transcript

Speaker 1:
[00:00] Welcome to Kwik Brain, bite-sized brain hacks for busy people who want to learn faster and achieve more. I'm your coach, Jim Kwik.

Speaker 2:
[00:08] Free your mind.

Speaker 1:
[00:10] Let's imagine if we could access 100% of our brain's capacity.

Speaker 2:
[00:15] I wasn't high, wasn't wired, just clear. I knew what I needed to do and how to do it.

Speaker 1:
[00:20] I know kung fu. Show me. What if the biggest threat to your future is not artificial intelligence, but your own untrained mind? What if in a world where machines are getting smarter every day, the real risk is that humans are not? What if the people who win the next decade aren't the ones who necessarily know the most, but the ones who could think at their best? Welcome back to the Kwik Brain podcast. I'm your host, your brain coach. This is a show where we don't just talk about learning, we talk about how to upgrade the most important technology you will ever own, which is your mind. And today's conversation is, I believe, one of the most important that we have ever had, because I think everyone is feeling this. Because we're talking about something that will define your future and future generations, which is human intelligence. And I'm joined by someone who's been building this with me from the ground up. She is my co-founder, our CEO, Alexis Bank. Welcome.

Speaker 2:
[01:30] Thank you for having me.

Speaker 1:
[01:32] You're always welcome because this is also your podcast. I appreciate more and more how you've been doing more things public-facing. You're always like the mastermind behind the brain. We say the brains behind the brain brand that we have. So this is a real treat.

Speaker 2:
[01:53] Thank you. And I think talking about human intelligence, I also try to really expand in different areas. And for sure, speaking is not my forte, but I ask myself, why not? I mean, if other people can do it, I'm sure I can. And I know a lot of things are illogical. I mean, I know I'm pretty good at the whole mindset thing, rewiring the mind. But sometimes it's not just the mind, right? We can try to willpower through so many things. But there are things that are beyond the mind, which is our body, the nervous system. And I think that's where human intelligence really lives. It's the it's not just the data and the knowledge and information, but embodied information. So even though it's challenging for my nervous system, I'm like, you know what? I'm going to keep at it and see where it goes. Because I think that's where our true intelligence is hiding.

Speaker 1:
[03:08] We get a lot of comments in our community because we have students online in every country and on social media, where they appreciate you when you share your story, and we won't go into it in this episode. But you and I had similar different but parallel challenges with education and feeling not so great about ourselves, where people would refer to us as not so intelligent or slow. And it's wonderful that building this brand over the time that we've done this for almost 20 years, it's where we take our mess and turn it more into our mission. And I want to contextualize this because we've mentioned intelligence a couple of times. And on everyone's mind is AI, right? We always hear this phrase that AI, artificial intelligence is going to replace humans. Is there, in your opinion, because you've done a lot of research, you apply this, if you apply things so quickly, both in your personal life, with your family, with your kids, with the business, what's your view? Right? A lot of people, they're very scared. It's like this dystopian challenge, or AI is going to do our jobs, it's going to replace the workforce. Are you optimistic? How do you view technology? And then what do you see that's making us valuable as humans? If AI can remember everything, it has access to everything. So everybody has access to all the information in the world, knowledge. So today, human intelligence is even information it used to be. Right? But now it's our ability to adapt, right? You know, and build those other characteristics. So how are you viewing AI versus HI?

Speaker 2:
[04:56] I find it kind of interesting because, you know, the work that we've been doing for a long time, almost two decades, and even before AI, before social media, before any of the technologies that we have now, what we've been doing is we've actually been going against the education system, not that the teachers are bad or anything, it's just the system itself. We weren't really taught how to learn, how to think. And right now, that entire system is being challenged in every industry. What's interesting is that we're so quick to try to defend that system that's been designed to keep us limited, essentially. And yes, AI will replace a lot of things. But my question is like, okay, great. We've been trying to replace this thing for so long. And now that we have the opportunity to do so, I think people are just scared because they don't, they're uncertain about what else is possible. And I think if we can give people a better perspective, or at least help people to think outside of the box, maybe we're completely missing the solution that's right in front of us.

Speaker 1:
[06:16] Kind of like the elusive obvious.

Speaker 2:
[06:18] Elusive obvious, and because we're just taught like, this is what life is all about, but what if it's beyond this? What if, yes, the jobs will be replaced, but my question is, were we meant to do those in the first place? Is that all there is? Without going deep into my story, that was the challenge that I kind of had growing up. I always asked, what is the meaning of life? And are we really just here against all odds? We can go to school, learn some things, get a job, and then work some more, pay taxes, and then die. That sounds really limited. What else is possible?

Speaker 1:
[07:03] And then there are many examples throughout history. We don't have to go through them where people were fearful of technology decades ago that would replace jobs. But technology does make things more convenient. We're generally pro-technology, right? It's also how it's applied. With me, when I'm doing brain training, I'm focused on just not the heavy reliance on technology to remember everything, to think for us because the human aspect, it's just like taking an elevator to your apartment or to your office. Yes, technology, an elevator is a form of technology, but then the consequence is we don't get the steps in, right? And then there's a physical toll, and if I put my arm in a cast for a year, it wouldn't grow stronger, it wouldn't stay the same, it would atrophy. And my concern is the high reliance on technology, to think for us, then we don't even have to utilize that. And neuroplasticity is you use it or lose it, right? And so I think we always have that choice in terms of when we apply technology. And even when we talk about becoming limitless, it's about leverage. And technology, you use technology in every area of our business, use it in your personal life, use it with your children also as well. And it's always changing, it's always evolving. My challenge is where AI is exponential and it's just that human intelligence, is under protected, it's under managed, and it's definitely under trained. Like you mentioned in school, they teach you what to learn, what to memorize, what to think, but not how to do those things, how to adapt, how to unlearn, how to relearn, and be able to do the things that I feel like are more human qualities.

