22. Howard Berg: Super Reading Secrets From The World's Fastest Reader
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Hey everyone, it's Alex from Alex and Books, and you're listening to The Reader's Journey, the podcast that takes you on a journey to meet amazing authors, discover brilliant books, and learn valuable lessons along the way. Now, let's get started. Hello everyone, and welcome back to another episode of The Reader's Journey podcast. Today we have Howard Berg, author of Super Reading Secrets. Howard, thank you so much for coming on the show today. I'm happy to be here.

So Howard, before we dive into your book, I want to talk about kind of reading as a whole. Are you someone that kind of always loved reading ever since you were a kid or was it something you developed later in life? I always loved reading. I actually started very young.

I remember when I was seven, I was studying mythology and astronomy. I was always very involved. But I grew up in the projects in Brooklyn, as I mentioned. It was very violent. And I think you're familiar with the areas, you know, quite accurate. And, well, let's just say we moved when they raped an 88-year-old man. So that's not the best place to be. But I found the safest place in my neighborhood was the library. Because gang kids would rather be dead.

Caught in the library. So I read, and I read a lot. I had college reading when I was 11, and I went to the State University of New York, Binghamton, when I was 17, to major in biology. Well, in the last half of my junior year, I got interested in the brain.

I wanted to go in a branch of biology called psychobiology, not psychotic biology. That's Frankenstein. Psychobiology is biology behavior. And I said to the dean, I want to do a major. And he looked at me and said, do you realize you're a second term junior? You haven't had any psych courses. He said, you'll have to do the whole four year program in one year and finish the bio program. And I worked three jobs. I was working 18 hours a week. And he said, you know what? You're not smart enough.

And that's when it hit me. They never taught me how to learn. They told me what to learn and why to learn and what would happen when I didn't learn. So I said, I'm going to do it. So in the last year, I learned about the brain. I started reading 80 pages a minute. And I finished the program in one year, the whole psych program. I took six science courses a term, 18 credits, all science, two four-hour labs. Back then, lab reports were on slide rule. So it took 16 hours. It was a lot of work.

And then I finished the bio program and I scored an 800 on the GRE in bio. I read 48 books in three nights, like biochemistry, genetics, cell physiology. I got three questions wrong. So that's how it started. And then I found I could teach it. I had a group of young people, 11 to 15, told them what I did. They did a semester of lifelong developmental psych, a sophomore college course in one week. They were 11 to 15.

And they took the AP test, 15 out of 18 passed it in a week. It's not about me. That's a freak show. It's about saying, yes, you can do this too. Maybe you won't go 80 pages a minute, but you'll go two, three, four times faster with really, really good comprehension. And that's what I've been doing for the last 35 years.

Wow, that's incredible. Yeah, that you kind of discover that. Can you kind of dive a little bit more about that? Like, did you start reading books about how to learn or was it more like trial and error trying to figure out, you know, what speed reading tips work than what like techniques didn't work as well?

Well, I was studying like psychophysiology and learning and motivation. And I was like, boy, they're making a lot of smart rats and goldfish and monkeys. Why aren't we using any of this information for humans? It should work for people.

I started taking the ideas that I was learning about learning and I integrated it into my reading strategy. And then when I finished, I took some graduate courses on the psychology of reading, which filled in some of the gaps that I had and taught me what I was missing. And so when I combined everything, I was able to double a normal person in four hours with really good comprehension. Wow.

Wow. Yeah, I'm sure a lot of people love to double their reading speed. So when you teach people how to speed read, what's kind of like the first thing you teach them? It's reading isn't learning.

And that's a big problem for many people. They think reading is learning. If everybody who read a book got an A, it would be learning. But that isn't what happens. You can read a calculus book, memorize the equations, and fail the test. I think some of our audiences experience some of that joy. You thought you knew it, and then somehow it didn't work out well. So what is learning? Learning is being able to use the information when you need it and remembering it when you need it.

And it's not learning how much, how many hours you read. If you have so many days to study, yeah, I read four hours or I read 400 pages. So what?

What did you learn? Did you retain any of it? Do you know how to use it? I did a graduate course in educational psychology, which is a five-month program in seven hours. And I took the AP test in 50 minutes. It was a six-hour test. I got a B+. I didn't get an A. I got a B+. But I didn't need an A. I needed the C-. I was a teacher. I needed the credits. I wasn't interested in the course. I was interested in the credits.

So for B plus when you need to C minus, that was my goal. So, yeah, people can do amazing things. I have 11-year-olds going to college and getting A's in a week. And we'll be showing the people today how it's done, not just what I've done, but how they can do it and actually start them on the path of doing it.

Yeah. And in the book, you talk a lot, like a big part of speed reading is knowing a schema. Can you kind of explain what that is and like the role that plays in speed reading? Great question. Yes. I see you read the book. Schema is very important. It's the key to comprehension. So that's one of the problems. Again, people read a lot of words, but they don't comprehend what the words mean. I'm going to give you a passage with no schema. Watch how confusing it is.

