Uh, you know, he can memorize, you know, a room of a hundred plus people and memorize all their names, but he honestly believes that every single person has the capability to do that.
And so we dive into his story a little bit, his origin story of how we, um, you know, develop this talent and now how he teaches in how we, uh, works with celebrities now. Um, and so many, uh, tips for, uh, we get into helping people to remember names, which is a big thing that I’ve struggled with until I started using his, his system. And he has a gift for every single person listening to this podcast. So you’re really gonna enjoy it. Hang around to the end. We did have some, uh, audio issues, audio issues at the end. So we had to kind of cut that part out, but it’s just the very end. Uh, but all of this, you guys is such great information. It’s so valuable. I really hope you take the time to listen to the whole episode and share it with people that need to listen to this.
Cause it’s a very, very powerful stuff and you will, you will love it. A lot of, uh, quotables. Uh tweetables if you will, in this episode that you’re going to love and want to write down these quotes in here, uh, because they are they’re powerful. So anyways, before we jump into the episode with Jim, I’m super proud to have our sponsors a sponsor podcast. You guys, uh, we wouldn’t be able to continue to do this without our sponsors. Our first sponsors Everly, well.com. I’ve been working with you with these guys for a while now, and I love what they do. They make a blood testing, you know, getting your blood work, done so much more convenient, affordable, and it’s so easy that anybody can do it. So basically every well.com is a website that you can go to and you can order certain tests that you want to do for your blood work.
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All right, Jim, quick, welcome to the fit to fat, to fit experience podcast. How are you doing today? I’m doing fantastic. Drew much love to you. And then thanks for having me and thank you to everyone. Who’s listening to this. Yeah, man. I really appreciate it. I’m glad that we finally were able to get this set up. I know it’s been tough. You travel a lot. I travel a lot. Um, but we’re here finally. Um, and so are you in California right now? Yeah, I’m a home in Los Angeles. Okay. How about yourself? Yeah, I’m home in Utah now. I was in California, actually for, for the Thanksgiving holidays, but back here in the cold, it’s actually beautiful this time of year with the snow capped mountains. I’m not sure if you’ve ever been out here, but the mountains, the Rocky mountains are beautiful. I have, I’ve been up to a park city to Eden.
I love, I love those States. Those are both great places, man. Uh, just to forewarn you and, and my followers too. Um, I today’s day one of my, of my seven day fast. So I’m embarking on a seven day fast, uh, no food. So if I seem a little bit off, I’m going to use that as my crutch. I’m going to blame my seven day fast. I love it. I love it. Yeah. But, um, anyways, uh, I appreciate you coming on. So I kind of want to start off by first introducing you to my audience. Cause I don’t know if a lot of my audience knows who you are, you know, mostly I interview, you know, health and fitness professionals or doctors or nutritionists. Um, maybe start up, start off with, uh, you know, you grown up and uh, you know, how, what type of environment you grew up in and then it, and then maybe talk about your brain injury at a young age too. Cause I think that’s really important. Sure, sure. I know we’re going to talk about teaching people how to remember names and improve their memory. So I mean the origin story pretty much is what I tell people when people ask what I do, I tell them about kind of like a personal trainer for the brain. And so, uh, so I don’t, I don’t want the six pack abs, but it, hopefully mental muscles
Are, are pretty, are pretty carved out. Um, so what I do is I help people just get sharper faster, better memory and learn faster, be a clear thinker, sharper focus and, and all that. Cause I think it’s not just mental intelligence now. It’s also mental fitness and I think that’s so important. And so I know that’s the conversation, but um, like yourself, I had my challenges now I know this was self-inflicted and mine. I went to necessarily chosen. Maybe, maybe I’ll choose it now, but it was, it was really tough. I, um, as you mentioned, I had a brain injury at the age of five. Um, and I hadn’t been as a result of it. I had learning challenges and what, how that manifested was. I didn’t understand things like everybody else, um, because of this head injury, um, and this traumatic brain injury, I teachers would have to repeat themselves five or six or seven times and I still wouldn’t get it.
Um, I had a very bad bed focus, uh, was easily distracted. My memory was nothing to speak of. It took me actually an three, almost four years to learn how to read. Um, and that was a big challenge. And I, I actually taught myself how to read by reading comic books late at night. And, uh, something about the, I don’t know, I don’t know if a lot of your audience, likewise likes to watch, you know, superhero movies and stuff like that and TV shows, but I, um, something about the illustrations about good versus evil about one person can make a difference and it’s superheroes they’ve discovered their end developed their superpowers, but just having a superpower, doesn’t make you a superhero. You have to apply that to those powers for good. And I think the world really needs modern day superheroes. And I’m not talking about shooting lasers out of your eyes or leaping tall buildings, but be able to discover their unique ability, your unique talent.
I think everybody has unique purpose and in unique power. And so I, uh, I’ve been on a quest to find mine and I, because I had these brain injury, I struggled all through elementary school and middle school and junior high and high school. And I really suffered. And again, I don’t know if asked if I would still go do that by choice if I had to change chance to, to, to change it. But like with your experience of going, you know, fit to fat to fit again, it made, it really drove in my empathy. And, and I think it’s important for anyone who has a, is someone’s a coach or if they’re a parent and they’re working with individuals to understand the challenges, the emotional, mental, everything that comes with, you know, what you went through when you going from fat to fit again. And, um, and so I know what that struggle feels like.
And so at the age of 18, I, uh, I was lucky enough to get into a university and I thought I could start fresh and make my family proud. Um, my parents, uh, they immigrated here and they didn’t, they didn’t have a whole lot, but they, we had a, we were abundant in other areas if you will. But I just, I really, I was the oldest and you know, I am the oldest, so I have younger brother and younger sister and we’re up growing up in the suburb of New York city. And I just, I wanted to do good by and be a good role model for my siblings. And I thought I could start fresh and show them and show the world, show myself that I could really do it, that I was good enough that I was smart enough and I actually did worse.