Speaker 2:
[08:46] Yeah. And if you look at the education system, it really grew because of industrial era. And it taught people how to perform in factories. So if you look at certain education system, the way people are taught to think, it's in a very linear fashion. So it's like cause and effect. But there are a lot of different dynamics. And also, it's more about systems thinking. But we're not taught those. And if you, the more you learn about your mind, we always say this to people, it's much more powerful than you could have ever imagined. It's everything. But what does that mean? And what I learned is that we're not very good at seeing things that we haven't experienced or we haven't been exposed to. So if you don't have experience in something, if you're not exposed to it, you're not going to be able to see it. And that's okay. That's actually, that's good to know. That's good blind spot to know. Because all you know, it's not all there is. So it keeps open to idea that, okay, this is what I know now, but where are my blind spots? What am I not seeing? That's there. And that question alone gets your mind to start looking for things or notice things or have that like tiny little signal that you may pick up that you normally would have ignored, but you may start paying attention to it. So I think being able to ask better questions, we're not even taught how to do that. We don't even know that there are different kinds of questions that lead to different answers. Questions are literally directions given to the brain, what to look for.

Speaker 1:
[10:30] Like prompts in an AI.

Speaker 2:
[10:32] Exactly. It's like a GPS system. It tells where the brain to go, and AI is very similar. So it's really about how you directed, what the outcome you're looking for, and being able to communicate that properly is the difference between mediocre results versus something that's really, really great that you would have missed otherwise. So I think that's the huge distinction. But if you don't know that's possible, or that it's there, or that it's even an option, you're not even going to look for it.

Speaker 1:
[11:03] Well, we hear that AI helps you to scale, it helps you to amplify, but it only scales and amplifies what you bring to it, your human intelligence. You and I were talking before we started filming in the studio here, and that it's kind of like Tony Stark's Iron Man suit. The Iron Man suit with Jarvis, AI.

Speaker 2:
[11:23] Oh, I love this. Yes.

Speaker 1:
[11:25] It's one of those things, we will geek out over superheroes. But it's kind of like the suit is the AI. It amplifies. But what is it amplifying? It's amplifying Tony Stark's intelligence. He would operate it much more effectively than another superhero, each of us, and so on, because he's what he brings to it. It's kind of like with our business, we train a lot of race car drivers and F1 drivers, that priceless car, that technology is like AI, but it's the driver that makes the difference.

Speaker 2:
[11:56] You put me in that same car, it's not going to get the same result.

Speaker 1:
[12:00] It's what the driver brings to the technology that allows it to be effective, and it's like a partnership. It's almost like it's artificial, maybe it's artificial intelligence. Maybe it's more accurate for me, it's like augmented intelligence. You're partnering with something to help you to create a result, like any technology, more conveniently, more powerfully, higher leverage.

Speaker 2:
[12:21] And I love the analogy of Iron Man and Jarvis, because if you look at the first one came out a long time ago. I remember when I first saw it, I freaked out. This is the most amazing thing in the whole world. But if you watch the interactive dialogue that Tony Stark has with Jarvis, he's literally guiding Jarvis to what to look for. It's like, okay, what about this? What about that? No, take this off. And he's guiding their co-creating something together. And that's what I do with AI too. It's like, okay, this is what I'm sensing. These are the coordinates that I'm looking at. What am I missing? There's something that's incomplete. Like I need to know, and how would you weigh this against that? And you're always like, it comes from what you're sensing, what you're seeing, but you don't have the structure or the word that you can put into it because it didn't exist before. So when it comes to that, AI can run through a lot of different similar patterns to help you nail down what you mean precisely. So that's been a really, really helpful and powerful process. So it's not AI giving you what to create or the answers, but it's guiding you because you're directing what to look for. So that's the biggest difference. And I find this so powerful. It's been helping me to structure my thoughts way better and helping me to organize information because my mind can go into all different directions.

Speaker 1:
[14:04] And then the human beings have these cognitive biases, these blind spots that you mentioned, and we bring that to AI. So just it could amplify. If you have a chaotic mind or confused mind, AI can amplify that. You ask questions just like as we ask questions to our internal operating system, like, why can't I ever learn this? Right? Or why am I so slow? Then that's like prompts and like, oh, here are all the reasons why you can't learn this.

Speaker 2:
[14:30] And your brain will find the reasons for you.

Speaker 1:
[14:32] So, HI is kind of, it's like providing the direction, right? Through thoughtful prompting or questions, which is questions just as the process of thinking to yourself and answering questions of yourself. But it's also decides like, what I find fascinating is AI has this infinite capacity, near-infinite capacity where it could do pattern recognition, it could do research, it could do computation, right? But ultimately, human beings determine the direction of something, and also what things mean, and also what to do afterwards, right? Human beings still have to do that themselves. And my challenge is that as you mentioned, AI is exponential, but human beings, our human intelligence hasn't grown and kept pace anywhere near as fast as technology has done it. You know, you and I saw the months ago, they had this MIT study where they work with students who had writing essays, and they put them in three groups. One used ChatGPT, one used Google, one just did it with their own brain, right? And then they followed up and they saw the cognitive engagement for each group. And the study suggested at MIT that those who relied completely on AI to do the work for them had lower scores than all three of them, right? So in your experience running this global brand in the area of education, do you feel, in your experience in AI, do you feel that AI is making us less intelligent?

Speaker 2:
[16:04] Well, also to complete on that study, what they found is that people who were outperforming, just by using their brain, against people who were using AI to start with, when they use AI, the results were even more stellar than what they could do alone, because they were mirroring their thinking pathway to AI. So AI knew how to get there even faster, and it will help you to see things faster. So that's the combination. It's really having that foundation, the neural network of training your mind. AI is not going to give you all the answers. Yes, it will give you the answers, but it won't build a neural pathway for you. And you have to do that job, because when you have a certain neural pathway to get to going from ideation to implementation, and execution to creation, when you know your process around it, you can see where you can leverage and what you can minimize, or what you can switch out. Like you have that process. So that's a very different usage of AI. So I think the question is not, is AI dumbing people down, but is it really, have we been set up? Like, is there like prerequisite of work that we have to do to show up to best leverage the tools? Sometimes I feel like AI, it's like giving a box of matches to kids. Be like, here you go. Do whatever you want with it. I think that's, that may not be the goal. I think that you have to learn, like, okay, you have to think about, there are things that you have to think about, there are prerequisite things, whether it's training your mind or even just thinking about your own mind, learning about why you think the things you think about, and why do you feel that way? And without understanding your inner environment, you're not really going to know, like, some of the best tools will work against you if you don't know what's going on inside of you. So I think even just having a simple step of slowing down, taking a step back, and really just start having conversation with yourself. I find that to be the most effective thing someone can do. You don't even need technology. You can just have, like, just have simple conversations. Like, hey, how are you doing? What's going on in there today? Where is this coming from? And just having that conversation, knowing that care and love to your own internal dialogue, it's helpful.

