Episode 347: How To Improve Your Brain Power
Episode Stats
Words per Minute
203.92456
Summary
Ron Wyde is a jiu-jitsu black belt in jiu jitsu and has been teaching me how to improve my memory and brain power. He can recite the names of 2,400 people who died in the Vietnam War.
Transcript
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30 seconds, one time for the underdog, ignition sequence start, let me see you put em up, reach
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the sky, touch the stars up above, cause it's one time for the underdog, one time for the
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I'm Patrick B. David, your host of A. Tim, and today's guest is Ron Wyde, who can teach
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you how to improve your memory and also how to improve your brain power.
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I've heard about you and known about you for a while now, and so it's an honor to finally
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The only thing that's interesting when you were telling me about your memory is, so obviously
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he's very good with memories, but the only thing he has a hard time remembering is he
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met a girl he called Mary Jennifer, and he got a black eye from it, so if he can tell
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Tell us how you got your black eye so we can get that one knocked out of the way.
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Right, well, knocked out's pretty much how it happened.
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And I do jiu-jitsu, and Tuesday night I had somebody at my guard, which basically means
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I did not sweep him, but it's technically not in the rules, but he's a good friend,
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How does somebody become, because here's a few things you tell me.
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When you tell me, I can take this deck of cards out, and I can mix the card, shuffle
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You'll go through the cards, and you can recite the 52 cards.
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Not looking at it, you can recite them one at a time.
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I can't do it as fast as I used to be able to do it, but I can do it.
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And also the Afghanistan wall that's got all the names on there, 2,400 names.
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It may take you three or four hours, but you can do it.
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I mean, you remember someone's name you do business with, people are impressed to say,
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The process of memory is actually very simple, though.
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Whatever you want to remember, you got to turn it into a picture.
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So when I think of the name Patrick, I think of a leprechaun, you know, or St. Patrick's
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When I meet somebody named Mike, I will think of a microphone.
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It's the process of seeing a picture instead of an abstract such as a name.
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That's not just Mike is a microphone, Patrick is a leprechaun.
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Ranked, first name, last name, that's 7,000 words.
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And the downside of that is that is when people see me set up this wall.
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And they say me take eight hours and write out all 7,000 words.
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They're like, this is an amazing display of memory.
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This is an amazing display of discipline because to sit down and just do it is what really took
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But when compounded over 7,000, that's when it gets hard.
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So let me ask you, this would be a question I would ask because a lot of times in the world
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of business when, you know, somebody meets someone that's got a great memory.
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And I remember when you and I spoke, you were doing this.
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And I remember you were telling me about your daughter wasn't feeling too good.
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So some say, some say you were born with a great memory and others say it's taught.
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So is memory thing something that you were born with this kind of a memory?
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Or was it something that you learned a system by meeting somebody that helped you become
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So the biggest challenge I have, I've been doing this 28 years.
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I started when I was 18, so I'll let everybody do the math and figure out how old I am.
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I was going to the University of North Texas, kinda.
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On this channel, that's a very impressive YouTube.
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But during that time, I met a guy that teaches memory seminars.
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I was a telemarketer, and I was making cold calls one day.
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And I called this guy and I said, hey, can we come clean your chimney?
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And as he was hanging up the phone, I said, sir, don't hang up the phone.
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If you're trying to sell your house, you need a clean chimney.
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He said, I don't know about that, but I do need a good telemarketer.
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I sell memory training seminars, and I'll pay you more than you're making now.
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Anybody could have said that, and they'd have been right.
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But that's such a crucial part of what I do, that story, because people always assume,
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Now, I don't think I was a dumb guy, but I don't think I had any special ability either.
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This guy taught me a system that I learned, and I really believe anybody can improve their memory.
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This is very interesting because this validates that, you know, the memory, you sold memory,
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so you also learned the content that he was teaching to others.
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You internalized it yourself at the age of 18, so that probably helped you out.
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But prior to that, if I was in high school with you, if we were friends when we were 10 years old, 12 years old,
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Were you somebody that people said, this guy's a proto.
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I did well in school, in high school, clearly not in college.
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But, you know, I don't think there was any sign.
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Do you think that if you met somebody who was fluent in Spanish and you worked under them
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and they coached you to learn the Spanish language, could you learn it?
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Oh, of course I could learn a different language if I actually worked at it and had a tutor or whatever.
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I had a memory tutor, and I became fluent in the language of memory.
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That's a very good way of putting it because you simply learned a language of how to memorize.
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And there's a language to learning how to do that.
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And the unique thing is, is not many people know this language.
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So when somebody speaks the language, we're looked at as a savant.
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But it's no different from becoming fluent in Spanish or German or whatever.
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Back in the days, you know, if you remembered phone numbers, like I can still recite many different phone numbers,
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but people don't remember phone numbers anymore.
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Is there a system different of remembering phone numbers versus names for you?
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Well, the concepts are the same in that whatever you want to remember, you have to turn it into a picture.
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You want to remember numbers, you've got to have images, substitute images for numbers.
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For example, the number 21, let's think of a substitute picture for it.
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So for me, I think of a blackjack table for 21.