This is an easy thing to do. If possible, you could do it at home, but you could always go someplace else if it's necessary. Beware of overdoing it. This is a major mistake. It may cost you quite a bit of money. It's very vague. There's no schema. I'll read it again with a one-word title. It has schema. Instantly, it makes complete sense. Laundry.

Laundry, this is an easy thing to do. It's possible you could do it at home, but you could always go someplace else if it's necessary. Beware of overdoing it. This is a major mistake. It may cost you quite a bit of money. Totally makes sense. So by teaching people where these clues are, how to find them, it's like a decoder ring. You go two, three, four times faster. Even in very technical material, you're actually understanding better.

slowest speed and yeah I like the example you giving your book kind of schemas kind of like information people might already know like a like the example you give is like if you're reading a book about biology and you're a biologist you're gonna be able to read that book faster because you have already a lot of background information but if you're like a finance person that book is gonna be a lot harder to speed read than someone else that you know doesn't know as much about that topic you don't know the words

You don't know the formulas. You don't know the principle. So if you read a history book, you know who George Washington is and Abraham Lincoln. It's a lot easier than who's that. It's the same in every subject. About 80% of learning the topic is the vocabulary. So when we start for the first time, we have a blank slate.

There's more work to be done, but each successive reading in that niche becomes easier and faster because we've mastered the basic formulas and vocabulary, and now we recognize them with meaning. Otherwise, they're just words, words that don't have any meaning and significance, and that's exactly how schema works.

Yeah, and I've noticed personally, like I've been able to read business books faster because it's kind of a repetition of like the same kind of scientific examples. Like they always give like the marshmallow test or something else. It's like, oh, I've read about this before. I kind of just like skim through it and I get basically the gist of it while having to spend time and reading it slowly. Exactly.

And that's a very good strategy you're using. It's ironic, but most people slow down in familiar material because it's comfortable. You're in a chemistry book and you're struggling. You get a chapter that was interesting and easy. Are you in a hurry to go to the next struggle or stay in the comfort zone? And so as a learner, you have to have the confidence.

Realization that it's a better strategy to go into the new material you don't know that you actually have to learn than waste your time on what you know already, which is comfortable. And what you're really doing is burning time. The time you had to learn what you needed and didn't know already. And then they don't have enough time to learn it because they wasted all that time. Yeah.

- And speaking of kind of getting out of your comfort zone, you mentioned in the book when people first start speed reading, they might feel like they're not comprehending everything or that it's kind of like too much information at once, but that's kind of, you know, that's anticipated and you're still reading faster than you would at your normal pace. Can you talk a little bit more about that? - Yes. I want people to get confused initially. When they're reading, here's what most people do when they read. They're hearing the book with their eyes.

It's like a little person in the back of their head is pronouncing one word at a time. So most people read about the same speed as they speak, because that's how they read. They speak to themselves. When you're in a car, you go 70, 80 miles an hour and read the road in four directions, front, back, left, and right. Watch your gauges. Listen to the radio. Talk on the phone. Talk to your friends. All at the same time, and you're bored.

The difference is in a car, it's very visual. You're taking in all that information like a movie. So what I'm training people to do is to see more, which is what reading should be. You don't hear with your eyes.

see more and hear less. And it's not that you don't hear anything. You hear what's relevant, but seeing more of a movie, so it's more visual, which is a bigger chunk of the brain is the visual cortex. And as a result, you're reading at a much higher rate. But there's a transition between hearing and visual. And in that transition period, what's happening is you can't read at all because your brain hasn't learned how to read visually, and it's too fast.

to hear the words. So you're in that discomfort zone of, I don't get it. That's exactly what turns on the visual mode. The confusion makes the brain look for something that can handle the information at that rate. And what we do is we can easily switch on the visual mode. So I want them confused temporarily, not long, about 15, 20 minutes.

And as a result, their brain switches on to a different area that can process quicker and more efficiently, like driving in a car instead of a conversation.

And so I make them aware. You are going to get confused, but I want that to happen temporarily. That's what's going to turn on this ability to read quicker with good comprehension. So it's a good thing if it's happening. It means it's working, but it's very temporary. So you're quite correct about that.

yeah it might be if anyone that tries kind of speed reading might feel kind of counterintuitive like oh i'm not really feeling like i'm understanding this but it's actually part of the process and also in the book you say it usually takes like 15 to 30 minutes a day practicing every day for about eight weeks it's not like one just one big hack and like in 10 minutes you can read like 10 times as fast as like uh reading is a skill and it's something you have to practice and develop oh would you say would you say that's right

It's true, but most people at the end of the program have doubled. I had an 84-year-old read three books in three hours the day after I taught her, Ruth Rubin.

I had kids with dyslexia that were able to do it because they were using a different part of their brain. Doesn't mean every dyslexic can do it, but the ones that I worked with were very successful. And you're correct. Most people go through a brief period of confusion followed by a rapid increase of speed with good comprehension. And by knowing why it's happening,

And while it's necessary, they're more tolerant of a brief moment of confusion to get to another place to switch on that part of their brain that can do this more efficiently. Yeah, and it's just amazing to know how much the brain's possible of doing.