Speaker 1:
[19:04] Yeah, we talk a lot about the emerging property. You know, we have an operating system that we've created to help people upgrade their human intelligence, right? And it's not IQ. Where IQ is, you know, decades ago, it was a standardized test that you take, let's say, you're eight years old, and that's your potential when you're 88 years old. And fundamentally, I'm not for that because it says, these are the markers which are antiquated, just like our school system. Assembly line, you know, industry led to assembly line education, like your manufacturing date is your grade, is cookie cutter, one size fits all, treating everybody as if they learned the same, you know, not personalized like AI could do for you today. So there are definitely some pros and benefits. In Limitless, we talk about how AI could actually enhance your HI. You could take all the principles of space repetition, personalize, you know, quizzing yourself. Everything's very measurable. It could give you the information and the preferred learning style and so much more. So I think that's a wonderful way of creating less friction to get where you need to go. And it's interesting because they say if Rip Van Winkle woke up today, the guy that's left for decades, the only thing he would recognize today are classrooms. And again, just like you said, it's not a slight against teachers. And my mother became a special education teacher to help me with my learning difficulties and stay throughout the New York public school system. But the system hasn't changed. So systems are really hard to change because, you know, after people are doing something a certain way over and over again, people tend to stay with what's familiar. And also systems tend to be incentivized and working for people that, you know, set up the system. You know, we're very pro-agency, where we want to give people of every age and stage more intelligence. And I'll define intelligence as functionally, how to use your brain and your mind to create a result, right? Your intelligence is your ability to create the life you desire and deserve. If somebody is very book smart, but they can't create a result, how intelligent really are they? If you're using that as the measure. And so we talk about a dozen different pillars of building human intelligence that aren't going to be as easily outsourced to AI, things that make us more human. And the emergent property of that, when you develop those dozen, then you have high intuition, wisdom, confidence. These are things that you don't have to train. They're emergent property of your creativity, of your flow states, of your state regulation, of your ability to make better decisions, of being cognitively flexible. We know, because I know you spent a lot of time with business leaders at high levels, that industries just go over, like Kodak created the original technology for digital photographs. But where are they now? They weren't cognitively flexible. They were in a vertical, and they thought that this was the way, and then that became extinct. You know, a blockbuster. I mean, there's so many examples, right, where people aren't flexible. But cognitive flexibility is just another pillar of our intelligence. Like, we can't be set in just one way of doing things, because while we live in an age of artificial intelligence, for human beings, I feel like we're almost in, we're in the age of adaptation. And that's our superpower, our ability to adapt rapidly with change, because change is the only constant.

Speaker 2:
[22:42] Then yeah, and things always changed. The difference now is that it's just happening faster before, especially in the beginning, it was very, very slow. Most people never, you just, you're born in the same place and you die in the same place. It's now it's becoming less and less and less, and it's just going to get faster and faster and faster. But it's, it's in our DNA to adapt. We are meant to adapt. It's just constant evolution. And we learn when we evolve through learning. Learning and collaborative effort really is what drives evolution. So it's not about trying to get things perfect, but it's okay if you don't know if we, how can we ever know if, if it's something that we haven't experienced, but just being open to that and knowing that, yeah, you know what, things are going to change. And I just have to learn how to be adaptable. No matter what happens that I'll figure it out. And that's kind of the mindset that I have. It's like, okay, well, whatever happens, I'll figure it out. It's not the end of the world.

Speaker 1:
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Speaker 2:
[26:24] There's misunderstanding between thinking and habits. So people often misunderstand habit as thinking. It's really not. Thinking is being able to see a repetitive pattern and being able to see like, hey, wait a minute, what's going on here? Why is this continuously repeating? That's actually thinking. And that's the beginning of metacognition, being able to look at the loop and pause and look at, wait, why am I doing this again? What's going on here? When did this start? Those questions, it's like opening the door to metacognition, start to think about your own thinking and what's going on.

Speaker 1:
[27:08] And what I love is we've injected metacognition to every module of the system that we've created to help people. Because you get on your computers, on your phones, on your apps, it's always these notifications to update them, right? Because it'll get rid of bugs, it'll make them run more, hopefully more efficiently. But when's the last time we upgraded this technology, this operating system that's controlling our entire life, right? Our happiness, our focus, our income, everything is coming from that place, as the control center, the nervous system, which the brain is part of your nervous system also. It's challenging because with AI, there's just even more overload and more distraction and more competing noise. And I know you talk a lot about finding and discerning. It's almost like we need to refine our filter system. With all the information available, what do we, it's like someone in a book highlighting everything and everything's important, then nothing becomes important, right? But at any given moment, there are millions of stimuli. You could be focusing on your environment or in your thoughts, and what you determine is important determines everything.

Speaker 2:
[28:19] And it's really the wiring, because if you look at the entire system that's designed for reactive thinking, being in a reactive mode, and I mean, I've been in that mode too, so I know exactly what that feels like. And you're just, you're always reacting to what's going on or like the environmental factors. It's never truly in proactive mode, because we're just not, we're not taught to be in that mode. The environment is not settled for that. So unless you proactively decide like, okay, I'm reacting to everything that's going on. And even if you think like you're proactively doing your, doing your chore and going through like, you know, all your to do list, a lot of those activities are reactionary activities. They're not truly, truly proactive activities. And being able to really look at an audit and think, and you talked about the distractions and all the noise. Until you disconnect from those, you don't really know what noise is because you're so drowned in it. It's really hard to tell.