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You know, on a football field, you've got the upright slope.
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The number from one to a thousand, I have a picture for.
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My picture for the number 527 is actually right behind you on that wall.
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And this is where, explaining this, I'm always hesitant because as soon as I explain this,
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And then I start talking about this and they're like, oh my gosh, this is too complicated.
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Every digit, zero to nine, I have a letter assigned to.
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And when I say I've assigned it, it's actually well before me.
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So if you have the number 527, you have Lincoln, right?
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So if you want to remember a number, it needs to be a picture.
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If you want to remember a name, it needs to be a picture.
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Everything you want to remember, the first step is to create a picture for it.
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So Kenya just, you came in here a minute ago and Kenya asked you, she said, what's my
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And then I don't know what you said after that.
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And then you went through all these other numbers.
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So was it the same formula you used as this one right now you're showing?
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So when she showed me the number, one, zero, one is toast for me.
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Five, two, seven, which was the next number I already shared with you.
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Zero is the sa sound, an S, and eight is the V sound.
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So she said one, zero, one, five, two, seven, two, zero, eight.
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I just imagined Abraham Lincoln eating toast, getting a newspaper.
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There was one more digit on the N3 that I just remembered.
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But it's a, remembering a long number like that, which is 10 digits, probably takes a
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Nobody's going to listen to this interview right here and then tomorrow go memorize a
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Because they're not going to have pictures for five, two, seven, one, zero, one, or two,
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So I wouldn't recommend anybody starting there.
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I'd recommend them starting with more simple things and kind of building up to that.
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We kind of jumped right into probably the most difficult thing to memorize.
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I'm like, man, I don't see value in me reading books.
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And I'm probably going to leave thinking to remember two things about books.
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Not necessarily memorize, but consume the best part of the content.
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Is there a method to that madness as well or no?
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And so what I would say is with what we jumped to right here was with numbers, maybe the most
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And so let me jump to the most easiest thing to understand with memory and then show you
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how you could use that easiest thing to remember what you read.
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So there's a technique that it goes back 2,500 years.
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It's called the mind palace or the memory palace.
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And it is what I used when I set the record for the fastest to memorize a deck of cards.
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Right now I'm memorizing a constitution, the U.S. Constitution.
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Everybody right now that's watching or listening to this interview, you could close your eyes
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You could visualize, okay, I'm standing in the front door.
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Let's imagine, pretend right now, you're standing in the doorway to your house and the doorway opens.
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Now we're standing at the doorway to the office.
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The table made out of a ceramic that my dad made with PHP's logo on.
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And when it got started with the chest on top of it and a painting of Lincoln to the left.
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So on that table, I want you to imagine a washing machine, okay?
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So you just told me that the table there and then next to it's the picture of Lincoln.
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On the picture of Lincoln, I want you to imagine there's a dam and Abraham Lincoln pictures
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holding back water behind that dam and maybe the dam breaks.
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Well, let's keep going around the room clockwise.
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So if I went left, I just told you what's on the left side.
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There's a washing machine on top of it with the painting holding the dam.
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If you keep going around, there's boxes sitting there with my Sonos mic that I haven't installed
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yet from the old house because I moved into this new house.
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So now we've got a washing machine, we've got a dam, and we've got a chef.
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It's going to be my leather chair that I have right behind my desk.
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You sit down in that chair and you take your medicine.
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The furniture is a old classic presidential type of a desk that's sitting there.
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I don't know how to describe it, but it's a presidential desk.
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So on that desk, I want you to imagine there's a guy in a rowboat and he's rowing a boat and
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What were the five, can you remember the five pictures?
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On top of the microphones is my chef making sushi for me.
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On the leather chair, I have NyQuil all over the place because I spilled it all over the
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And there's a guy on top of the table rowing a boat.
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We took the first five presidents of the United States, turned their last names into
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So on the first one, we got a washing machine for Washington.
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On the next one, we got a dam for Adams, a dam Adams.
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On the next one, we got a chef for Jefferson, old Thomas Jefferson, right?
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So I've literally taught six year old kids to memorize the presidents of the United States
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And they'll, they'll memorize the presidents in like 60 minutes.
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Now, if you, all you have to do to memorize all the presidents is just continue walking
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Let me ask you, who's doing this to teach business owners about this ability?
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Is there some, can somebody, can you do a weekend course and go teach them on how to get
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You do that on a one hour speaking gig or you do that as a three day conference?
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You know, I'd say 70% of my speeches are one hour keynotes at conferences, but we also
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I mean, that can get really deep there with the memory part.
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So, so if you want to, if you want to lead me, because you said math, the numbers will
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What you just taught me, which is the dam for Adams, the, the chef, you know, the, the
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washing machine for Washington, the chef for Jefferson, the, uh, uh, medicine for Madison
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So those five, I remember to myself right now with the presidents, right?
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And by the way, you know, what's so crazy in the army, we, uh, in Navy, you were in the
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But in the army, when you were remembering generals and I was sitting with General McChrystal,
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And be my little general general is a four star.
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I said, my sergeant taught me that when I was coming back in AIT, cause you have to take
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the test to remember, you know, uh, what all the ranks mean.
