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Kindle Notes & Highlights
by
Jim Kwik
Read between
April 1 - December 31, 2022
While the technological advances of our time have the potential to both help and harm, the way we use them in our society can lead to an epidemic of overload, memory loss, distraction, and dependency.
If our mindset is not aligned with our desires or goals, we will never achieve them.
The second secret to a limitless life is your motivation. Jim outlines three key elements to motivation. First, your purpose. The reason why matters. I want to age well and am committed to lifting weights and getting stronger even though it is not my favorite thing to do. The purpose supersedes the discomfort.
And lastly the tasks must be bite-size, small steps that lead to success. Floss one tooth, read one page of a book, do one push-up, meditate for one minute, all of which will lead to confidence, and ultimately bigger successes.
Limitless teaches us the five key methods to achieve whatever we want: Focus, Study, Memory Enhancement, Speed Reading, and Critical Thinking.
Often when you put a label on someone or something, you create a limit—the label becomes the limitation. Adults have to be very careful with their external words because these quickly become a child’s internal words.
“No problem can be solved from the same level of consciousness that created it.”
knowledge is power, then learning is our superpower. And our capacity to learn is limitless; we simply need to be shown how to access
What’s one of your dreams? One that is ever present, like a splinter in your brain? Imagine it in vivid detail. Visualize it. Feel it. Believe it. And work daily for it.
What I have come to find over my years of working with people is that most everyone limits and shrinks their dreams to fit their current reality. We convince ourselves that the circumstances we are in, the beliefs we’ve accepted, and the path we are on is who we are and who we will always be. But there is another choice. You can learn to unlimit and expand your mindset, your motivation, and your methods to create a limitless life.
When you do what others won’t, you can live how others can’t.
A limit in your Mindset—you entertain a low belief in yourself, your capabilities, what you deserve, or what is possible. A limit in your Motivation—you lack the drive, purpose, or energy to take action. A limit in your Methods—you were taught and are acting on a process that is not effective to create the results you desire.
Mindset (the WHAT): deeply held beliefs, attitudes, and assumptions we create about who we are, how the world works, what we are capable of and deserve, and what is possible.
Motivation (the WHY): the purpose one has for taking action. The energy required for someone to behave in a particular way.
Method (the HOW): a specific process for accomplishing something, especially an orderly, logical, or ...
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Where motivation and method intersect, you have implementation. In this case, your results are going to be limited to what you feel you deserve, what you feel you are capable of, and what you believe is possible because you lack the proper mindset. Where mindset and method intersect, you have ideation. Your ambitions stay in your mind, because you lack the energy to do anything about them. Where all three intersect, you have the limitless state. You then have the fourth I, which is integration.
“I think science is beginning to embrace the idea that some technology is Twinkies and some technology is Brussels sprouts. If we consume too much technology, just like if we consume too much food, it can have ill effects.”
There is a growing body of evidence that suggests that if we never let our mind wander or be bored for a moment, we pay a price—poor memory, mental fog, and fatigue.
A Reuters study, ominously titled “Dying for Information,” showed that, “Two out of three respondents associated information overload with tension with colleagues and loss of job satisfaction; 42 percent attributed ill-health to this stress, 61 percent said that they have to cancel social activities as a result of information overload and 60 percent that they are frequently too tired for leisure activities.”
“The capacity to reflect, reason, and draw conclusions based on our experiences, knowledge, and insights. It’s what makes us human and has enabled us to communicate, create, build, advance, and become civilized.” He then goes on to caution that there is “a growing body of research that technology can be both beneficial and harmful to different ways in which children think.”
Do you remember what it was like when you were approaching your teens and you first started formulating thoughts and opinions independent of your parents? My guess is that this experience was extremely liberating for you and that it might have even been the first time in your life when you truly felt like your own person.
Like fire, technology has changed the course of human history. However, fire can cook your food or burn your home down—it’s all in how you use it. Like any tool, technology itself isn’t good or bad, but we must consciously control how it’s used.
Just as there are people who have suffered strokes and have been able to rebuild and regain their brain functions, those that procrastinate, think excessive negative thoughts, or can’t stop eating junk food may also rewire and change their behaviors and transform their lives.
In learning, when you fail to remember something, view it as a failure to make a connection between what you’ve learned and what you already know, and with how you will use it in life.
Plasticity means that your learning, and indeed your life, is not fixed. You can be, do, have, and share anything when you optimize and rewire your brain. There are no limitations when you align and apply the right mindset, motivation, and methods.
You are not limited to just one brain, you have a second—your gut.
All of this is to say that you have the ultimate superpower between your ears. You also have the ability to hone that superpower and make it greater—or to let it falter and decay. You get to decide what kind of environment your superpower lives in: one that supports your mission in life, or one that distracts you from your greatest dreams.