Speaker 1:
[29:32] It's like a fish. It's like a fish in water. Yeah, they don't even recognize the water. They don't even know what water is because it's always been with them. It's like the matrix is all around us.

Speaker 2:
[29:42] It's simple, but it's like the hardest thing to do. It's just stopping that flow of noise. That's really, really hard. And when I had to go through this several times, and it happens like in cycles, when I finally realized, I was like, you know, all you have to do is just get really good at sitting with yourself without doing anything in complete silence and be totally okay with it. That's all you have to do. And until you get there. But I was like, this is so simple, but it took me such a long time. It's so hard to do. And then you start to see your brain a little bit differently. Because I used to have, you know, I used to pry the brain powers like a lot and just put that in. And I still do. I just have a little different relationship now. And I saw like how vulnerable it is to it's very, it's easily programmable. And that's good and bad thing, right? You can because it can go both ways. The good thing is that yes, you can change at any moment when you decide. You can rewired like a whole bunch of things. But the opposite is also true. A lot of times we're not even aware that it's been you're being like we're being pro-programmed. So that and that could happen in an almost instant. This, I think you talk about like the biases, it's all around us and we think we're making choices, but we're really not. You know, it's not coming from a place of proactive choice-making places, really coming from the reactive choice-making place, from things that we are conditioned to make. So it's very predictable. So when I look at certain patterns, I know, like, okay, so these are programmed. Like, those are all predictable outcomes.

Speaker 1:
[31:32] You know, I have a high respect for you for a number of reasons. But also your ability to change your mind on something based on new data or new information. You know, a lot of people, their identity is set with, you know, they're looking for things with the reticular activating system to reaffirm and validate what they already know. They don't really want to learn something new. This is not a judgment, but this is just an observation, and I'm guilty of it also, right? Where you hear new information or new data, but you've leaned so much into this. And for me to say that I was wrong, and it's like me saying, like I've dedicated the past X amount of years to something, and that was waste, or it's an ego challenge. You know, and so I feel like that, you know, the better we know, or the more we know, the more and better we could do based on that new information. Because ultimately we're, you know, why I think memory is so important is you can only make decisions based on the information you have in any given time, which presupposes you remember it. The people watching or listening, they lost half of their memories. How effective would they be? And how happy would they be? How connected would they be with their loved ones if they forgot half of the words they know, half the people they know, everything, right? On the other side, when you can magnify that, and memory is only one of a dozen pillars for human intelligence that's trainable, that's not fixed like your shoe size. But I also feel like, wow, what an amazing, like if you want to improve your self-esteem overnight, study this operating system, right? Like meta-cognition is so fascinating to me. So meta-learning, which is one of the things that we have in our flagship education academies is learning how to learn, right? Meta, it's about itself, learning how to learn. Meta-cognition is thinking about your own thinking. And that, what an incredible like superpower that is for human beings. But there is a quote out there that says thinking is the hardest work there is. That's why few people indulge in it, right? That we have 60,000 thoughts a day, which are a lot of thoughts, or maybe it's a little, or maybe we're giving too much credit to some people. But the challenge is, I think most people would agree that most of those thoughts are the same thoughts you had yesterday, and the day before that, the day before that. So how do you create a new result in your life, in any area that's important to you if you're thinking about it the same way, with your attitudes and assumptions about something, right? And so I love having this conversation, because I don't think it's often something that people, that we're always aware of, because metacognition starts with awareness, awareness of your beliefs, your identity, your values, your self-talk, your cognitive biases, which we go through in various modules of our, of the human intelligence operating system. And we have, we develop a scout method where you can actually navigate through reality and see things other people don't see. And it also, it's almost like a magician or somebody who's a lead where they're performing and people around, they don't even understand how you're doing what you're doing, right? But I do believe genius leaves clues that are, there are patterns that are mostly unconscious, either by the performer or they're unconscious by the people around them. And that creates those kinds of biases. So, you know, I'm thinking about today, somebody's listening or watching this right now, and, you know, they're listening, you know, and maybe they agree or they don't agree. What are some of the, what's your focus in terms of the future? Like, when you're thinking about AI, you're thinking about human intelligence and its relation together, and hopefully one is supporting the other. But, you know, how are you using AI to transform yourself, whether it's, you know, personally or professionally? And what would your advice be to somebody who's listening or they happen to be watching as a starting point? Because a lot of people have fear around technology. But I just want to remind people that throughout history, people always fear technology. You have some early adopters, but an early form of technology is fire. You know, fire wasn't good or bad. Fire could cook your food, or fire could be used to burn down your home. It's just how it's applied. But they're all, you know, we're surrounded by technology, and that's all came through the human mind. Like I'm a fan and a student of biomimicry, right? Where you're learning from nature, and a lot of technology was inspired by nature, by the principles of nature, right? And it's interesting that in nature, like there are creatures that have superpowers, right? We talk about Iron Man and others, you know, like using the power of his mind. But, you know, there's some creatures that could breathe underwater. There are some creatures that are incredibly fast. There's some creatures that could fly. We can't inherently do any of that, but because of the power of our human intelligence, we can fly. We can go underwater. We can go super fast, right? And that's the power, and I think it's the ultimate superpower. And can you imagine going through life being Superman and not knowing you have those powers?

Speaker 2:
[36:32] I don't think people are scared of technology. I think they're scared to really discover what's within us. If we are truly beyond what we thought we were, who is that standing on the other side of that place?

Speaker 1:
[36:53] You remind me of that Mary and Williamson quote, where our greatest fear is not that we're inadequate or none of, it's that we're powerful beyond measure.

Speaker 2:
[37:00] And I think that may be a very subtle subconscious fear that we have. So even with the technology, we're not looking for ways to truly expand our minds, our capacity. We're looking to reinforce what we've been doing. And I see this problem time and time again across many industries. I think even with AI and other things, people are trying to do more of what they were doing, but faster. And that's fine. It's fine. I'm like, yeah, I'm all for it. Let's just eliminate all these things so that we can actually, like now then we can really think about what we're here to do.