And you touched on a subject earlier, vocalization, which is like when people read out kind of they're reading to themselves, but kind of talking to themselves while they're reading. That's actually slowing them down. Can you talk more about that and how people can kind of like stop themselves from doing it?

Yes, it's a major problem for many people. Remember, they read as fast as they talk. And when they read it, remember when we started reading in first grade, we read aloud. There's a lot of out. And some people never broke that habit. They still read aloud. It slows them down.

There's a few things that help. One, the skills that I teach them use a different part of the brain. The fastest speaker is about 2,500 words a minute. I'm about 25,000. So at that speed, you wouldn't hear any words. You'd sound like a fax machine.

And so you can't speak at that speed. So that helps shut it down. But one of the things I was taught in graduate school that helps with students that have that problem, they said tell them to put a pen or a pencil in their mouth, which gags them, and they're not able to talk. They said that's another strategy that will work.

But I know as a result of reading more visually and using the strategies that I teach, for most people, that problem will go away. Yeah, that's something I've been working on dealing with. And yeah, I feel like my reading speed has improved absolutely.

as I like decrease my vocalization. So I think that's a really great tip for people. And a large part of speed reading is also kind of like using your hand, especially you talk about starting with your finger. Can you kind of explain how the role that plays in speed reading? Yes, you're completely correct. We want to keep the eye engaged. So here's a little thing our audience can do.

When we're done today, pick a book you've read, preferably a nonfiction book. So the only thing that can possibly confuse you is your speed, since you already understand the book. And get a timer. You can use a smartphone or a smartwatch. There's lots of timers. Time yourself for a minute. Read at your normal rate, nothing special, and see how far you get in the first chapter.

And when the bell rings, take a pencil or a pen, put a little mark. So that says, this is how far I read now. Now you've got a measurement. Now we're going to do the magic. Go to the second chapter. And this time, use your hand, as you mentioned, go across one line at a time, the eye following the hand. And this is important. As fast as you can comprehend. So as long as you know what you're reading, go quicker and quicker and quicker till you don't.

That's when you know you went too fast. Since you understand the book and now you don't, that means you're going too fast. Slow down just enough so your understanding is back. And for five minutes, as fast as you can understand, no faster, go one line at a time, left to right, left to right. Then after you've done that, go back to the first chapter where you tested yourself.

Turn on your timer, read with your hand as fast as you can comprehend, moving your eyes continuously, and you'll go 20 to 40 percent further than the mark you put in during that first minute. That's the first step in learning to read faster.

Yeah, I think trying that out, you'll notice, yeah, you could read a lot faster because your eyes just kind of follow your hand motion. So I think, yeah, that's a great tip to increase your speed reading. And you also talk about there's three other things that kind of slow people down, which are regression, progression, and distractions. Can you kind of explain each one and like how people can overcome them? Some people read this way, love.

The dog. The dog ran. The dog ran over. The dog ran over the... The dog ran over the hill. And that's how they read. They read one word, then two words, then three words, then four words. It slows you down terribly when you do that. And that's regression. When you're using your hand and reading more visually, that won't happen. Another problem is...

They lose focus. So they're reading and it's like a squirrel and then they go back and they don't even know where they were. Their eyes are like, where was I? What was I looking at? So the hand keeps, it's like a conductor in an orchestra. It keeps you focused on

but specifically where you are moving forward exactly where you need to be. So the hand plays a very important role in keeping you continuously reading quicker and exactly the spot you need to go. Now, you can read fast without your hand, but you'll always, always read faster with your hand. Yeah.

Yeah, and it's such a cool thing to think about. Like, just moving your hand, it keeps you focused so that, you know, minimizes distractions. It prevents you from going back because your hand's kind of moving forward. And you're not reading too much ahead because you're following your hand as well. So it's like one solution for three problems. So it's a great tip for people to have. Absolutely. And it's very easy. We use this for kids as young as the sixth grade, around 11 years old. And my oldest person was 92.

I trained the US Special Forces at Fort Bragg and the Royal Thai Army in Bangkok and a lot of Fortune 500 companies. So it's all over the map. The difference between children and adults is you'll read a spreadsheet and they'll read a biobook. That's the only difference. Reading isn't different. Memory isn't different. Studying isn't different. What you read is different. But the actual activity is identical.

Yeah, that's great. That's applicable to so many like errors. And so we talked about vocalization, regression, progression, distraction. Are there any other like common mistakes you see people make when they're first learning how to speed read?

Yes, they're trying to learn while they're reading instead of doing it in a series of steps. Most speed reading programs are like that. I have a funny story on that, if you'd like. I was with Dick Cavett. He was a famous talk show host in the 70s and 80s. When MSNBC first launched, he was one of their first hosts. And I got to be on the show. We got to be friends. After the show, we chatted. He told me a story about Woody Allen.