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This is very interesting when you're teaching a method you're, you're, you're talking about.
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So you said the most simplest one is the one you just shared.
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Well, everything actually kind of builds on this memory palace.
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So now there's just different ways that we can use it.
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Let's say we want to use it to remember what you read, which is what, what you had asked.
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I don't recommend people memorize as they read.
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I recommend they have a highlighter or a pen or a notepad over here.
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And as they read, they highlight or underline the key points, which is what most people do.
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And then when they get to the end of the chapter or the end of the book,
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now you got all this stuff underlined or highlighted, just go through it.
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Turn each one of those things into pictures and imagine them around your mind palace or your memory palace.
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I would say almost everything I memorize, I use this method, the mind palace or the memory palace method,
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So I guess the next step after you would really, what really the next step would be is to build your mind palace.
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So the way I would do it or the way I did do it and the way I would recommend anybody do it is stand in the doorway of every room in your house like we did.
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And number five pieces of furniture going clockwise around the room.
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Do that in room number one, room number two, room number three, room number four.
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Do at least five rooms and get yourself 20 pieces of furniture numbered in your house.
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Then the next step is, is take whatever it is you want to learn to remember or memorize.
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And next time you want to remember it, I'm in a meeting with you and you say, hey, Ron, you know, don't forget to call Brian.
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So immediately I see a telephone, Brian is a brain for me, and I'm putting that on the number one location.
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So you can be, and I hate to dumb it down and say, use this to remember your things to do list,
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because I think it can be such more beneficial information.
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Names and faces is something people ask me about a lot.
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In this process, it sounds simple, but it works.
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I just spoke at a meeting yesterday, and there was probably 150 people in the audience.
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And as they walked in, I stood at the door and I shook 150 people's hands.
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And then when I got up on stage, I said, everybody stand up.
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And they put their hands over their name tags, and they're like, there is no way.
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There was this one guy named Joe, and I couldn't think of his name.
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But the process itself is actually pretty simple.
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The black eye is probably what's going to stand out.
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But hopefully, and I'm hoping, it's going to be gone in a week, you know.
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So you need to look at my face and pick out something that you think is going to be there in a week or two weeks.
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So I actually visualize a leprechaun running across your eyebrows right there.
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Running back and forth, you know, maybe eating Lucky Charms or whatever.
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Instantly, I'm painting the Mona Lisa in her eyes.
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So I imagine I was coloring in his beard with a marker.
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So now I get in front of the audience and say, everybody stand up.
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I'm not actually trying to remember their names.
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I'm just trying to remember what stood out on their face.
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So yours is not like in order of letters, like to have a musical sound of way of memorizing it.
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They had colleges, college studies where they took a group of college students and they
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put them in an auditorium and they gave a list of a hundred words.
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And they said them verbally, spaced out by five seconds.
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And then they took a second group of students and they gave them a hundred words.
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Instead of the word saying the word house, they had a picture of a house in a PowerPoint presentation.
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The recall on what they saw versus the group that just heard the words was seven, eightfold.
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Let me ask you, how valuable of a skill set is this?
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I mean, I think about in the business world, it's extremely valuable.
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So when you're selling this, who's buying it from you?
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Who are the people that are coming to your conferences?
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Who are the people that are coming to your three days?
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I imagine one part of it is entertainment aspect of it.
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But forget about the entertainment aspect of it.
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Are corporations, are companies bringing you in because you can bring value to their executives?
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And, you know, sometimes I do get pinholed as the entertainment or the comedy because people are laughing.
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When you just repeated 150 names and you just saw, they're like laughing because they don't know how to react to it.
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But I tell them this is so much more than comedy.
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Let's say that you sell real estate or you sell automobiles or you sell insurance or you sell anything.
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And you meet somebody today, a prospect, and in six weeks you're at the Dallas Cowboy game or the Texas Rangers game or some other sports team, Starbucks.
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And you see that person and you're able to say, Patrick, how are you doing, man?
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And you're able to ask them about their families by name.
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You and I talked earlier and you brought this up.
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You brought up Dale Carnegie's book, How to Win Friends and Influence People.
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In that book, he said, everybody's favorite subject is themselves and the sweetest sound of their ears, the sound of their own name.
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I was at a meeting and I memorized a 50 digit number and I said it forwards and backwards.
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And he said, Ron, if you teach me how to do that, I'll give you $100,000.
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And I thought, well, he's got to be joking because he's paid me to be here and he's not giving me a hundred grand.
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At the end of my speech, a guy at the back of the room says, Ron, I could say that 50 digit number now.
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Well, the guy who had hired me turned to that guy who's named Jerry.
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He said, Jerry, if you say the 50 digit number, I'll give you the hundred thousand dollars.
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He wrote him a check for a hundred thousand dollars.
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Three days later, Jerry emails me, Ron, I cashed the check.
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He's got an office off here off of us, 635 and the tollway.
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Because this guy's name, I'm saying his name is on a lot of buildings.
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But anyways, so he pays a hundred thousand dollars to this guy.
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And I emailed him and I said, sir, you know what?