Speaker 1:
[37:46] I mean, even like how technology and AI could automate things that maybe we don't want to do. There's all kinds of forms of technology people have in their homes that make things easier. And you know, dishwasher.

Speaker 2:
[37:57] Yeah. And I ask people the question too. And I asked myself this also, like if I didn't have to do any of this, like what would I be doing? And I think people are more afraid of that question because they feel like if they didn't have to do any of it, they may fall into certain habits and behaviors that may not be really, they know it's not good for them, but they may choose to go to that route because they haven't really had the space to think about what else is possible. I always talk about it as like the either things can go expansive or it can be expanding or contracting. So you have to look at your behavior. Like am I moving towards expansion? When I'm given the time and space, what am I doing? Is it what I'm focusing on expanding me or is it contracting me? And when you can start to allow yourself to really think about what that expansion looks like and feels like for you, it's going to feel scary no matter what happens. Any kind of disruption in what you're trying to hold on to is going to feel uncertain and scary. But if you got a taste and a little bit of experience, even in your own imagination, what that expansion feels like, you will chase after it and you will fight through all the limitations and look for ways to utilize it in a way that it will expand you because there's so much more. I really believe without going too far into the band of where I think things are going or what's possible. It's not guaranteed, of course, we always have the choice to go either way every day. So it's hard to make that prediction, but I think there's just so much more. There's so much more that we have yet to discover. There's so much more that's within us. And even though I love learning, I love new information, I truly believe everything that we need to know is already within us. It's really about just bringing out more and more of what's already in you.

Speaker 1:
[40:15] I mean, you think about the natural state. You have children, I have children. That natural state is possibility, is imagination. Everything is doable or possible or figureoutable. There's a sense of play, there's a sense of wonder, there's a sense of awe. And I feel like some critics would say, until they get into traditional education where it's more structured, and repeat this over and over again until you take this test, and then get this kind of grade or whatever it happens to be. And again, take the judgment out of it. There are these studies where they take five-year-olds. I think it's not just about evolution, it's about expression of that evolution. One of my friends of mine in my mind is Bruce Lee as a mentor, and he said the purpose of human is to fully express yourself. And part of that is to the creativity, like an artist, right? There's a science and art to life, and they'll do these things with kids and say, how many artists are in the room at five years old? And 100 percent of them will raise their hand. They'll follow up 10 years later, only 10 years later, and maybe they're teenagers and say, how many artists are in the room? And like 5 percent of the room will be artists, right? But in some critics would say, it's because through education or saying a certain way that it squelches our creativity, our sense of possibility. It's like, this is the track that you're on, and I certainly felt that way. And my guidance counselor never offered me this possibility of being an entrepreneur, or being a creative, or driving some kind of mission, or as a coach. And so, you're right. What we know is not all there is to know. And we do have these biases, all of us do, because we are human. And I think that's what makes the world interesting, because we're not exactly the same. So there's some texture there.

Speaker 2:
[42:15] I think that's exciting.

Speaker 1:
[42:17] It is, because you can learn from everybody, either through example or through warnings. But also even like, we were just spending time with some amazing entrepreneurs of legendary brands that everyone watching would know. And Peter Diamandis says this, we were on his innovation board when they first got started early on X-Prize. The day before something becomes iconic, it was a crazy idea, right? Because creators are able to see something visible and make it visible when other people can't see that because they have their blind spots, or they have belief issues about what's possible. And sometimes I like reading two things. People think I just read non-fiction all the time in terms of for business or for teaching or science and psychology. But I also love biographies, and I love fiction because what does fiction do? It opens up the possibilities. When you're reading books on sci-fi in the future, it's like, wow, it just opens up different. I feel literally like parts of my brain opening up. Or even when I'm reading biographies and seeing what people went through and how they saw something, and they were called crazy for it, but they were right. Sometimes often they're not even recognized for decades later, that they get the Nobel Prize, when it's just that the work has passed. But I find it fascinating how human beings are. While we study neurological networks, but it's also the social network of every human being on the planet.

Speaker 2:
[43:46] I feel like I change a little bit too frequently. I don't mind that. I'm like, well, you know what? That's just how it is. And I think it's exciting that I... And I know I give people warning. It's probably... I'm sure two years from now, it will change again. And, you know, I...

Speaker 1:
[44:08] And you kind of hope it does.

Speaker 2:
[44:10] Yeah. And it would be... It would be sad if that's all there is to know, like, in this current state. Although, like, I would have never been able to imagine the state that I'm in now, even like three or four years ago, even five years ago, it's just... There's such a huge gap. And it just keeps exceeding my expectation and imagination over and over and over again. So now I'm kind of, like, wired and trying to think, okay, what else is possible? I'm pretty sure, like, I'm going to say something completely different two years from now, so...

Speaker 1:
[44:46] And so to Alexis who's watching this two years from now, how are we doing here? You'd mention nature and you'd mention evolution, and the opposite of evolution, because everything in nature, you're right, it's green and it grows or it's brown and it rots, nothing stays the same. That's the one thing. We can't stay same. Even if you have the same money in the bank, there's inflation, there's always things that change in the environment. But I feel like the opposite end of evolution, if we don't evolve, then we become extinct. Because everything in nature grows or dies, and everything in nature also has to contribute, or it's rendered extinct. And so I feel like one of the reasons why, I am pro-technology, I am very optimistic. I am concerned about, there are movies out there, if you're barring on fantasy, of whether it's The Matrix, whether it's Terminator, whether it's Idiocracy, or Wall-E, where people totally neglect their bodies, and they're hooked up to digital devices, and just eating whatever they are, which with all the processed foods, and our podcast isn't going to be sponsored by any time soon, by any fast food or some of these retail brands. But it also makes it harder to think for yourself. You have the fluoride, the chemicals, that just makes it hard, it takes more neurological energy to be able to think independently, to be able to unplug, if you will. But I do want to go back to that silence where you disconnect, because people think that if you slow down, they're going to lose ground, right? Because everyone feels like they're racing. It's a competitive world, you can't remain still. But you have a practice of creating white space, meaning there's nothing on the calendar, just to be with yourself. And the importance of that, I think that's a big takeaway, because that's something that I've revisited now. You know, there's a phrase in the military where, you know, slow is smooth and smooth is fast. But taking that time to learn from yourself, that introspection, right? The intrapersonal intelligence, interpersonal intelligence is you and somebody else, but intrapersonal is yourself to yourself. Really understanding yourself, who you are, having the curiosity to, you know, to be that person. Because I find that fascinating.