He said, Woody told him he took out one woods and he read War and Peace in five minutes. Dick said, that's incredible. It's about as big as the New York Yellow Pages. He said, what do you remember?

Woody said, it's about the Russian Revolution. That's all I remember. That was spirit reading. It's a bio book. It's about dental dams. You don't learn at that speed initially. So what happened is I changed it. I used reading to find what I don't know and need to learn at very high speed that

Then I used brain-based study skills to comprehend what confused me. So, yeah, I read the calculus book, but I can't do any problem solving. That's not what I was looking for. I need to actually market or do problem solving, depending on the book. So how do you learn? You use study skills, and these skills go very quickly. And then you use memory skills. So you don't forget what you just learned five minutes later, and you still can't use it.

We use emotional intelligence skills so you don't get nervous. People often will learn and they take a test, they get nervous, they forgot what they learned. They don't perform at the right level. So by combining reading skills with study skills, with memory skills, with emotional intelligence skills, it's now a Swiss Army knife.

We're not making magic. We're using science. And some of what I'll show is how that's done today. Yeah, yeah. I like how you have a chapter for each of those sections in the book. And speaking of like you just mentioned, when you're speed reading, you're searching for like kind of key information. I like how you have like a passage where you highlight kind of the verbs and adjectives and you kind of show like here is the key information you want to look for while you're reading. And this kind of like speed reading regular text. So that's a really cool example you have in your book.

Thank you. And we made this into an audio video program as well. We upgraded it. That book is a few years old. I think I wrote it in the early 90s. And so we've upgraded. It's actually in 109 languages now online. And if people are interested, they go to berglearning.com and there's a link on this page with the podcast that will take you there. And you can start for free. There's some free lessons. Get started, but it will definitely help you.

Awesome. Yeah. And definitely I'm looking forward to checking that out as well. And so we talked about speed reading. Now, like you mentioned, comprehension is a big part of that because one thing kind of read the information, but you also need to be able to understand it. So do you have any tips you use or what do you teach people to comprehend while they're speed reading? What if I told you what you have to know is five things?

Most people, when they read a complex book, a really thick book, say organic chemistry, law, medicine, marketing, sales, things that are very dense, they look at the book and say, how I learned this? There's so much. I don't know where to begin. I don't know what I'm looking for. There's only five things you need to focus on to master a subject. And I'll tell you what they are. The first is vocabulary.

About 80% of the new topic is the words. What words? They usually don't look the same. They're bolded, they're italic, they're underlined, they're in color, might be the glossary. The writer is drawing your attention to those words because they're specific and very important. The second thing you need to learn are the names. Who's in the book? What did they do?

George Washington is a good example. When you're one year old, you don't know who he is. You had to learn who he was in school at a very early age. The third thing you look for are any numbers, dates, statistics, and a formula. They're not for decoration. They're there for a reason.

Next thing, and particularly in nonfiction, most nonfiction books, especially textbooks, have subheadings and headings that demarcate the sections. This is a topic. This is a topic. What are the five takeaways in each section, the five big takeaways? And lastly, any questions and answers. Now, often, particularly in a textbook, the questions are at the end.

So you read this 50-page chapter. Now there's 25 questions. You get to them when you're done. You don't remember any of the answers. You go back and have to look for them. What if you read those questions before you started to read? What are those questions telling you? These are the 25 things the person who's an expert who wrote the book wanted you to know when you were done.

wanted you to prioritize. If you knew what they were before you started reading, you would consciously be looking for them. And then when they appear in the book, you prioritize them and know these are more important than the rest of the material because that's what they want me to know when I'm done. So what are the questions and answers? Now think about this. If you know every word and what it means,

every person, what they did, every number, date, statistic, and formula, and its significance, how it's used. Five main ideas in every section, and every question and answer. You're on your way to mastering that topic super fast. And that's what we did. We took kids 11 to 15. We gave them a 30-chapter book in Lifewell Developmental Psych, and we showed them how to do this super fast. They did it in a week.

And 15 out of 18 passed this sophomore college course in one week, which is kids. So you can imagine what an adult with more schema and more experience can do. It's very easy to apply. And I take them step by step through the whole process. So they not only find it, but they master it. Can I show you another technique to use with this that will help them? Of course, yeah.

I like to take notes when I'm reading if it's possible. It's not always convenient. Sometimes we don't have anything to write with. What I do is I set up a three column table in Word. The first column is the facts, what I'm learning. The second column is my insights. Why are these facts significant? Very important. Also, if I'm interested

Did I learn how to make someone get interesting? They just wrote something and said, wow, that was amazing. Why was it amazing? What got your attention? Did they tell a story, a joke? Was it a picture? Whatever they did with your writing, you can do to make your writing stand out also. You've learned a strategy. That's another level.

The third thing I'm looking for in the third column is what will I do with this information? This is very, very important. Your brain isn't going to learn something if it doesn't have a reason to retain it. It's just going to see it for a few minutes and then forget it because what am I going to do with it? If you're right, say a lot of your audience is reading business books, how to sell, how to market.