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Matter of fact, he's told me it's okay to use his name.
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Why don't I teach you how to memorize those employees' names?
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I quoted him a fee that was less than a hundred thousand,
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And he said, Ron, a lot of people think this is a lot of money to give to a guy who's just
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He said, the reason I got a company that's making so much money and I can write a hundred thousand
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dollar check on a bet is because I know how to leverage skills.
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He said, I'm going to take this skill of remembering names and I'm going to leverage it to make more money.
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So I guess that's kind of a long story to answer your question of the value of remembering names.
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It's worth well more than a hundred thousand dollars to learn disability.
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And so he is, he used it to memorize the names of his employees.
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What other industries have, you know, showed interest like this gentleman did, Ryan, to learn, like what else have you learned?
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It's a lot of salespeople that they, they, they really seem to grasp onto it a lot because I think the interpersonal skills or remembering names is really going to impact the pocketbook.
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But it's not just that it's people who have to stand up in front of groups and give presentations because when you can stand up in front of a group and give a presentation and not have to read your PowerPoint or not have to read your notes instantly, you become a more dynamic speaker.
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You become a speaker that appears more knowledgeable of your subject matter.
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So people who have to give speeches, any person who's taken any type of exams or tests for their certifications or whatever, they are taking this course so they can taste those exams without stress.
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Any, any weird ones, any weird ones that have, let me, let me give you an idea what I mean by this.
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I don't know if you know who Richard Turner is.
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Richard Turner is the number one card magician in the world.
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He's the number one card mechanic in the world.
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And he was on Penn and Teller and he's doing his old trick on these guys.
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By the time he's done, what they don't realize is he's blind.
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He was at the same place here and he was a guest.
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And I said, what's the weirdest person that approached you with this ability?
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Because this ability can attract good people and bad people.
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He said, the mob was interested in my ability to go, due to counting cards, playing cards at
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Because, you know, once you do it one time, they could own.
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Was there any weird people that have ever approached you with this ability?
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You got a smile on your face or something tells me.
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You know, in 2009, I set the record for the fastest to memorize a deck of cards in the
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And the next day, David Blaine's assistant called me and said, hey, David, I just heard
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I said, you can give me my social security number.
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And I went down to his office the next day and I taught him the system to memorize a deck
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You know, these guys are, you know, the entertainment shock value where they have had a bunch of
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ladies line up that were wearing maybe less than nothing.
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I don't know if anybody, anything other than that, but those are the two that jumped out
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I mean, those are, those are pretty cool things to be able to do.
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All right, let's do the deck of cards and see if we can do anything here with it.
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So, is there anything you want to tell us before I do this?
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You know, Paul, if you want to get this so we can show exactly what the deck looks before
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Yeah, and you know, the only things I would tell you is that this stunt takes a lot of
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preparation and practice and I haven't practiced it in years.
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So, if you do it, it's that much more impressive if you do do it.
00:30:26.800
Obviously, it's just going to be a couple million people watching.
00:30:28.800
I don't want you to get too nervous about this.
00:30:37.800
I'm going to mix it one more time and then what do I do?
00:30:40.800
You want me to hand it over to you and then you'll look at it and then as you're going
00:30:44.800
through it, I'm going to show it to the audience here.
00:31:03.800
And now, when you do the recall, we'll do it from this side.
00:31:10.800
So, the first card I believe was the Eight of Spades, then the Five of Hearts, Two of Hearts,
00:31:19.800
King of Hearts, Ten of Hearts, Ace of Clubs, Queen of Spades, Four of Hearts, Eight of Hearts,
00:31:34.800
Three of Hearts, Three of Spades, Queen of Diamonds, Queen of Hearts, Nine of Spades, Six of Hearts, Ten of Spades, Seven of Spades, Five of Clubs, Three of Hearts, Eight of Diamonds, Seven of Hearts, Jack of Clubs, Nine of Diamonds, Two of Hearts.
00:31:53.800
Three of Hearts, Three of Hearts, Eight of Diamonds, Seven of Hearts, Jack of Clubs, Nine of Diamonds, Two of Clubs, Nine of Clubs, and then Nine of Hearts, Four of Spades, Ace of Spades, and then Six of Spades, Ten of Clubs, Four of Spades.
00:32:18.800
Ten of Clubs, Ten of Clubs, Five of Diamonds, Six of Clubs, Four of Diamonds, Seven of Clubs, Two of Diamonds, Two of Spades, King of Spades, Eight of Clubs, Four of Clubs, Seven of Diamonds, Six of Diamonds, King of Clubs, Jack of Hearts,
00:32:46.800
Five of Clubs, Jack of Hearts, and then Five of Spades, Jack of Diamonds, uh, uh, oh my gosh, it can't be Five of Spades again, that would be impossible, and that's what I want to say.
00:33:01.720
Uh, let's push that card to the side, and we'll see if I can come back to it, uh, Ten, so the next card is, uh, Ten of Diamonds, Queen of Clubs, Three of Diamonds, and then Ace of Diamonds, King of Diamonds, and Ace of Hearts,
00:33:25.960
and then the next one would be, uh, Jack of Spades.