Speaker 2:
[46:58] It is. So we talked about how the mind is the most powerful thing. And when it gets to the metacognition layer, and once that develops, it's just, it's incredible. Before that happens, it's extremely humbling. Because metacognition is all about pattern recognition. And when you start to see that your patterns aren't that different from everyone else, we all go through the same pattern. The process is the same. What triggers the reaction and everything, it's very experience dependent, and everyone has, we all have our stories, and that's distinctive, it's different. But the cycle, the pattern, the process is all the same. So it's like, okay, first you realized, you're just like everybody else, and that's okay. And there's nothing like, you know, you're no different from every, and it's very, very humbling. And it's, it's a beautiful process, but that's, I think that part is hard. But once you integrate, and it's like, okay, now I'm open to learning because if I'm like everybody else, I can also be like the people that I look up to and, you know, how they operate because they have different wiring and different process they integrated. And then you start to look for that pattern, and you start to integrate that pattern because you see how malleable, like no matter what you choose, your brain will find ways to adapt to it. And that's really how your mind is, you know, it works. And once you realize that it's like, oh, wow, okay, this is really powerful. And then once you start to experience that level of operating. And that's why I think the more you integrate this, I don't know if you remember, like, you know, even like long time ago, like I couldn't finish a book. I didn't, I couldn't finish a book from cover to cover. It's, and when I first like finished that first book, it just felt like a huge win for me because I wasn't able to do that. And that, but that process took a long time. But once I figured out a certain system and process, I refined it over the years. One by one, everything that I wanted to integrate, it got faster and faster and faster. And now it's like, okay, I put my mind to it. I know what, how to look for the leverage points. And I go straight into it. I do like a deep dive into the things that are going to drive 80 percent of the results. And I just like break it down and I integrate really fast because I know what to let go. And I know how to like, you know, switch things. It just gets faster. Your brain is a learning machine. And I didn't even know that. It just kind of like, you know, you do it intuitively and then through the work that we've been doing, I was lucky enough to have like the pointers. So it helped me to guide my mind through like a different process. But I did that for every area, like whether it's the personal health or business. And suddenly like things just like, okay, you know what, like all this is noise. And then I knew how to compartmentalize, like put things into phases, the cycles, because you see the same pattern all around you, and we all go through the same thing. So that I think that's really, really powerful. So at first, it's that humbling process, and then it becomes like empowering process. So you mentioned before how everything either grows and dies. And we are changing all the time, but there are certain things that are core pillars when it comes to human intelligence. I'll offer you to go through some of them so that, while we are, like how that expresses changes through time, but I think at the core, things remain the same. And I always say the closer you get to the core, the simpler it becomes. But the further you get from the core, things seem more random and unrelated. But that's chaotic. But that's not true. It seems like that the expression changes all the time. But what it is, what's driving it, the engine stays.

Speaker 1:
[51:19] Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[51:19] What are the core?