And you write in the third column specifically how you're going to use this marketing strategy to make a million dollars or double your income or triple your income. Do you think your brain's going to pay more attention to something that's going to increase your profits 100, 200, 300 percent? Or just another idea that you read out of a thousand ideas? So in the third column, what will

What will I do with this information? And by the way, this can be done in a live workshop. First column is what you're learning. Second column is insights. And what did the speaker do to get your interests going? Did they tell a story, a joke, a picture? Because you can use that when you speak. And in the third column, how will you use what you just learned? And here's the last part.

Take one to two of the three of these things you're going to use and use them. Every day, pick two or three of them and use them. You're going to learn by doing, not just by looking. And so now, as you begin to see the outcome, your business is growing, you're becoming more successful, you're a better speaker, your interactions with people have improved.

You're going to remember what you just did because it brought you an immediate and powerful reward. And that's missing in most people's learning. They're looking at words on the page and wanting magic. And I'm going to remember this forever. And they don't. And they walk away disappointed because they put all that time into the book. And a few weeks later, all they remember is a really nice book.

Yeah, that's an incredible tip and something I think a lot of people struggle with because they think, okay, it's just like all I need to do is learn how to speed read and that's like the solution. It's like speed reading is great and you should know how to do it, but you also need to apply the information that you're learning. Otherwise, you're either going to just store or most likely just forget it. And without the application of that knowledge, you won't get the results you're actually looking for. So that was a wonderful tip. Thank you for sharing that. And they can get more. I mentioned if they go to the link below,

The podcast, we have a full program. We made it into a seven-week program, but we chopped it into little lessons, like 10 minutes, 15 minutes, so it doesn't eat the whole day up.

There's lots of practice drills with all these kinds of ideas I'm giving and many, many more that will take them to another level. Awesome. And so we covered kind of speed comprehension. And you also have a whole chapter dedicated to super memory. So can you kind of share more like some tips you use to kind of remember more of what you read? I'll do better. We'll do it.

I'm going to give you, you may remember because you read the book, but I'm going to give you 10 things to remember. And those on the podcast haven't had this yet, so it'll be news to them. Here are 10 things you want to remember. Pole, shoes, tricycle, car, glove, gun, dice, skate, cat, bowling pins. And I'm willing to bet most of our audience doesn't remember all 10 and order backwards and forwards effortlessly.

but you will in three minutes. This is just one of many memory strategies that are in the program. Here's another tip that'll help you to learn the skill that I'm about to teach you. Remember, 10% of what you read

and 90% of what you say and do. What I'm about to share with you isn't just a drill, it's a tool you'll use for the rest of your life. So say and do what I ask you and you'll master it much better. So let's begin with how do you learn that list? The ancient Greeks discovered a shortcut for mastering long lists. Take a list you know, it's hanging in your memory, and hang the new list on it like a hanger.

I'm going to bet everyone that's watching us today or listening can count to 10. I feel very, very confident that this is something they can do. We're going to use those 10 numbers they know to learn those 10 things they're wanting to learn incredibly fast. Let's start with the number one. Number one looks like a flagpole. So when I say one, you say pole. Ready? One. Pole. Perfect.

Two. How many shoes do you usually wear? Two. So two is shoes. What's two? Shoes. What's one? A pole. You may notice you're looking for the pictures, too, as we go along. Three is a tricycle. How many wheels are on a typical tricycle? Three.

What's three? Tricycle. What's two? Shoes. What's one? Pole. Getting smarter. Your brain's learning the strategy. Four is a car. How many tires are on a car? Four. What's four? Car. What are two? Two. Shoes. One. Pole. Three. Tricycle. Jumping all over it. It doesn't matter. Your brain's getting the skill. Five is a glove. How many fingers in a glove? Five. Five.

What's five? The glove. What's three? The tricycle. What's one? The flagpole. Perfect. The pole. Six gun. When I lived in Texas, everyone had a gun. Cowboys, they love guns. What's six? The gun. What's four? The car. What's two? Shoes. Perfect. Seven's lucky in dice, at least on the first throw. Yeah. What's seven? The dice. What was five? Glove.

Three. Tricycle. One. Pole. Perfect. Rhymes work. Say eight skate. Eight skate. What's eight? Skate. Six. What did they love in Texas? Gun. What was four? Car. What was two? Shoes. Perfect. Nine is a cat. How many lives does a cat have? Nine. What's nine? Cat. What was seven lucky? Dice. Five is a? Glove.

Rehazel? Tricycle. What's one? Pole. Last one, ten. How many bowling pins are in an alley? Ten. What's ten? Bowling pins. Let's do the list you couldn't do now. One. Pole. Two. Shoes. Three. Tricycle. Four. Car. Five. Glove. Six. Texas. Gun. Seven's lucky in. Eight rhymes with? Skate. Mine is a?