And I was actually ready to quit, uh, college. And I didn’t know how to tell my family, cause I didn’t want to be the big disappointment. And um, a friend of mine said, Hey, I’m going home for the weekend. Why don’t you come with, um, for the, to get some perspective, right? And I think perspective is so important to solve problems, you know, for anyone who has health challenge, relationship, challenge, financial situation, we all have these challenges. Right. Um, and so I think perspective to change a place or change of people usually helps you to see things from a new angle. And so I agreed to do it. And the, um, the family was, uh, they were pretty, they’re pretty successful. Um, they were either happy. They had, they had money and, and such, and the father was walking me around his property before dinner.
Um, and by the water there and asked me a very simple, innocent question, uh, that you would ask an 18 year olds. And he said, how school? And that was like the worst question somebody could ask me at that time. And I just break down and I I’m, I’m, I’m an introvert, but I just to this complete stranger, I just start bawling. And I tell him that I’m just, you know, school is not for me. I am this injury. I’m not, I’m not smart enough to do it. And he was like, very smart, man. He actually asked me a new question and I found that asking new questions, lead to new answers. And he asked me a question that no one’s ever asked me before. He’s like, well, why you in school? Which is kind of interesting, like, why am I, why are you in school?
What do you want to be? What do you want to do? What do you want to have? What do you want to share? And I didn’t have an answer right away, but he kept on prodding and I eventually opened my mouth and he said stop. And he actually reached down his back pocket and took out a journal and um, and he tore out a couple of sheets of paper and he made me write it down. And this was a, you know, 25 years ago, I, at this time I just, it was like a bucket list. Right. And when I was done with it, I must have 50 things on that list. And I start folding up the sheets of paper to put it in my pocket and he grabs it right out of my hand. And I’m like freaking out. Cause I wasn’t expecting somebody to see this list, right.
Dreams. And he says, he starts looking at it and he looks at me and I don’t know how much time went by, but he split it. He’s he spreads his index fingers about 10 inches apart. And he says, Jim, you are this close to every single thing on that list. And I’m just thinking, there’s just no way. Give me 10 lifetimes. I’m not going to crack that list. And he takes his two index fingers, puts it to the side of my temple to the inside of my skull ahead. Right. Meaning that, you know, between that, my brain was really the key to getting everything on that list. And he walks me into his home and into a room. I’ve never seen a room like this before it was walled. You’d love this wall to wall ceiling, the floor covered in books and he just starts grabbing books and he starts handing them to me.
And I started looking at the titles and their books of some men and women in history, um, highly accomplished that really changed the world. And also, um, some very early personal development books like Norman Vincent Peale, the power positive thinking. Psycho-Cybernetics, you know, Napoleon Hill, any Dale Carnegie. And he says, Jim, I want you to read one book a week. And I’m just thinking, you gotta be kidding me. I was like, I think we all had these stories, right? Yeah. All these stories. And I think that’s sometimes we have to give up in order to be able to reach another level of breakthrough, not a level of limitations. We have to give up that story. Sometimes that we’re not old enough, then we’re not, we’re too old or we’re not smart enough. We don’t have the education, the IQ, whatever it is. And um, and so I tell them, I can read all these books because I have too much schoolwork and he looks at me, he says, Jim, and always remember this a gym don’t let school get in the way of your education.
That’s awesome.
It was a Mark Twain.
Yeah. Mark Twain. Yeah.
True. I just, it really hit me and I was just like, you know, truly that I, that makes sense to me. And I still can’t commit to reading all these books. And then he very wise, man, he reaches into his pocket and he takes out my sheets of paper with all my dreams, my bucket list. And he starts to read them off one by one and something about hearing a stranger. Who’s obviously very successful someone I just met in, can’t say saying out in the universe, my dreams and my desires, my fantasies, if you will. And it messes with my spirits, something fierce. And honestly, a lot of the things on that list were things I wanted to do for my family, for things they can never afford to do for themselves. And with that leverage and that motivation, because I find that motivation is such a key to memory, you know, wanting to learn something like a name or something like that.
It’s very important with that motivation, just like motivation for, for eating the right foods, right. Being, you know, tapping into that drive to work out, you know, each day I, um, I agreed to read one, uh, one book a week. And so now I’m back at school, I’m at sitting at my desk and there’s a pile of books that I have to read for school on a pile of books that I promise to read and I don’t have time to do it all. So what do I do? I don’t eat. I don’t sleep. I don’t spend time with friends. I don’t work out. I just give up there. I just live in the library and you know, that’s not very sustainable. And so I don’t know if I could do that for as long as you’re you’re on your path, but I just, uh, I ended up asking out actually of sheer exhaustion in the library and I fell down a flight of stairs. I hit my head again and I woke up in the hospital two days later. And at this point drew, I was, it was a scary place. I was when I woke up. I mean, I was, I was at this point in my body, I was at 117 pounds.
So I lost all this crazy.
I was dehydrated. I was hooked up to all these IVs and um, I thought I’d died. And it was a really kind of a very, very bad kind of place. And I just, I thought there has to be a better way. And when I had that thought nurse came in with a mug of tea and on the side of the mug was a, a hand, a drawing up artistic rendering of a genius. The opposite of me at the time it was Albert Einstein. Albert Einstein had a quote on there and I love these quotables, right? It said, same level of thinking. That’s created your problem. Won’t solve your problem. Same level of thinking is parades your problem. Won’t solve your problem. And made me ask a new question. Like, what’s my problem. I’m like, I’m a really slow learner. And I was thinking, well, how do I learn better, faster? And I was like, well, maybe I could go to, you know, learn it in school. So I picked up a course bulletin with all the courses and I looked through hundreds of classes and every single one of them, you know, our 20th century, education’s a great place to learn what to learn. Math history, science, Spanish, all on what’s learned, but there were zero classes on how to learn, right?