Speaker 1:
[51:20] The outside, the external is more of a moving target, but the internal is constant. And that's what gives people peace. You know, I find that, you know, change is a constant, but change doesn't mean evolution. Change could be for the worse also as well. And so we have to adapt for that based on the feedback that we're getting. And, you know, that's a big part. So in these chaotic times, in a world of AI, the biggest thing that our community around the world, I mean, this is a global international challenge, is how to navigate the world, because we're navigating everything through our mind. Let's take, recently we were on an island with these founders, right? And investors and the people that are, have the attention of billions. And it's one of those things where, you know, I feel that in my estimation, where we're working with so many of the Fortune 500 companies, that the bottleneck, the thing that's holding us as a ceiling or a limit, keeping us stuck, is, let's say, a founder, because everybody ultimately is CEO of Ewing, right? So you're the founder of your own brand and business. What I would say is, it's not often technology, it's not often capital, it's not even always talent. The limitation is the cognitive capacity of leadership, right? So any business, the asset is the cognitive potential of your team, right? Our ability to adapt, to think, to make good decisions, to be creative, to innovate, those are all inherent, you know, human qualities. So we created what I feel like is one of the only, at least the preeminent science-based system for upgrading your human intelligence in a world of rapid change driven by AI. So there's certain pillars that will amplify our human intelligence, you know, which I feel like is our worth today in society, whether it's our income or influence or impact. And so some of them are intuitive, meaning like something like attention. Like, I don't think anyone would disagree that if they had stronger levels of attention, they were more, they could focus, they have focused fitness, that they would be more effective, you know, in the world, right? That's one pillar. Another pillar, which is so very important, that makes us human, are our emotions. So emotional regulation, state regulation. Because when you're in a state of survival or fear, or because uncertainty makes you scared and puts you in your survival brain, it holds you hostage to our human intelligence, to our ability to problem solve, to our executive functioning, to our ability to focus, to get into flow states, to be able to innovate and be creative, whatever you're creating in the world. Another one is learnability, accelerated learning, which is just one pillar. Everything we've done, whether it's even in our online academy, whether it's speed reading, memory improvement, focus, it all builds for greater levels of human intelligence. Another one is your ability to make great decisions quickly, especially so your ability to adapt and decide and choose. People see the choices you made, but they didn't see the options that you had. So how do leaders, elite cognitive athletes make better decisions? Another area is your ability is metacognition, which is imbued in everything that we do. How to be aware of your thoughts and how to be able to upgrade your thoughts to upgrade your life. Another one is something that we termed a cognitive flexibility, our ability to do mental parkour. This is kind of this cognitive cross fit where you're not stuck in just doing one thing one way that you're adaptable, that you see things from different angles. Where often a lot of innovation comes from people outside of an industry because it takes somebody outside who doesn't have the same cognitive biases, the same traditional education to look in and ask a new question, which is just a form of thinking, saying, with today's technology, why aren't we making automobiles this way, as an example? Another area is your identity, because I feel like ultimately the choices that we make are to remain consistent with how we perceive ourselves. But if someone perceives himself as less intelligent, if they perceive themselves as, I am a procrastinator, I am not worthy, I am fill in the blank, then that's going to be a ceiling that you set your thermostat on. And so the areas that we develop, cognitive endurance and anti-fragility, not where you're just bouncing back from adversity, you're actually bouncing forward. Because you notice everything in nature, like there's a hormetic response when you do a sauna. You don't go, like for me, cognitive resilience is just bouncing back to baseline. And that's great, right? But I think cognitive flexibility is you're actually stronger because of the struggle, right? Think about your children's immune system. If they're exposed to more bacteria and soil, then they're going to have more robust immune system. So it's actually stronger because of the stimulus, right? Just like working out. When you work out, you give yourselves a certain level of novelty and exertion, creates some stronger muscles, right? So I want people to be cognitively fit and start to see themselves almost like you. You think about an athlete who's fast, flexible, has endurance, has lots of energy. They have technique. Well, I want you to be cognitively flexible, cognitively strong, cognitively energized, cognitively nimble, right? And fast also as well. So this human intelligence operating system is the upgrade that we get notified on our phone to upgrade our phone or a certain app. But we're never upgrading this. And the challenge in the world today, as we've talked about, is AI is making everything exponential, right? But human intelligence, if anything, it's being under more stress, more overload, more distraction. It's waning. So that growing gap is what people are feeling. Fear, stress, overload, uncertainty that they can never catch up. So this is the upgrade that we've created. And what I love about it is not only am I doing these, you know, a dozen or more lessons where I'm teaching people the science and the practical things in their day, you've taken to a completely different level because we have labs with you where you're using AI and you're literally pulling the curtain back and you're showing people how you use AI to enhance your own human intelligence. And again, human intelligence for me is your ability to use your mind and your brain to create rapid results in your life, right? And you're utilizing your gifts. And so you use AI for all these areas that I've mentioned to develop cognitive flexibility, to develop introspection, self-awareness, to see how you're operating with metacognition in terms of where your blind spots are, and create a roadmap. And what I love about it, the synergy between the two, it creates this blueprint for people where we become their guides. I really wish, like everything we've created, whether it's with Kwik formulas or Kwik learning, we created programs or products. That we wish we had when we were going through all these struggles, right? And I feel like that's part of our mission in the world is, you know, shame on anybody who has insight or instruction or ideas that could help people who are struggling like they did and didn't share it. So I know we have a mission. We have a moral imperative to do so. But the other part of it is, you know, going through it, we teach the things we need to learn the most. And what I like about it is, what I respect is knowing a lot of the authors and experts in the space. And there's a trap with expertise, right? It's really known in science where you see yourself an expert, so you know everything, so you don't learn anything else, right? That's why a beginner's mind, an open mind is like a parachute only works when it's opened, right? But it's so important you practice what you post. So this came from our own personal experience, but also because we have such a big community and such a scaled platform, we get so much feedback. So we know what people are dealing with moment to moment because they tell us from around the world and there's certain patterns to that also as well. So I'm really excited about this system. It's not even a training course, right? It's not a program. It's a literal human intelligence upgrade. And when you upgrade, it's like trying to explain to somebody what a rainbow looks like that's never seen a rainbow, or smelling a rose that's never smelled like a rose, or taste a certain food that's never had that experience.

Speaker 2:
[60:33] And also this lab, I do want to add that it's not... I try not to go too easy. The difficulty gets... It becomes more difficult, because it is meant to challenge the mind, and the difference will be... You know, I think everyone knows that, yes, focus is important, and your attention, all of that creativity. It's kind of like reading about doing pushups in a book, but not doing it. So the lab will get you to really practice and audit your focus, all of those things. But it's not just focus. I have, so I'm taking, again, I look for ideas that are key leverage points. And what I would like people to learn at the end of it is how to communicate their ideas better and create new creativity, like just become like a cat, creating like a catalystic, like pot for creative ideas. So that would be like the exercise. And doing the exercise, it's really walking them through each step to activate metacognition. And I have a different learning arc, starting from how to ask questions. I think, as I said earlier, questions, they're the GPS system, the navigation system for the mind. We were not taught how to ask good questions. And I know this because I didn't know this for a long time. And we think, you know, questions are all the same, but it's really not. It creates different results, different answers. I start from there. But it's really about asking better questions, activating your senses, your imagination, being able to have memory, but not remembering things just to recite things back. It's remembering things to understand. So the relational recall, the memory is very different from just categorization. So those are the different elements that I kind of picked to use in this lab for people to really experience not just their mind and that introspection, but how to utilize AI, what kind of relationship you create. It's not to outsource what you're doing, but it's really becoming your thinking partner and how to direct it in a way that will give you the results that you're looking for. So people will be able to experience the first hand. So we're not just talking about theories, but they can practice in real time.

Speaker 1:
[63:13] So how do people, some people are going to start flooding us with messages about how do people find out more information?

Speaker 2:
[63:20] This is not going to be for everyone. Like you really have to like training. And you want to, if you want to go through like some challenging loops, I'm going to invite those who want to, who are ready to rewire their brains, because this is a foundational restructuring. It will be intensive, but it will be very rewarding. And if they would love to step up for the challenge for the next three months, it's like a 12 weeks, right? Like it's a 12 weeks. Like deliberate practice. It's going to...

Speaker 1:
[63:56] They're going to go on their own hero's journey, for sure.

Speaker 2:
[63:59] It's a hero's journey. But I think this is the foundational skill that people will need in the age of AI to truly thrive and be creative and be able to direct, bring out their creativity and become that proactive thinker that we discussed in this episode. So to find out more, it's jimquik.com/hi. Hi. Very easy. jimquik.com/hi.