Oh, cat. The picture. You see the picture popped in? And 10. Bowling pins. Perfect. That's called pegging. And here's how to use it. You just learned how to speed learn numbers. Let me show you how that would work in a real life situation. You go to a hotel. The hotel room is 314.

How many times when you left the hotel, you forgot what room you were in? Because you could go to different hotels and you forget which room it is today. I make a movie. Three is a tricycle. One is a pole. Four is a car. I turn the numbers into pictures. Picture this. A tricycle, it's a pole on a car. A tricycle, it's a pole on a car. A tricycle, what number? Three. It's a pole. One.

On a car. Four. That's your room number. Try school, Paul, car. And you could string together all these pictures for numbers. The zero, by the way, because numbers have an alphabet. Zero, nine. That's it. Zero, nine. The zero is the ten bowling pins. So by stringing them together in a meaningful way, it stimulates your brain when you play the movie back.

You recall the number. And I teach this to kids. 3.14 is pi in geometry. For math and science, history, they use it. Business people, they use it for due dates, percentages, hotel rooms, phone numbers. Just turn the digits into pictures. Now you know how to speed learn numbers. And that's one of the things that's in the program that we teach. Mm-hmm.

Yeah. Wow. That was a, definitely a fun and insightful exercise. Thank you for sharing that. And, uh, yeah. Without fun is stupid. That's why people like to learn because teachers are boring. I want, I was on comedy central when it first launched with Dennis Leary and I helped launch the network. And I was joined Stewart's first guest. This, I know how to be funny. I'll give you an example. Sure. Okay. Bushman walks in a bar, a bar,

A bartender says, get out. We don't serve your kind. Most of them says, why not? I'm a fun guy. But when you know how to entertain and make people laugh, you learn.

A program shouldn't just be facts. It should be fun. It should be entertaining, stimulating, because then your brain wants more. And you're not struggling to learn. Think of the teachers you love to go to. You couldn't wait to get in the room because you knew it was going to be a wonderful experience. And then they were the ones that, someone kill me. I got to spend a whole hour with this person. They're the most worried person on the face of the earth.

I've made it my purpose when I teach, make it engaging and interesting and fun. And then the brain will learn what they're learning. Yeah, definitely a great point. Like the best teachers were always a fun time. And so I want to get back to your book because there's a lot of great tips there. And one of my favorite lessons was how you actually analyze like a book's cover and like table of contents to kind of get a feel for it and understand it. Can you explain that process?

Yes. I was on a Dennis Leary show I told you about, and he had me read the book Lady Boss. It was about 500 pages in five minutes, and then Jackie Collins was testing me on her book she just wrote. So

Before the show started, the cameraman said, can you just pretend to read the book? Don't read it. Just skim the cover with your hand so I can see where the camera needs to be pointing when you read. So, okay. So I'm reading the cover, and it's giving me the names of many of the characters, like Mike, Moe, Murray, and Mel, which are actually characters from 30 years ago. I remember it.

So now what I'm reading, my Mo and Mel doesn't look that different at 80 pages a minute. It looks like the same person. But I wasn't reading the words. I was seeing their faces. One was a criminal. One was a friend. One was a nice guy. And so when the names appeared, I would see an image. Like you might, Big Mick Jagger, you can see him. Paul McCartney, you can see him.

And so certain names evoke images. So by using the cover, I was able to pick up the key names of people who would be in the story. So when I started reading, I already had set up file folders that I could use to make the story easier to retain. That's a good example. Now, contents page.

That was another area you asked me. It's a map. It's a map of the book. This is what you're about to go to. So if you're a person reading nonfiction, the first thing you do is you skim that. The less you understand, the more you're going to have to learn.

The more you understand, the less you're going to have to learn. At very high speed, you don't learn things you don't know already. You recognize things that you do know. So it's a filter. So it's like, I don't know anything on this page. You've got a lot of work in that book to master the content. I've seen almost all of this. Like you mentioned the marshmallow concept book. For me, in psych, it was Pavlov. Every psych book I ever read had a chapter on Pavlov.

First book, I had to learn who is he? What did he do? But the tenth book, it's like, oh, there it is. Dog drooling, bell. That's all I had to see. I knew what it was. I didn't have to read any of the words. I knew exactly what it was, and of course I was right. So the same thing is true with the contents page. So what I'm able to do

is guesstimate how long will this take to learn based on the challenge that this page is presenting to me. It also gives me an estimate on the interest level. Have you ever read a book on this topic before?

Was it boring? Was it interesting? Based on my prior experiences, how interesting will this be? How much time do I think I'll need because there's a lot of new material? Well, how little time will I need? Because I see there's a lot of content here I already know. And it's very easy to do this with a little practice. Again, it's in the program with the link below the podcast on how to do all this.

Yeah, a lot of great tips in the book, especially like you mentioned, the table of contents kind of like a roadmap of what people can expect to learn. And if the author did a great job, each chapter title or subtitle kind of gives you like a heads up of what you're expecting to learn. And also, you also mentioned if you read like the inner flaps is usually a summary of the

book and kind of the main lesson the author wants to teach you. And all of that is like crucial information to determining if this is like a good book for you and what you can expect to learn from it.