How to, how to think for yourself, how to solve problems, how to be creative, how to focus and concentrate, how to read faster, how to, how to remember things. You know, I always thought it should have been the fourth R in school. They teach you three RS, reading, writing, arithmetic. But what about recall? What about retention? What about remembering Socrates? Socrates says there is no learning without remembering, you know, so, um, I go and I, I start by putting my schoolwork aside and I start to actually, I wanted to solve this riddle, this riddle, this puzzle, if you will. I wanted to understand how my brain works so I could work my brain. I wanna understand how my memory worked so I could work my memory. And I started studying that, you know, brain science and, um, learning theory, uh, multiple intelligence, anything, I get my hands on in terms of how to be fitter faster, smarter in that mentally.
And about 60 days into it, a light switch went on and I just started to understand things. I started to remember things better. I started to read faster. I started, I mean my whole life improved. My grades improved my, my life improved. And the reason why I’m doing this to this day almost 25 years later is because teaching it as when I started tutoring. Because when you get, like, when you go through that experience of struggling for 13 years and you feel you’ve come across these ideas that could really help everybody. And you just don’t want people to struggle and suffer the way that you do, you had, or you did. Right? And so I started to tutor and one of my tutoring students, she was a freshman in college. She read 30 books in 30 days. Now, now think about that, like one book a day for, for a month and magic.
Wouldn’t an Amazon and picking up 30 books and, and understanding it too. And I wanted to find out not how she did it. I’m going to know why she did it. Going back to motivation. I found out that her mother was dying of terminal cancer and was given 60 days to live. And the books she was reading were books to save her mom’s life. And, uh, and I wished her luck and, and prayers. And then six months later, I get a call from this young girl, this young woman, and she’s crying, crying, and crying. And I find out that her they’re tears of joy, that her mother not only survived, but it’s really getting better. Doctors don’t know how or why doctors actually call it a miracle. But her mother attributed a hundred percent to the advice she got from her daughter who learned through all these books.
Wow. Yeah. And that’s where I applied this Kimmy, like knowing nothing else, or you start to realize that if knowledge is power, then learning is your superpower. That if knowledge is power learning is your superpower and it’s, everyone’s right. It’s their birthright. And we just need to be shown, you know, your brain doesn’t come with an owner’s man and you just need to be shown how to do it. And your life could be easier. I mean, higher levels of performance and productivity and prosperity. And I don’t just mean financial prosperity. I mean, all the treasures, your life, your health, your relationships, your career. And, uh, and that’s my mission is to help people to, to, to build stronger, better brains. Yeah,
You’re doing a great, you’re doing a great job of it. First of all, Jim has wanted to let you know, like, you’re, you changed so many people’s lives for the better, um, in so many different ways. And this is just one example that you had back in the day, um, of, of, you know, this, uh, you tutoring this, this young girl that’s such an amazing experience to have, first of all, was it in that moment that you realized you have this talent to share with the world, um, after you, um, you did your research and, and you, you kind of went through that. Um, I want to call it rock bottom, but you kind of realize, okay, here’s my problem. And here’s how I’m going to fix it. Is it, was it at that time that you realized you have this super power, if you will to share with the world, or what time at what moment did it hit you, that you had the superpower?
That’s a great question. I think it really was that experience because you know, the idea that the knowledge is out there, it’s just do people have the time to be able to go and find it and learn it and absorb it and apply it. And remember it, um, you know, I think that people have to, sometimes it takes a breakdown to have a breakthrough and through the challenges, the challenges that we have can lead to positive change. I mean, we hear all the time about posttraumatic stress and, um, challenges like that. And what people don’t realize is there’s new research. It’s put, that’s come out, they call it posttraumatic growth. So it’s posttraumatic growth where that we go through certain episodes in our life and experiences that you don’t wish upon anybody, but there’s some people that actually come out and do that baptism of fire.
And they’re actually grateful that it actually happened because they learn to associate new meaning to that experience, new levels of empathy, new levels of the, you know, they find their strength through the challenges that they went through, the suffering, they turned into strength and the struggle they turn into superpowers. And that’s really, I hope everybody who is able to find it maybe, and maybe I don’t ask anyone having to go through that kind of challenges, you know, where it’s like life threatening and such like that. But you know, the, and I think there’s a reason why, if somebody is listening to this right now and they’re going through, I think there’s three important areas in terms of mindset to be really be a real life superhero. And I call it the three GS number one is a growth mindset, right? As opposed to a fixed mindset, when people see me on stage or on video, and I memorize like a room of a hundred people’s names or a hundred digit number or a hundred random words in and out of order, I always tell people, I don’t do this to impress you.
I really do this to express to you. What’s possible because the truth is every single person who’s with us today could also do it. It’s just, we aren’t shown how to do it. You know, we’re not taught how to do it. If anything, we’re taught that our, you know, our learning or intelligence or our potential is somehow fixed in our, like our memory is fixed, like our shoe size. And we’ve discovered more about the human brain in the past 20 years and the previous 2000 years. And what we know with neurogenesis and neuroplasticity is that we can create new brain cells, even as we age. So anyone listening to this right now is concerned that they’re absent minded or senior moments are coming a little bit early. You could, you could actually do it. And the way they do it, it’s the same way you create new brain cells and new connections.
Neuroplasticity is the same way you build your, your physical muscles. It’s, it’s nutrients and it’s it’s novelty. And then, you know, you have to stimulate yourself and you have to give, you know, give your brain what it needs and give it the rest it needs also. And so growth is saying that it’s nothing is fixed in your life, is that you have the ability to make things better. The second G I would say is, uh, in terms of a mindset besides growth, I would say grit. I think grit is so important. You know, that, that what you’ve mentioned, the resilience. Yeah. I think it’s one of the two most defining factors for people that succeed at the highest levels, because it’s inevitable that we’re going to have problems. It’s inevitable that we’re going to have challenges, but are going to have to have the persistence to be able to do it.