00:33:32.340
So, everything correct with the exception of one S, yeah.
00:33:38.800
Okay, so if, uh, would you give me, will you give me one second here to run through my brain?
00:33:52.160
So, what were you processing right now? What were you at?
00:33:55.800
Yeah, so, I used the Mind Palace, the technique that I talked to you about, and for every card, I have a picture for it.
00:34:02.780
My picture for the Three of Clubs is a bathroom stall, okay? This is what it is.
00:34:12.500
Well, uh, okay, this is the absolute worst card, as an example.
00:34:18.100
Am I kind of getting an idea where this is going?
00:34:20.220
Well, this is actually, uh, the, the worst card, but I'll go ahead and tell you, and then you can decide if you want to keep it in your YouTube.
00:34:28.680
Um, uh, for every card I have, I've assigned a celebrity to, okay?
00:34:33.860
So, not, not all of them are celebrities. The Queen of Hearts is my mom, right?
00:34:37.460
But some of them, most of them are celebrities.
00:34:40.540
Um, I told you before that every, every, uh, number has a sound to me.
00:34:47.460
So, three is the sound M, M, and that card is a three.
00:34:54.660
For the clubs, I all had them start with G or J sound.
00:34:58.440
So, when I'm going through this, I'm like, G, M.
00:35:03.260
Yes. And so, George Michael, and where, he got arrested in a, in a bathroom, okay?
00:35:18.580
But I'm not necessarily a huge George Michael fan, but his initials happen to correspond.
00:35:23.200
And it's the first famous person you thought of. It's the first famous person I thought of with those initials.
00:35:28.100
So, I had George Michael on this desk in my house, which is, you know, one of my pieces of furniture.
00:35:34.460
And I just, for whatever reason, the image wasn't super solid.
00:35:43.780
Unbelievable. And you're saying anybody can learn how to do this?
00:35:49.400
Anybody who will take the time and number 20, 30, 40, 50 pieces of furniture in their house.
00:35:59.040
For the next three, four weeks, tell yourself, every time I meet a person, I'm going to turn their name into a picture.
00:36:14.140
Just make your commitment to yourself that you're going to do it for three or four weeks.
00:36:17.540
At the end of that three or four weeks, you'll have turned a hundred names into a picture.
00:36:23.640
So it's going to take time, but anybody can do it.
00:36:26.680
Can I ask you some names to see where you go with that?
00:36:42.200
I use a baseball player, Ian Kinsler, and that's terrible.
00:36:47.160
I recommend you don't use people for people, but that one's so unique I do.
00:37:05.980
I think of, you know, I'll think of rhinoceroses or elephants, whatever I think is on a safari
00:37:18.820
Now, with this one, you've got to remember that it's Rudolph O and not Rudolph, but that's
00:37:26.060
Someone's going to say you are close enough to it.
00:37:28.340
That is so amazing to me how you're doing this.
00:37:30.960
And so let me ask you, the average time for somebody to learn this Mind Palace, how long
00:37:37.680
I think everybody that's, you know, watching or listening to this interview could, in 20
00:37:43.640
minutes, number 20 or 30 pieces of furniture in the house.
00:37:52.340
And I recommend you do it five pieces of furniture at a time.
00:37:56.320
And the reason for that is it just becomes easier to count.
00:37:59.040
In other words, if you memorize the Presidents of the United States and you've got six in one
00:38:02.920
room, four in one room, and nine in another room, and then I say, what's number 12?
00:38:09.440
But if you've got five in this room, five in this room, five in this room, and I say,
00:38:15.700
So for organizing, that's the best way to do it.
00:38:17.780
So what if you live in a small little, you know, place?
00:38:26.300
Because I live in a one-bedroom condo in Fort Worth, okay?
00:38:29.700
And I just, and my current project is, is I'm memorizing the United States Constitution.
00:38:39.100
How in the world do I memorize the Constitution when I'm living in a one-bedroom condo?
00:38:45.660
I've numbered all the places in my condo, but then it's downtown Fort Worth.
00:38:50.660
So then I go around downtown Fort Worth and I start numbering locations all over downtown
00:38:56.300
I've actually brought a visual aid with me here.
00:39:04.020
Here's a gas station that I'm real familiar with.
00:39:13.180
Here's Joe T. Garcia's, which is a famous restaurant.
00:39:20.320
In other words, I built a mine palace all over Fort Worth in restaurants, down streets,
00:39:34.600
So I took 500 photographs and then I put them in a PowerPoint.
00:39:38.720
So now I've got this PowerPoint that's 500 locations, mine palace.
00:39:43.500
And then underneath it, you will see is the constitution.
00:39:54.480
And I just have to look at this and create some image that's going to be a brain trigger
00:40:02.080
I'll kind of go a little bit into the weeds here on this.
00:40:05.600
You will notice on this one, there's a lot of yellow on here.
00:40:10.000
In the constitution, the word shall be repeat over and over, but also the words maybe repeat
00:40:18.280
I'm like, how do I know if it's shall be or maybe I have coded for myself yellow for shall
00:40:24.700
be and maybe, I don't know if I can find another one is blue.