You took a lot out of that. You're completely right. How many times have you been in the wrong book for three weeks? And they said, this didn't do it. The title was misleading. It isn't giving me what I needed. And I've wasted three weeks on a book that didn't give me anything I needed. Now I've got to go find a book that does it. So one of the advantages of the contents page is you very quickly are seeing the content.

Does it actually deliver the concepts and topics you were hoping for? If the answer is no, get another book. You found that out in seconds instead of weeks. And now you're able to move on to a more appropriate book that will give you more bang for your buck.

Yeah, I think that's a common like bad habit, especially people learn from school, which is like they're used to being assigned the book and being forced to read that book. But now, especially if you're out of school and you're adult, it's like you could read whatever you want. And if a book isn't interesting, like feel free to quit it and grab another book. Yeah.

Another thing people do is they read the wrong material. So, for example, if you're in school, the only thing you need to know, and there's only one thing, the answers to the questions on the test. If you know all the answers to every question on the test, you get an A. If you know everything except the answers to the questions on the test, you get an F. So you might say, well, am I supposed to learn this?

Theoretically, yeah, but the real win in college isn't learning. It's getting A's on the test. That's how you get a grade. So what are you really supposed to do? You're supposed to figure out what the questions will be on the test, and I teach how to do that based on old tests, how to do an analysis.

Or for business, based on prior experiences with people like this, what questions will they probably want me to answer at the interview or at the proposal? So we're not learning a lot of information no one will ever want to know and missing the information they did want to know, which happens all the time. I know a lot of people work very hard to prepare, but

Nothing they expected was there, and the things that they were being asked were the wrong things for them.

And if you had a better insight ahead of time of what to look for and how to know when you found it, you could learn a lot quicker and filter out all the fluff that has no relevance to your goals and objectives. And that could speed you up tremendously when a large percentage of a book is not material you need or should be looking at, and you only find what's relevant to your purpose. Mm-hmm.

Yeah, I definitely wish I had read this book or wish these techniques were taught in school where people actually need to learn how to learn. So definitely valuable information there. Very helpful. Howard, is there some situations where you shouldn't speed read? Like let's say someone's reading Shakespeare or kind of just reading for pleasure. What's your opinion on that?

If I'm reading Shakespeare for school, it's not for pleasure. They put a gun to my head and said, you got to read Hamlet and do a report tomorrow. That's not pleasure reading. But if I'm reading for pleasure, what I do is I speed up the boring parts, the parts that are, oh, my God, this is so boring. I was reading The Mists of Avalon, which is a very nice nonfiction book on the king author of legend.

And there were huge sections. There was one section about 16 pages long on the furniture in King Arthur's throne room. And I couldn't care less. It talked about every napkin and fork and spoon, the motifs. I was like, I'm not interested in napkins and forks and spoons. So I read that in three seconds, 10 pages. Turn, turn, turn, turn. Oh!

Here's the story. And so the boring parts that might have prevented you from finishing the book are done so quickly that you're not bored, which is better than saying I can't stand this anymore. And then you get to the parts where there's emotional gratification. And then you should slow down. If you don't go to the Louvre and look at the Mona Lisa on a skateboard,

Or chug Dom Perignon. You're supposed to say the same things. And you can't read a sonnet in three seconds and leap over the beauty of the language.

And so there are times when we want to feel emotionally connected. And so what we do is we go quickly through the chafe, the non-relevant, non-interesting section. We're aware of what it's doing. We know what's going on. We just don't care, which is better than being bored. And then when it appears more engaging and more emotionally gratifying, don't speed up.

Read it at a speed that gives you that emotional epiphany that you were looking for from the book. You'll actually finish more novels now with greater appreciation and less boredom. And I go through this again step by step by step in the full program.

Yeah, that was probably one biggest takeaways I got from your book is like speed reading is something like sometimes you want to turn it up. Sometimes you want to like slow it down depending on like the material. Yeah, if like something you already read or looks familiar or is boring kind of speed up your reading. And if something like really catches your interest, you know, slow down and try to take some time to like understand and reflect on it. And I think that's a very valuable skill for people to have.

Right. You don't want to read the same way at something totally unfamiliar, you know nothing about, it's very complex, and you're trying to understand it versus something you've seen in 10 other books, and you could do this in your sleep. It's not the same. Reading is not always the same. There's actually four kinds of reading.

This was developed by Malcolm Knowles. No, Mortimer Adler. Mortimer Adler. He was the editor of the Encyclopedia Britannica for like 30, 35 years. The first kind of reading is called elementary reading. That's reading phonics and D-O-G spells door. We all started somewhere. The next type of reading is called inspectional reading, which is when you're reading at very high speed. What is this about?