And what I would say to people is even when you don’t, I it’s a couple of a year ago, I, there was a big fight on a, on television and I’m not, I love martial arts and I love of the, the athletics of it, um, and pushing people to their limits. And, and I’m also having a conflicted, cause I, I know what, you know, concussions and, you know, the damage it could do, but it’s extreme sports and stuff like that. But there was a big fight. It was the, uh, the PACU Mayweather fight that was going on in boxing. And, uh, I get this call from a Sylvester Stallone. And, uh,
And I mean, you’re like froth and he’s like, Hey,
Jim, you want to come over and watch the fight? I’m like, Oh yeah, I want to watch like the biggest, you know, boxing match ever went wrong. And I get there. And when I’m sitting on the couch with me and right next to me is specialist alone right into his left is Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Oh my gosh,
That couch people will be like, you dude Photoshop that Asian guy
That
Afterwards, I didn’t, you know, the fight was, you know, kind of blob. But I was like, I, I, I’m always getting sanely curious, like you are with people. And I asked, I was like, Hey guys. I was like, what does it take to be a champion like these guys, you know, like in any area, whether it’s boxing or anything, what does it take? And I remember Arnold, he said to me, he said, Jim, he said that the key is being bold in terms of what makes a champion or what you call superhero is someone who is able to push past the pain period, push past the pain period. I was just like, wow. I was like, that’s a great metaphor because all the time, like, you know what, I’m talking about, grit. We all go through these pain periods and it’s, it’s pushing past that.
And what I would encourage people who are struggling right now is I would say that if it’s important to people it’s worth doing. And first of all, I would say, ask for help because I think that’s a sign of strength. I think there are a lot of people who are struggling right now, who aren’t asking for help and they’re struggling, you know, privately about it. And like I was for 13 years, just my learning challenges. So I think asking for help is a sign of strength, not weakness. The other thing I would say is, you know, self care is so important because it’s hard to have resilience when you’re tired or you’re not eating right, and you’re not taking care of your body. So I think scheduling self care is so important. But the other thing I would say is, you know, people are watching you and so know that through your acts, that even though people would totally understand if you gave up that through your grit and through your grace, you’re inspiring the people around you.
And, you know, that’s where I get a lot of my motivation. So I think for, in terms of a success mindset or superior of mindset, I would say growth crit. And the last G I would say is giving, you know, giving in terms of knowing that these are universal laws in nature, everything grows and everything gives, um, you know, if it’s growing or it’s not growing, it dies and it cease to exist. And if it’s not giving something back, it also is kind of a it’s eliminated. And so I think that’s, and I think we give not be, you know, we don’t give to get, I don’t think people, you shouldn’t give to get high. You know, I think people should give because it’s who they are. You know? And so that’s why I love what you guys are doing, you know, with you and Lynn, especially with this podcast, you’re bringing incredible information to people that they people need to have and convenient bite-size form. And that’s where you take knowledge and you put into real wisdom. But I think those, those three areas are so important, especially in the world we live in today.
Yeah. No. And I agree with that. And you, you touched on so many things that I was thinking about, like, okay, maybe I should go this direction next. Cause there’s so many things I want to talk to you about. Um, but I honestly, the first thing I wanted to ask was, okay, you talked about Sylvester Stallone, for example, and Arnold ha who was your first celebrity client and how did you get to this stage where you’re at or Sylvester Sloan was calling you to ask if you want to come watch a fight. I’m just curious.
Um, yeah. I mean, I, I’ve been very fortunate in my career. I’m a, I D I don’t really want to be like super famous. I just, I just want to help people, but that’s my motivation.
I love about you too. You know,
$1 billion doesn’t do anything for me, but one, 1 billion brains so important for me, because I just think that are, if you’re, if someone’s listening to us right now and they’re struggling and I’ll answer your question with this, if people are listening to this right now, and they’re struggling, there’s like too much to keep up with. And, and they’re, they’re, they feel like I talk about superpowers and superheroes. And I taught because I, we live in a world of super villains. And we’re all like in these villains are relatively new. I’m talking about information, overload information and anxiety, mental fatigue, mental fog, mental forgetfulness, I mean, digital distraction there’s is actually a new term called digital dementia drew. I don’t know if you’ve seen this. Doctors just could call it digital dementia. The idea where, you know, your brain is like a muscle and it eats use it or lose it.
Right. But the challenge is a lot of us are outsourcing our brains to our smart devices. So think about like, growing up, how many phone numbers you use to know like, Oh my gosh. Yeah, that’s right. Every single person’s phone number, how many phone numbers do you know right now? Just mine. Right? You’d be somebody like a spouse, a best friend single day, but honestly, but your phone is dead or you don’t have it on you. You just don’t know what that number is. And I’m not saying that I want to memorize 500 phone numbers or in 500 emails and everything, but the idea that we can’t anymore, it’s like, we’ve lost that art and then that fitness. And so basically it’s the digital dementia is saying, you’re using your phone to keep all this information. Your schedules is doing math for you. That’s getting you from here to there.
You’re keeping your calendar and your phone numbers. So your brain not getting the workout in normally would need to keep to keep sharp. And so we ha we live in a world of super villains. And so my, my, my goal is to help people on lease their greatest superpower, which I think is their brain. Um, and so, you know, because that’s how we create a lot of the value that, you know, be in our lives. Cause it controls everything. Now, in terms of the, um, I get to work with a lot of interesting individuals, I get to train, I’ve done trainings for everyone, you know, from Elon Musk, uh, you know, at space X to, to will Smith, you know, and I help actors speed read scripts or memorize their lines. And honestly, I like to do it just because I like to be around like my childhood heroes watch.