00:40:36.480
So to answer your question, how do you build a mind palace with, uh, if you live in a small
00:40:42.540
place, use the town you live in, use your favorite restaurant, your favorite bar, uh,
00:40:50.040
If I'm sitting with a high-end client that I got to close and I'm selling, I'm a business
00:40:55.580
If I'm sitting with a partner that I really want to do business with, I want them to invest
00:41:01.520
I have a lot of data and research I've done on them.
00:41:04.480
Is that concept of doing the research on them similar to what you're saying right now?
00:41:08.820
So you would take a folder, you would take 40 different facts about them, create a visualization
00:41:14.580
If you don't have a more than a one bedroom place you're living in, go to this place and
00:41:20.000
And then you will know as you're speaking to them that you dropped this, you dropped that,
00:41:24.680
This person's going to say, very impressive for this guy to know the history about our company,
00:41:28.140
when we got started, who the first CEO was, who the second CEO was, who our first investor
00:41:31.840
was, when we sold for $320 million, the same procedure, the same process can work for that
00:41:42.600
I was watching your videos, you know, just to get a feel for your show, but also to get
00:41:46.800
a little bit more background on you and see if there was any common friends that we could
00:41:55.460
And as I was doing the research on you, yeah, I take that little bit of information and I
00:42:00.280
put it on the first piece of furniture in my house.
00:42:02.420
I take the second piece of information that I want to talk about and I put it on the second
00:42:07.200
If you're doing research on a client, get that information.
00:42:10.180
And then you've got 10 points about this person that you want to bring up.
00:42:18.500
You walk in and you've got all these things you want to bring up, show them that you're
00:42:26.740
But now in the conversation, that client or prospect might tell you some stuff that you
00:42:31.820
want to remember for your next meeting to show them that you're listening.
00:42:35.280
As they say that information, put that in the next room in your house, put it on that.
00:42:40.220
I mean, there's nothing wrong with writing it down in front of the client either.
00:42:42.640
But if you don't want to do that, put it on the next piece of furniture.
00:42:53.540
There's no shame in writing those 10 things down.
00:42:55.840
But the mind palace held it in your brain until you got to your car.
00:42:59.660
So I can use the same furniture for the same thing or no?
00:43:05.360
So meaning I can't use the Lincoln to use dam or the table to use Washington to put a washing
00:43:14.100
machine up top, I can't use that again for another piece.
00:43:17.060
And you actually just had a very perceptive question that you just asked me because I
00:43:22.140
just told you you used 10 pieces of furniture to remember data on this person.
00:43:26.460
And then I told you to use a different set for what they tell you.
00:43:30.240
The reason I said that is it's from the same meeting.
00:43:35.100
In other words, if you memorize the presidency of the United States today, use your first
00:43:41.340
five, then tomorrow you do research on a prospect.
00:43:45.780
You can use those same five pieces of furniture.
00:43:49.320
You're not going to think, oh, this guy used to know James Monroe.
00:43:55.940
But if the subject matter is so similar, it comes from the same meeting.
00:44:02.700
So right now, if you did this exercise with me that I remember five presidents, I'd know
00:44:08.900
If it was you or no, I remember the first three.
00:44:14.480
How long would it take you for you to be able to do the 45 presidents with me?
00:44:17.840
We could probably run through it and we would have to establish your house files.
00:44:22.100
Or we could walk around your office right here.
00:44:24.500
We could do it here and you'd probably have them in 30 minutes, 25 minutes, 20 minutes maybe.
00:44:28.420
It's probably going to stick for the rest of my life.
00:44:33.020
So this is not just a method for people to learn for themselves.
00:45:00.480
He says, hey, I got a question I want to ask you.
00:45:06.280
I'm meeting with somebody who is very powerful in the business world, similar like you.
00:45:10.200
And I want to be able to earn his trust and earn his business.
00:45:14.620
And we had a 40-minute conversation together on what approaches to take and how you show respect.
00:45:21.620
That's respect to them because to them they look...
00:45:25.820
And he went and he was able to do the business and get whatever transaction he wanted to get done with these kids.
00:45:30.460
And obviously that's disclosed, but business was done with them.
00:45:33.960
This is an ability that can help in many aspects of a person's life.
00:45:39.380
Saying it to you, how does this apply to personal relationships?
00:45:43.620
Does this help in personal relationships with your boyfriend, girlfriend, parents, kids, based on what you know as well?
00:45:51.300
One thing that I love to do is the President of the United States exercise with kids.
00:45:56.140
I was dating a girl a few years ago and I would memorize a deck of cards in front of them.
00:46:05.800
But I never went to these kids and said, hey, let me teach you a system that's going to help you in school.
00:46:10.440
I think if I would have done that, they would have been turned off.
00:46:12.860
But they saw me memorizing a deck of cards and they just were fascinated.
00:46:16.620
And this little five-year-old girl, my girlfriend's daughter, comes up to the table
00:46:20.560
and she's got these little cards and one says O and orange underneath it and P and pirate or whatever.
00:46:34.340
Her little brother or her big brother said, I want a Nintendo player.