What are the major concepts covered? Can I use this information? You're not mastering the details, but you're seeing what those details would be if you chose to master them and if they're relevant. The next level up is where you're learning the book thoroughly. So you could take an exam and ace it. You're actually mastering the material.

And the last type of reading is called syntopical reading. You're reading four or five or more books on a topic, and you're taking different concepts from different books that compare and contrast, and you're looking at the different opinions on how it can be done. Five books on marketing, and each one's giving you a different way to do the same thing, and you're seeing the similarities and the differences and doing an analysis.

and trying to create an outcome from this different material that might be different than what any of the books did, but it's a synthesis of what several books showed you, and that's the highest level of reading. Mm-hmm.

yeah i love a mortar adam lewis book how to read book definitely you know perfect book best book ever written on air yeah it's reading such a crucial skill to have especially in today's world and uh yeah like you said is we could always use more smart people in the world so that's a great thing to have and uh so howard this has been a awesome conversation and i want to ask my closing question and i know you know you probably read

probably thousands if not tens of thousands 38,000 books wow that's pretty incredible but I want to ask you maybe have there been like one or two books that have had like the biggest impact on you as like a young adult or like two books that had really like huge inflection points on your life what would those books be um

Different subject areas, because different books appeal to different areas of our life. In business, Unlimited Selling Power by Donald Moyne. It's a classic. You may have read it.

It's a book on neuro-linguistic programming and using it in sales and marketing. It's invaluable. People who are knowledgeable about writing copy that are in business and are successful at marketing and sales, they've read it. It's the Bible for learning language patterns that will help you to close more sales and

Help more people. So when your mom said, eat your spinach, she wasn't trying to hurt you. There's an ecology here. If I'm saying, try my program, it's not just to make a sale. It's to help you. Just like eat your spinach. And if I say it in the right way and motivate you to get it, I'm going to make your life better. And that's why I'll do it, because I know I'm going to help you. And if I can't, I'm going to need money back. So to me, that's not a bad thing. I want to make sure you actually have more success.

Moines' book will do that. Now, in metaphysics, I'm very interested in self-development and self-realization. And Buddha wrote a book on the obstacles to enlightenment and how to overcome them. I thought it was pretty important. It's considered his main work. And Alice Bailey did an up

Western interpretation. A lot of her, a lot of his symbolisms and metaphors would make sense thousands of years ago in India. And you have no schema on those things he's referring to because they don't exist in our world. So it's like, what? What's he talking about? She explains it in more Western form, in light of the soul. And it had a very big impact on my mind. One other book I found interesting was Ouspensky, P.

P.D. Ospensky, The Fourth Way. And it's about how to obtain more awareness and consciousness and self-discipline and self-control. And I found that to be very powerful. And the last book I liked was Jeffrey Lant, The Unabashed Self-Promoter's Guide. It's about how to get on shows, how to conduct an interview.

and how to want people to want you back again. And hopefully you will want me back again. But that's where I learned. I don't know everything. I learned from people who know more than me. And I've been on over 2,000 shows. So I'm going to say it helped. So I'm trying to throw out a few different topics and books that should help our audience to achieve another level of success.

Yeah. Thank you so much for sharing those books. I haven't heard of them. So definitely look them up and place an order as soon as this conversation is over. So Howard, this has been a wonderful conversation. I'm sure listeners would love to learn more about you and your work. Where's the best place for them to go? Well, berglearning.com. It's B-E-R-G. The link is right below the podcast. You don't have to go to Berg Learning. Just click on the link. It'll

It'll take you there and you can try the program risk-free. You know that there's some free lessons as well. And then when you get the program, you're going to learn it because we're going to make sure you learn it. And it's going to change your life. You'll be able to learn more in less time, make better decisions, fewer mistakes, and ultimately increase your productivity and profit because everything you do is based on one thing, what you know.

I've read almost 30,000 books. If I'm an idiot, I'm well-informed. But a lot of the breakthroughs we see is people read something that other people in their area didn't read, and they saw a new way to do an old thing better because they saw a strategy someone was using in a totally unrelated area that would help. That's what reading does. It gives us more dots on our map.

When we connect those dots, we make breakthroughs. And that's what I want to see happen. We need solutions to so many problems in our world today. And I'm hoping that I can't solve every problem, but those watching today, as they get smarter and learn more, can start being part of the solution and help us find some of those answers we're looking for.

Well, I could have said it better myself. Howard, that's, I think, a wonderful place to end. And I just want to thank you again for coming on the Reader's Journey podcast today and talking about your book, Super Reading Secrets. Thank you so much. Thank you for having me. Hey, everyone. I hope you enjoyed this episode of the Reader's Journey. You can learn more about what's covered in today's podcast in the show notes below.

If you enjoyed this podcast, the best way you can support it is by subscribing and leaving a positive review. If you're looking for reading tips or book recommendations, head over to alexandbooks.com. If you want to join my reading journey, you can follow me on Instagram and Twitter by searching for Alex and Books. That's all for now. Thank you so much for listening, and I hope to see you soon. Read on, everyone.