Cause they were inspirations for me when I was growing up. I couldn’t read very well. So I would watch movies. And you know, and when you, when you watch see these individuals overcome their obstacles and it always, these movies were always the same. It was always like the size of the, of the villain determined that size of the hero. Right. And when, when the, when the villain was really smart and they were really powerful than the hero had to be that much better. And that’s what we get excited about. Right. And so, um, how I ended up actually doing this was I, uh, I got called in a few years ago to do, um, and this, the reason why I moved to Los Angeles, like I called in by the CEO 20th century Fox, um, and, uh, to do a training like a half a day training for him and his executive team on a Friday.
And I go in and I just, it’s my best training I’ve ever done. And maybe cause I was a Friday and I was walking through to the board room, I saw these movie posters of like avatar and star Wars. And I was just like maybe a little kid again. And I think to be a really great learner to helps. It has nothing to do is her chronological age, but it’s really the age of your mindset and your heart because who are the fastest learners? It’s like children, right? It’s how fast kids pick up like musical instruments, you know, or languages compared to like an adult right now. Actually I think adults could actually learn it faster. It’s just kids, you know, they don’t have adults, don’t have this, the, the, the skills or the strategy and kids have a lot more time. Right? Yeah. To, to, to, to do that.
But, um, I get called in. I do, uh, um, the best job I can has a thank you. The chairman of Fox 20th century Fox gives me a tour of the studio lot. And when he was doing it, I saw movie poster of Hugh Jackman. It was for the new Wolverine movie that was coming out and so excited about it. I was like, wow, I can’t wait for that to come out in a few months. And the chairman picks up the phone, his phone, and then five minutes later, true. I’m sitting in a movie theater, the Fox theater with three D glasses watching huge actor,
No way. It was awesome. Right.
And so afterwards he comes to get me after the film and he was like, how’s the movie? And I was like, Oh, it was, it was great. And I, because I’m still like acting like a kid. I, I tell him, I was like, you don’t know this, but I grew up with learning challenges. I had this brain injury when I was five and I couldn’t learn, I couldn’t read. I taught myself how to read by reading comic books. And I tell him my favorite comic books growing up was actually Wolverine and the X-Men. And I tell them not because they were the strongest it’s because that they didn’t fit in. And I felt like growing up, I’d been fitted because of my, you know, I was a boy with the broken brain. And the cool part about it is I grew up in, uh, in Westchester, New York, outside of New York city.
And that’s where I found out that’s where the X-Men school was, where they train the X-Men professor X. And I told them when I was seven, eight years old, I used to ride my bicycle in my neighborhood around town, trying to find the expert in school. Cause I wanted to run away and I wanted to go there because I wanted to find my superpowers and I wanted to find my super friends. Do you know what I mean? And I I’m telling this to him and he’s like, Jim, I didn’t know. You liked superheroes. Um, how would you like to go to Comicon? And I was like, you know what? Comicon is true. Yes.
Yes.
It’s a big collision in San Diego once a year where everyone gets dressed up as their favorite comic book, character and such. But he was like, I was like, when’s comic con. He’s like, it’s stay Friday, Saturday, Sunday. And I’m acting like a nine year old. But I, I, I become like a 99 year old and I’m saying, Oh, how am I going to get from LA to San Diego on a Friday? And, Oh, I don’t have seen aware. And I have all these meetings here and there’s some lines and it’s funny, like, you know how age it changes our mindset sometimes. And I, and he’s like, Jim, do you want to go? I’m going tomorrow. And I was like, Oh yeah, the chairman of Fox is going to, I want to go with you, fix me up the next morning, Saturday at eight o’clock. And instead of driving, we get on his plane. And when I get on the plane, true, I swear to you, it’s the entire cast of experts on the plane.
And he didn’t tell you that he didn’t tell you that
It’s a surprise to everyone at Comicon because they were going to surprise everybody with, uh, with the showing there. And, uh, and so I’m, I mean, I’m talking about a huge Ackman and Patrick Stewart. I mean, I’m sitting between Jennifer Lawrence and there, and we spent the entire day at Comicon. I won’t go into how amazing that was. But when we come back to Los Angeles, uh, the chairman’s like, how has, how was your day? And I was like, this was the best day ever. Oh my goodness, thank you so much. He was like, Jim, I have something else for you. I was like, no, I don’t want anything else. What can I do for you? And he’s like, Jim, they really, they really like to, how would you like to go on set? I was like, what do you mean? He was like, we have another 30 days of filming a new X-Men movie days of future past and uh, in Montreal.
And how would you like to go? And I was like, Oh my goodness, I’ve never been on a movie theaters before. I was like, what can I do for you guys? And he’s like, just share with them what you shared with us, teach them how to speed, read their scripts and have better focus on camera and remember all their lines. And I was like, I could totally do that. The next morning, Sunday, I’m on the, what they call the X jet, you know, sharing these brain tips with, with all of them. And I get to spend all his time with them on a, on set. And now I go back to home and when I’m, when I get home, then he loved this. There’s a, there’s a package waiting for me. It’s like the size of like a plasma TV. And I open it up and it’s this photograph, it’s a photograph of me and the entire cast of X man. Oh wow. And, uh, and even better than that, it’s like my permanent, you know, Twitter and it’s my permanent Facebook cover photo. But even better than that, as the note in there, it said this from the chairman and said, Jim, thank you so much for sharing your superpowers with all of us. I know since you’ve been a child you’ve been looking for a superhero school, here’s your class.
Wow. That is amazing.