00:46:42.220
I said, man, what kind of lesson would it be to you if I just gave you a Nintendo player?
00:46:47.500
He said, it'd be a lesson that people should be generous.
00:46:50.440
I said, man, that's not the lesson I'm going to teach you.
00:46:56.580
You memorize the presidents, I'll give you the Nintendo player.
00:46:59.900
He memorized the presidents in 90 minutes walking around his house.
00:47:09.200
Then his five-year-old little girl, the one with the cards, she wanted to do it too.
00:47:13.260
So then we did it with her, and she memorized them in an hour.
00:47:16.840
So with kids, it really helps them with their homework and that kind of stuff.
00:47:20.260
I'd say with relationships, if you want to remember your anniversary, I'll say this to
00:47:25.080
Guys, you want to remember your girlfriend's anniversary or birthday or your, just forget
00:47:34.800
But in all seriousness, maybe your girlfriend tells you something and it's important to
00:47:48.960
So how much information do you have stored in your mind right now?
00:47:54.780
Like, some of the things you said is obviously big.
00:47:56.600
Like, you said, okay, Constitution, you're working on it.
00:47:58.360
You're going to do it on 4th of July on Fox and Friends.
00:48:01.280
The 2,300 names, Afghanistan wall, memory wall.
00:48:05.940
The president's, I'm assuming, you can do that with your eyes closed to go through the
00:48:09.480
What else, what else of these have you memorized?
00:48:12.520
Well, you know, for the memory tournament, I memorized the periodic table of elements, you
00:48:18.000
know, and I had to memorize the atomic mass of all of them and the boiling point and that
00:48:23.200
But that was kind of not really important to me.
00:48:34.160
And what do I mean by holding on to it long term?
00:48:39.580
If something's not important to you, just don't think about it anymore.
00:48:42.660
If it's important to you, you're going to need to go back and review it every couple
00:48:52.420
Because to me, am I processing it as I have this much data that I can store, the more
00:48:58.340
I fill it, I'm either going to lose something that's not important or is it important to
00:49:03.620
empty to be able to fit more stuff in there, newer stuff in there?
00:49:09.440
And you don't have to consciously remove the material to put new data in.
00:49:15.680
Just don't think about it anymore and it'll fade away, which is why people want memory
00:49:26.000
But if it is something that's important to you, then you will need to review it maybe
00:49:30.960
the next day, review it in a week, review it in a month.
00:49:34.320
For that Afghanistan wall, when I memorized a 2,400 fallen military, I would memorize maybe
00:49:41.960
And then the next day before I memorize the next 50, I'd review the previous 50.
00:49:47.260
So now when I have 1,700 people memorized, I'm reviewing the 1,700 before I add another 50.
00:49:56.720
This is so powerful what you're saying because I ran a sales organization and every time we
00:50:01.140
taught a script, I would break down a script into 10 different parts and we would do 1
00:50:16.500
And then eventually after it's done, everybody knew the script.
00:50:27.560
This applies for yourself when you're meeting with clients.
00:50:29.680
There are so many different fences to this on the Mind Palace.
00:50:33.500
Is there any other things that you're thinking about that we can learn from before we finish
00:50:39.780
Well, one thing I'll touch on as far as sales guys, I used to have telemarketers that worked
00:50:51.560
And I said, man, as a telemarketer, I said, you sound like you're reading the script.
00:50:59.960
I said, yeah, but you're not supposed to sound like you're reading the script.
00:51:04.460
So we took the 10 major things that he needs to say on the telephone.
00:51:11.740
So he went from reading the script word for word sounding terrible to sitting back looking
00:51:18.080
around the room and talking about what he saw on the walls.
00:51:21.440
It was the exact same script, but he had it memorized and he sounded so natural.
00:51:28.480
As far as memory overall goes, though, I think names and faces is the biggest key for a lot
00:51:34.700
Commit to yourself every 30, for the next 30 days, turn everybody's name into a picture.
00:51:39.120
Next thing I'd say is commit to yourself to work on understanding this mind palace technique.
00:51:49.520
They want to become more dynamic and not rely on notes.
00:52:11.080
But I got two more questions for you after that, which has to do with if countries, certain
00:52:19.500
Because I read somewhere where the countries that had the world memory champion were either
00:52:29.020
So before we go to the course, is this curriculum in some places that you're aware of or no to
00:52:35.980
Not formally, and it is my biggest sadness, I guess I could say, of my 28 years of doing
00:52:46.540
My 28 years of doing this, I can go to a school and I can go into...
00:52:52.220
This is like crazy because what if teachers learn this concept?
00:52:56.360
Imagine if I'm running a private school, my teachers are required to learn this concept
00:53:03.000
and they spent a week with you to learn how to take the curriculum we're teaching and then
00:53:08.460
using this method of teaching so it sticks with the kids, how much more of an impact can
00:53:14.540
Because this ability is going to help people in their careers.
00:53:18.080
So you're not aware that any school is teaching this concept, like part of curriculum?
00:53:22.580
Not to my knowledge, and I have tried, and it's my biggest frustration.