Speaker 1:
[64:33] Yeah. I want to reiterate, this is not for everybody. This is something that's very raw. It's real, but it's also rewarding for people willing to do work. I found going through the labs, when we're beta testing this, mentally, that's my jam. A lot of the introspection, when you're, it takes a lot of courage to use AI to be able to introspect and use it as a partner, as a guide to help you look inward in terms of where your blind spots are, where your emotional wounds are, where your limiting beliefs are also as well. You know, but I feel like once you get that gets aligned, you go and navigate through your world differently. Like one of the, there are emergent properties by building these 12 plus pillars, confidence, intuition, wisdom, you know, self-esteem. Everything is an emergent property of accessing more of that human intelligence, right? And what I love about it is it's extremely practical. And the examples that we give, people are literally going to apply it right away in real time to their real life. So it's not theory.

Speaker 2:
[65:46] No. And also the good thing is that AI, like there's no emotional layer, so they don't judge you. It's, I found it interesting. A lot of people prefer to talk to their, you know, their chat instead of their, their spouse. It's because it's not judging. But if you're not directing it, it will, it will amplify what you bring to the table. And that's why it's really important to set proper, you know, guardrail on how you wanted to respond and walk you through. And in this lab, the way I designed it, initially it's going to do a lot of heavy lifting for you. So it's going to, it's going to be much more AI showing the example, giving like, you know, the instructions. But through the experience, the goal is to go from AI dependent to AI collaborative. So it's the thinking arc that evolves with the usage, because AI's job is to help the learner get confidence more and more and more so that they become co-collaborators. And eventually, AI is just the catalyst. So you're not looking to outsource or depend on it, but the agency goes more and more back to the learner.

Speaker 1:
[67:11] So final words. Tony Ram says this quote, saying something in the effect where it's your moments of decision where your destiny is shaped, right? The choices that we make shape our future, right? One step and another direction. If I'm going this way with life, maybe I feel frustrated, overloaded, distracted, whatever it is, I take one step this way. Like maybe this might be an on-ramp for some people. Then you end up in a completely different destination, or some people call it their destiny. And what I feel like this gives people is, I'm coming back to that word control again, where it gives them control of their life, where they're not, regardless of what's going on in politics, or the economy, or industry, or their job, or whatever it is, it gives people a sense, not only a purpose, but a power, where they have clarity and confidence to be able to do the right thing, the right way, at the right time, with the right people, right? And this is the system that would say, I mean, I'm going to go one step further. It's not for everybody, but if people feel like this is intuitively, because I feel like intuitively we know if something is for us or not, we feel a calling to it, and that's the first step of the hero's journey, is the answer to the call. If you feel like there's something deep down inside of you that is squelched, that maybe has been buried under doubt or other people's expectations or other people's opinions or fear of showing your power or maybe dimming your light because you're so scared it's going to shine in somebody else's eyes, but I would say the best way of helping other people around you is to be an example. I think the life you live are the lessons you teach. And just like you use any technology, whether it's a washing machine or a dishwasher or a car, an elevator, it's there to be able to amplify and make your life more convenient. What I love about AI is the personalized way of leveling up. It's almost like a video game, and I know you love video games also as well. You gamify. Having that time for the day. But in another lifetime where you have adversity, but you get experience through it, and then you level up and you power up. An AI just like Jarvis in the superhero world, in the Marvel world, or something else, it's an asset. It's a tool that we could use. We could choose not to use it. We could choose to use it for not so good things, and we could use it for great things. But I think the ultimate tool again is what's innate inside of us. Something that we haven't spent a lot of time in the world. When are people having conversations around their own innate genius? For their ability to be able to tap more of their potential and their purpose and their performance and power for whatever is important to them. So not for everybody, but I feel like it's non-negotiable for those who want that edge, whether it's in with their family, with their life, with their work, with their school.

Speaker 2:
[70:16] Yeah. And I think there's so much more that we can discover. I think human potential is something truly magical, and we are barely scratching the surface now. So I'm really excited to see what could unfold. There are challenges that we have to get through, as I mentioned even before the empowerment comes great humility. I think it's a natural process of how greatness is born. So even if with the setbacks, if you don't get it the first time, that's okay. That's normal. But just persevering, keep trying it again. If that method didn't work, what other ways can I try this? And just keep practicing and opening up your mind that way. It's going to get you so far, no matter what happens, you will figure it out, and you already have all the answers inside of you, I believe, that time and time again. In the beginning, when you don't know, you try to search outside for everything, all the answers. But everything always leads back to you. And that's what I have found. I think that's beautiful. Like even what we're creating here, it's just another, like it's an option. It's another avenue for people to initiate that process. But ultimately, if we've done our job correctly, they will find their own ways and create new solution because of this.

Speaker 1:
[71:56] Yeah. So I want to recognize to everybody that we know that change can be scary, that growth in any area of life can be hard, but nothing is as scary and hard as being stuck somewhere that you don't belong. And for me, this is about liberation. You know, it's about stepping into that because, again, you've heard me say this, but there's a version of yourself in the future that's just patiently waiting. Maybe it's waiting at the end of a few months. And the goal is we show up every single day until we get to be introduced to that version.

Speaker 2:
[72:32] I'm looking forward to it. Thank you, everyone, for joining us today.

Speaker 1:
[72:38] Thank you for your time and your attention. We know that today people could scroll past things and move on to the next entertaining meme or whatever it happens to be. But I really feel that in the world that we live in today, it's one of those things where your attention is currency and you pay attention. That even doesn't cost you anything to watch. There's something about the price of something, which is the investment to buy a supplement or buy a book or buy a house or whatever it is. But there's a difference between the cost, because the cost is what we pay for maybe not doing it. And for me, things aren't expensive. It's just, is it worth it or not? If you can invest something that makes your life a whole lot easier, helps you get a greater return, whether it's your income or impact or influence, or you're just your sole identity. I feel like an investment in your mind is it pays dividends. This is Alexis Bank and Jim Kwik. And until next time, always be limitless.