That evolved to working, you know, in Hollywood. But the reason I bring this up though, is, you know, I been looking for this superhero school for the longest, because I feel like that we all have super powers that are dormant inside of us. And again, school is a great place to learn what, to learn, math, history, science, but not how to access those powers. And so that’s what I’ve committed my work to doing, you know, and that’s why we publish online speed reading memory, all these courses in 150 countries, because we want to cause nowadays it’s cool. Doesn’t have four walls and you know, this conversation right now, it’s going out to thousands of countless of people. It’s just what a wonderful marvelous time to be able to learn. Yeah. Yeah, no, it’s
So true. And I’m, and thank you for sharing that story because you’re such a cool, humble guy down to earth guy, but, um, I appreciate you sharing that story with all of us. Um, and there’s actually three things, three truths that you brought up in your story that are applicable. I think to everybody and I kind of want to briefly discuss them really quick before we go into some tips for helping some of my followers, uh, learn how to remember names. And these are things that I’ve learned too. But anyways, um, the first thing you talked about in your story was perspective and gaining a perspective outside of your comfort zone. So for example, you go into your friend’s house, meaning that your friend’s dad, that was so cool of him to care about you enough to ask you those different questions and make you think differently than, than what you thought before.
And, and him handing you those books, um, you know, probably helped set you up and change your, your, uh, help you to rewire your brain and change the way you think. And that’s applicable to me. And so many other people that we need to be open to being open. We need to be open to other ideas that are out there that we haven’t discovered yet. We haven’t learned yet. Um, instead of just thinking, okay, well I’m strong enough to solve this problem myself, but it hasn’t been working for the past 20, 30, 40 years. You know, there’s something else out there that I need to learn. And so being open to, to Guinea a different perspective. And then the second thing you talked about was your story. We have, we all have stories that we tell ourselves, you know, for example, you, you told yourself the story, I can’t read one week, one book a week, you know, I just can’t do that.
Like, that’s the story you’ve been telling yourself your whole life and someone, the people go through the same thing. Ah, you know, it’s, I’m too old. My metabolism has changed my hormones, you know, it’s, it’s, it’s too late or it’s too hard. I’ve tried giving up sugar and it just doesn’t work. We tell ourselves our store, but we don’t realize that we have the power to change our story. Right. If we’ve told ourselves this story and convince ourselves of that story, we also have the power to change that store. If we want to, it’s a choice. It really is a choice. Um, and then, uh, the third thing, which I’m trying to remember now, and this is a podcast about memory. Oh, um, I like how you say in your trainings, there’s no such thing as a bad memory, but just there’s no good or bad memories trained or untrained memory, right?
Yes, yes, yes, yes. And I believe that too, because I feel like just like, there’s a parallel between you exercising your brain, right? You’re a personal trainer for, for people’s brains is the same principles for people that want to become healthy. Right? My whole goal isn’t to get people skinny and get six packs. Cause that’s not a sign honestly, of true health. You could have a six pack, you could be skinny, but you could be dying on the inside, right? Like you, when you were 117 pounds, but you were literally killing yourself, um, you know, not taking care of your health. So I think there’s a balance. There is a parallel between all of this and it’s when I was going through your training, it really hit home to me how much these principles that you’re teaching are. So similar to the principles that I teach when I try and teach people and coach people how to get healthy. Um, and, but it’s just, we don’t put the time and effort into it, just like with exercise or like, ah, isn’t there just a pill I can take, you know, unfortunately there’s not. Um, but anyways, I wanted to get into, uh, you talking about helping people to remember names. Cause this is one of the biggest things I struggle with. I meet so many people and they could have just said their name and two seconds later, I’m like, I, I, in my head, I’m thinking, I just forgot their name, but know, Oh, go ahead.
No, no. And I let, I love that because even what you just said, perspective and story and the beliefs, those three things have an enormous impact on people’s ability to remember names. Like I remember when, so I think perspective is important. Um, and even things like the words we use, we do an annual event called superhero. You Y O U about being your best self. And our last one, I was on stage interviewing, uh, Quincy Jones, right. A legend. And he’s amazing. He speaks over 20 languages. He’s incredible, like the churches and one of the things for perspective, he says on T set on stage, he’s like, you have to go to know, you know? And so that’s why I think travel is so important. Even if you can’t travel outside your local passivity, you know, that’s why books were so important for me growing up.
Um, you know, when I was learning this stuff, because it gave me perspective to travel different places, even if I couldn’t physically go somewhere else. The other thing he said in terms of perspective, I asked him about how he’s, you know, I was asking him about, we are the world and Michael Jackson and all this other stuff. And I’m saying, it’d be able to achieve those kinds of levels of success and success in anything, whether it’s remembering names or anything, they’re going to be some problems along the way. And he’s like, Jim, I don’t believe in problems. I’m like, what do you mean? I was like, no problems. Don’t exist. I’m like, Whoa, how many? Little of what, what it would mean, whatever you call it. I was like, well, I don’t call them problems. He’s like, I call them puzzles. I’m like, wow. I even just saying that I got like goosebumps thinking, I call them truth bumps.
But it’s like, but that’s a different perspective because all puzzles have a solution. Right? And so it becomes a different level. And when you’re talking about that’s perspective, I think, um, story, which is what you’re talking about, people’s story about, Oh, I’m too old or on to this. I think it makes a big difference because here’s the thing. If you fight for your limitations, you get to keep them. Yes. You know, you fight for your limitations. You get to keep them. And that goes even deep, deep in belief where we’re talking about belief, remembering names, that’s a big deal. People say I’m horrible at remembering names. I remember I was preparing to run a marathon, you know, with a name like Kwik, which is my real last name. You know, your life is pretty much planned out. You have your water. I get, I have to be careful.
I was driving. Cause you know you again, you’re not gonna talk your way out a ticket when your driver’s license says quick on a speeding ticket, I get to teach reading and speed reading. But I was preparing to run a marathon. And one of the chapters in this book I was reading was the psychology of doing it. And it said, this verbatim, you’d appreciate this verbatim. Cause I’m, you know, memory experts said, you said your brain is like a supercomputer and your self talk is the program. It will run. So if you tell yourself you are not good at remembering names, you will not remember the name of the next person you meet because you program your supercomputer not to.