In a era of autonomously driven electric cars and vehicles capable of taking us to Mars, our education system is the equivalent of a horse and carriage.
The head of operations is so relieved. He thanks the technician and asks him what he owes him. The technician says, “$10,000.” The head of operations is shocked. “What do you mean, $10,000? You were here for a few minutes. You turned one single screw. Anyone could have done that. I need an itemized bill, please.” The technician reaches into his pocket, pulls out a notepad, scribbles a few seconds, and hands the other man the bill. The head of operations reads it and immediately pays him. The bill read: “Turning screw: $1. Knowing which screw to turn: $9,999.”
There are those who know and those who don’t know. And that applied knowledge is not just power, it’s profit. Your ability to think, solve problems, make the right decisions, create, innovate, and imagine is how we add value. The faster you can learn, the faster you can earn.
I suggest you use the Pomodoro technique, a productivity method developed by Francesco Cirillo based on the idea that the optimal time for a task is 25 minutes, followed by a 5-minute break.2 Each 25-minute chunk is called a “Pomodoro.”
To get the most out of this book, here is a simple method for learning anything quickly. I call it the FASTER Method, and I want you to use this as you read, starting now. The acronym FASTER stands for: Forget, Act, State, Teach, Enter, Review. Here’s the breakdown:
The key to laser focus is to remove or forget that which distracts you.
Do your best to keep your self-talk positive. Remember this: If you fight for your limitations, you get to keep them. Your capabilities aren’t fixed, and it’s possible to learn anything.
learning is not a spectator sport.
Someone who is constantly asking themselves how to get people to like them can never truly be their true self because they will always be molding themselves to the preferences of the people around them, even if they’re not aware of it.
How can I use this? Why must I use this? When will I use this?
use the term LIE intentionally. In this case, LIE is an acronym for Limited Idea Entertained.
“Stan, you’ve created so many great characters over the years, like the Avengers and X-Men,” I said. “Who’s your favorite character?” He didn’t even hesitate a second. “Iron Man,” he said. “And who’s yours?” I pointed to his tie. “That would be Spiderman.” Stan nodded and said, “With great power comes great responsibility.” “That’s so true, Stan. And the opposite is also true: with great responsibility comes great power.”
When we take responsibility for something, we are imbued with great power to make things better. That’s what a limitless mindset is all about. Our background and circumstances may have influenced who we are, but we must be accountable for who we become. It’s about understanding that we are responsible for our assumptions and attitudes. And when you accept that all of your potential is entirely within your control, then the power of that potential grows dramatically.
Through her, I saw that what I’d perceived my brain’s capacity to be was so much less than what it really was.
She altered my mindset. It was impossible for me to buy into the notion that I could expect to accomplish only a modest amount with my brain when I knew that others could achieve so much more. I just needed to find a method.
I’m going to share much of that method with you in this book. At its core is one fundamental concept: unlimiting. The key to making yourself limitless is unlearning false assumptions.
Limiting beliefs are often revealed in our self-talk, that inner conversation that focuses on what you’re convinced you can’t do rather than what you already excel at and what you’re going to continue to achieve today and into the future.
In their book Mequilibrium, authors Jan Bruce, Dr. Andrew Shatté, and Dr. Adam Perlman call these kinds of beliefs “iceberg beliefs” because of how many of them lie beneath the surface of our subconscious. “Iceberg beliefs are deeply rooted and powerful, and they fuel our emotions,” they say in the book. “The more entrenched an iceberg is, the more havoc it wreaks on your life. . . creating your schedule chaos, getting in the way of successfully sticking to a diet, or holding you back from seizing opportunities.” And, perhaps most significantly, they say, “If we get a handle on our icebergs,
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our inner critic, “the voice in your head that judges you, doubts you, belittles you, and constantly tells you that you are not good enough. It says negative hurtful things to you—things that you would never even dream of saying to anyone else.
“The inner critic isn’t harmless. It inhibits you, limits you, and stops you from pursuing the life you truly want to live. It robs you of peace of mind and emotional well-being and, if left unchecked long enough, it can even lead to serious mental health problems like depression or anxiety.”
our superhero had everything inside of her to succeed. If only she’d been able to prevail over the beliefs that were holding her back, her extraordinary talents would have shone through.
as long as you believe that your inner critic is the voice of the true you, the wisest you, it’s always going to guide you. Many of us even use phrases like, “I know myself, and . . .” before announcing a limiting belief. But if you can create a separate persona for your inner critic—one that is different from the true you—you’ll be considerably more successful at quieting it.
“Researchers have long known that negative emotions program your brain to do a specific action,” he noted. “When that tiger crosses your path, for example, you run. The rest of the world doesn’t matter. You are focused entirely on the tiger, the fear it creates, and how you can get away from it.”6 The point that Clear is making is that negative emotions drive us to narrow the range of what we are capable of doing.