00:53:27.000
And here's the objection that schools will often give me, and it's because they don't
00:53:32.620
They will say, you know, I don't want my teachers or my students just regurgitating
00:53:39.080
And that's a valid objection, but it's an objection because you don't fully understand the role
00:53:44.780
In other words, the schools are saying, we don't want our kids memorizing it.
00:53:53.920
Memory training doesn't take you from being a novice to being an expert.
00:53:58.820
But what it does do is take you from being a novice to right here, just almost to an expert,
00:54:10.220
You still got to put it all together in your brain.
00:54:15.860
But I've given this speech in 55 countries, and every time I go to some of those, and
00:54:20.420
some of them are underprivileged countries and third world countries, and I always think
00:54:24.300
to myself, man, if I could just get this in the school system here, this would make such
00:54:32.620
Why do countries in India and Asia do so well at it, though?
00:54:40.120
You know, I, my YouTube following is, I would say, 30% in India.
00:54:53.980
Have you ever advertised your YouTube channel or no?
00:54:56.520
So this is all organic, that 30% is from India?
00:55:05.780
But it shows a hunger, I guess you could say, for education.
00:55:09.640
You know, you know, some, who, I heard somebody recently say that the heavyweight boxer that,
00:55:18.440
I heard somebody say, you know, it's hard to get motivated when you're sleeping on silk
00:55:24.820
And maybe, you know, when you're in a country that's, that's up and coming and you're not
00:55:30.740
sleeping on silk sheets, maybe you're a little more motivated to learn and educate.
00:55:35.240
I'm just taking some stabs here, but I don't know.
00:55:37.620
But there is a natural affinity, you're right, for learning and memory in some of those countries.
00:55:46.580
I know the one I looked at a couple of years ago was India.
00:55:53.080
I'm thinking, I've been out of the sport for six years.
00:56:02.040
Can you look up to see, I'd be so curious to know on what the last three are and if there's
00:56:07.160
Like, I'm actually curious to know if there's a trend with it to, and by the way, there's
00:56:11.900
never been a U.S. memory world champion, right?
00:56:23.560
He won the U.S. championships and the world championships.
00:56:28.040
Is that just what I type in, world memory champion?
00:56:43.540
There's a three-time back-to-back-to-back U.S. champion.
00:56:50.220
Well, he didn't win the U.S.A. memory championship three years in a row.
00:56:53.200
He won the undisputed world champion three years in a row.
00:56:59.080
Yeah, I mean, this is a, you know, sometimes you look at the curriculum in school being taught
00:57:03.240
and you're like, okay, how much of that's going to be used?
00:57:05.500
If this is being taught, 100%, I'm going to use this for the rest of my life.
00:57:11.400
I mean, if this is being taught at an early age, even first grade, so we don't have to
00:57:19.740
It's almost an unfair advantage if somebody teaches this to their kids.
00:57:26.720
You know, scholarships would be given for people because they know how to use this method.
00:57:32.360
If parents are watching this, if you want to save money for not sending your kids to
00:57:36.040
college, if your kids learn how to do this, for sending kids to college without you paying
00:57:39.740
for it, if your kids learn how to apply this concept, you can get some free scholarship
00:57:43.800
if they learn this concept because this is going to help with your grades.
00:57:48.040
It's, yeah, it's, you know, it helps kids reduce their stress.
00:57:52.300
Imagine you got a kid out there and he is just terrified to memorize his chemistry information
00:57:59.140
Not only does he know the information, he's no longer stressed or terrified about school.
00:58:08.960
I appreciate you sharing all this insight with us.
00:58:10.960
By the way, you do have a YouTube channel as well, right?
00:58:14.680
So I have a YouTube channel with tons of videos.
00:58:17.300
If you went to YouTube right now and you typed in the word Mind Palace or Memory Palace, I'd pop
00:58:29.540
The online memory course you asked me to let them know about is called Black Belt Memory.
00:58:39.020
I was sitting around a few years ago and a buddy of mine, he's a black belt in jujitsu.
00:58:44.800
Is this the buddy of yours that give you the black eye or that's a different buddy?
00:58:56.400
So he gives this to me and, you know, 30 minutes later, I got an ice pack on my eye and he walks
00:59:05.580
The black belt memory, you start off as a white belt in memory and then you go through
00:59:09.180
some lessons, you take a test and you earn your yellow belt.
00:59:11.760
And then at the end, you earn your black belt in memory.
00:59:14.680
And how long does that take to go through your course?
00:59:16.380
I've had people go through it in three days and the average person, three or four weeks.
00:59:20.980
Outside of that, man, it's been a pleasure sitting down with you.
00:59:30.840
I've known about you for a while now and I've been wanting to meet you and wanting to actually
00:59:36.080
And so when I got the call the other day to say, do you want to do it?
00:59:41.300
And my second thought was, you've been wanting to meet this guy for months now, black eye
00:59:54.040
And by the way, if you haven't already subscribed to Valuetainment on iTunes, please do so.
01:00:01.440
And if you have any questions for me that you may have, you can always find me on Snapchat,
01:00:09.560
And I actually do respond back when you snap me or send me a message on Instagram.