Wow. That’s powerful. That’s so true though. It’s so true.
Yeah. And I would tell people for remembering names, I would, you know, here’s the thing, when you, when you talk to yourself, that conversation is so powerful. So if you say you’re too old or I’m not good with names or whatever, it’s an unconscious command. And here here’s the tweetable. If you will, to be able, is your mind is always eavesdropping on your self-talk combined is always eavesdropping on your self talk. That’s a tweetable. Yeah.
Him KWA. K.
But um, so, so remembering names, you know, you have perspective and story every year, you need a positive perspective you need to in, in, in, in, during appealing story and also you need a powerful, empowering belief. Um, but here’s tactical stuff that could help people remember a name. So first of all, we have to know that it’s important, right? If there’s one business etiquette or networking skill to have, it’s the ability to remember people’s names, because here’s the thing it’s really hard to show somebody you’re gonna care for their health or their fitness or their finances or their future or their family. If you don’t just care enough to remember their name, right. Cause people don’t care how much, you know, until they know how much you care. And that’s why I named so important. And they say a name as the sweetest sound to a person’s ears.
His name is the sweetest sound to a person’s ear. So that’s so important. So I always tell people first, the first three things to remember to remember names is mom, mom, mom, mom. It’s like the mother of all skills. So basically if you’re ever forgetting something, usually one of these three things is missing. All right. And so let’s say somebody has trouble remembering names, but there’s a suitcase of a hundred thousand dollars cash for that person or their favorite charity. If they just remember the name of the next person they meet, is that person’s gonna remember that.
Yeah. Most likely I would say yes.
So of course. And so did that person automatically just become an instant memory expert? No. Right. They didn’t use any technique. The M stands for in mom motivation. And we talked about that earlier, but here’s the thing I know I can talk about visualize and people’s names and all that. But one of the most important ways of remembering names is to want to, so I would ask myself, why do I want to remember this person’s name? And if I can’t come up with an answer, I’m not gonna remember the person’s name because here’s a tweetable reasons, reap results, reasons, reap results. You always start with why. So maybe it’s because I want to practice this technique I learned on this podcast, maybe it’s to show the person respect, maybe it’s to make a new friend, maybe it’s to make a sale, whatever it is you need to come up with a reason.
Motivation is key. I remember I was doing a talk in Silicon Valley recently and afterwards, someone in the audience, bill Gates comes up to me, bill Gates. Right? And I ask everybody, like, my question is, I was like, if you have any one super power, what would it be? And he says, Jim, it would be, uh, to be, have the ability to read faster. And I was like, Oh, I could totally help you with that because it’s the wealthiest people in the world know the power of reading. Because if somebody has spent decades becoming an expert in something, and then you can sit down in a day or two and you could download decades into the days. Oh my God, what an advantage. But we started talking about the future of education. And I was, I was talking about it from an adult learning theory perspective.
And he was taking the perspective of technology and someone was listening in and says, is there anything else missing? And we were talking about it. And we both came to the same conclusion. It’s motivation. Understanding why people do what they do, right? What gets people to eat? What they should be eating or work out the way they should be working out. So motivation is key. Know your motivation. Number two, the Oh, and mom is so important. It’s observation, observation. A lot of people blame their memory. Like when they forget names, they blame their retention. When it’s more their attention, it’s not attention. It’s your attention. In fact, the art of memory is really the art of attention. And I’m going to Trump. One more name here. And the reason why I do it is, is not the name dropping is because when you ever see a Rocky film again, or you, you hear bill gay, whatever it reminds you.
Cause that’s, our memory works based on triggers and reminders. And so it reminds you of the lesson. So you’re more likely to use it in the future. But, um, so every time I had a, so everyone knows president bill Clinton has, is great, regardless of your political views, you know, most people would say he’s got charisma is a great communicators, great connector. What a lot of people don’t know is he’s, he’s excellent, super memory, superb. Every time I’ve had an opportunity to, to, to spend time with them, he remembers my name, class conversation, things that are important to me. And that’s a leadership skill. And I asked, I remember asking him the second time, it was like, how do you remember all this? You know, like what memory techniques are you using? Remembering people’s names. That’s remarkable and you any answers. And he’s like, I don’t use any memory techniques, actually, Jim he’s like as, as a, as a youngster, um, my grandfather, the grandfather used to tell stories in Arkansas to all the kids, but afterwards he would quiz them to see if they’re paying attention.
And I was like, that’s fascinating. And I noticed that he had an interesting way of communicating to me. It was like, when he’s talking to me, nobody else in the room existed. And there were, and every time I had the opportunity to be in his presence, there were a lot of important people in that room it’s rooms and putting, he makes you feel like no one else exists and that’s not how we usually make people feel at our everyday life. Normally when you’re out there, our attention, because we’re trained on social devices, our attention is everywhere. We’re looking, who else is in the room? Or if not externally looking like we’re internally talking to ourselves, like we’re not thinking about, um, you know what they’re saying? We’re thinking about how we’re going to respond to what they’re saying. And so we’re not really paying attention.
And so I think his incredible memory and his powerful presence comes from being powerfully present. And I have to, I have to say that again, that president, bill Clinton, his powerful memory and his powerful presence, I think comes from being powerfully, present with people that when he’s talking about his grandfather and listening, if you take the word and write down the word, listen and scramble the letters a little bit, it forms another word. It forms the word silent. Most people are present. And that’s what people really want. You know, holiday seasons. Everyone was thinking about like what to buy and everything else, but people want the gift of your presence more than anything. And people could feel the difference, right? Yeah. And then the finally, so motivation observation and the last M in mom is the mechanics. And those are the tools, the techniques, the tips on how to learn a language, how to give a speech without notes, how to remember facts and figures and numbers and you know, names and everything else. But I, I have to tell people that motivation, if you don’t want to remember a person’s name and if you’re not really present, then the technique is not going to happen is not going to help us help as much.
Yeah. And you know, it’s so true about that as it’s the same thing with health and fitness, I could give you the best meal plans, the best workout program. But if you don’t have a why behind it, you know, that’s powerful enough, that’s bigger than you. Then it’s probably just going to be another 30 day diet that you did that you kind of just got burnt out. Right. But if you have that, why that’s powerful enough, that’s, that’s bigger than just, I want to be skinny. Then it’s going to be something that’s going to help motivate you to help you embrace it as a lifestyle change instead of just a diet. So I that’s super applicable to, I think everybody here listening. So, um, one of the things that, the techniques that I remember that has helped me, that I put in practice now, which is kind of, um, uh, unique, or I guess I wouldn’t call it weird, but I started doing it is where you, you pretend like you imagine you’re painting their name on their forehead in a certain color, and you’re moving your fingers to like in your pocket or by your side as you’re doing it.
And that has worked wonders for me, honestly.
Yeah. And I’ll tell you why, because so one of the, so we teach a couple of dozen different ways of remembering names. One of them that stuck with me in our courses, but like what, what FDR actually did is he would walk around, he would remember everyone’s name FDR. And he would actually imagine the person’s name on the person’s forehead. Like it was a name badge and that visual cue helped. And how I’m just it elaborate on it a little bit is I actually think that there’s, you know, there’s obviously muscle memory. And so I just imagined doing these micro little movements with my finger, like as if I’m drawing the person’s name on their forehead, it micro movements. And then I use the may imagine their, their favorite, you know, my favorite color. And then I could just see, Oh, that’s bill, that’s Mary that’s John, right on their forehead.
Because we tend to remember more of what we see, right? Like you go to somebody, you know, a lot of people are much better with faces than they are with names. You go to someone and say, Hey, I remember your face, but I forgot your name. You never go to someone and say the opposite. You never go to someone say, Hey, I got your face. Right. And so there’s a Chinese proverb. That goes what I hear. I forget what I see. I remember and what I do. I understand what I hear. I forget. I heard the name. I forgot the name. What I see. I remember I saw the face. I remember the face, what I do going back to practice. Um, I understand. And so just the act of visualizing the name on their forehead helps you to be able to remember it better. And we were going to actually give, um, the actual techniques more of the, um, the mechanics, if you will, um, to everyone else. So I wanted, I know we talked beforehand about gifting, your listeners, something really special. So we prepared three memory training videos on how to remember names and speeches and it goes deep. So if you like this kind of stuff, you’re going to absolutely love that.
I actually do that right now. What’s the link to that.
A brand new site for it. It’s actually Jim quick, you have to spell it right there. It’s Jim K w I K K wik.com for slash fit two fat to fit with the number two. Obviously I just like my brand. Yeah. Jim, quick.com forward slash fit two fat two fit. Correct. And we have three memory training videos just as a thank you for every, I love your community cause they’re so engaged. And I really do believe everyone listening here is, is the potential to be a real life superhero, mental superhero brain, if you will.
Perfect combination. And yet you, the personal trainer for your brain and me personal trainer for your, your body as well. So it’s a good combination of we’re running out of time. And so, uh, just a couple of last quick questions before I let you go. And then, um, a quick shout out to you and all of your sites and all the things you do, um, uh, what exercises, cause we talked off there about, you know, you don’t really use supplements for your brain there’s nootropics and things like that out there. What exercises do you do for your brain on a daily basis? I know there’s apps and there’s games you can play. Do you do any of that?
I do. I do. Um, we’re actually developing a brand new speed reading app. Cool. Um, that’s in beta right now. And so I think reading faster, not as, as just like the top people do aerobics and such like that. I think a speed reading is an incredible exercise for the brain. I think all what they’re going to get as a gift at the site that we just gave out. They’re gonna be so many exercises. We’re actually on video, walk them through it. I’m on top of it. I do meditate twice a day. I think it’s so very important for people. I mean, I use like amuse device, M U S C as a resource for individuals or for me, I could also sit down for 20 minutes and just focus on my breath. Um, some people use apps like Headspace, which is great. If you know, 10 minutes, something that’s very inexpensive that anyone could do everything. You know, first thing in the morning help you to relax at night. Very good. So I think meditation,
I want to say thank you once again for coming on. Um, and I really appreciate all their information. You, you, you gave to all of us, me included. This was such a great podcast and thank you for doing this cause I know you were sick and you still did this podcast. So I really appreciate it, man. And I look forward to working with you in the future and, and uh, maybe having you on again,
Social media.
Thanks so much, Jim, for coming on. Appreciate it, man.
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Thank you guys so much for listening to today’s episode with Jim quick. I really hope you found it valuable and you learn something from it. I know I did a, he’s an amazing guy and I’m so happy that I was able to have him on the podcast. So please take listen to this, um, and share it with those, uh, that you think could benefit from this episode and also subscribe to our podcast so that you’re updated, notified. Every time a new podcast comes out, we do one a week, but every once in a while, we’ll shake it up and maybe throw into a week. Uh, so just stay tuned. We have a lot of stuff coming for 2017 and we appreciate you guys being a part of this fit to fat to fit journey has fit to fat fit family and fit to fat, to fit movements. So thanks for all your support. Um, a lot of big things coming for 2017, like I said, so stay tuned, uh, sign up for my newsletter. If you haven’t already it’s uh, just go to fit to fat, to fit.com it’s on the homepage. You definitely don’t want to miss out on the things coming up for 2017. So stay in the know, follow me on social media, say hi on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram or Snapchat. And we’ll see you guys back here next week.
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