EVERY SPOKEN WORD
135 min read · 27,216 words- 0:06 – 1:15
Roundtable kickoff: defining “life hacks” and the format for the episode
- CWChris Williamson
Uh, speaking of which, Yusuf and Jonny from Propain Fitness are here today. Um-
- JOJonny
Where do we look? Can't look at the camera 'cause I have to walk-
- YUYusef
(laughs) Chris, I was smelling my armpit as (laughs) -
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- JOJonny
... when you introduced me.
- CWChris Williamson
It's fine. It's fine. That's really not the worst thing you've ever done on a podcast, is it?
- YUYusef
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
Um, so yeah, we're talking about life hacks today. Those of us who are addicted to trying to make our lives more efficient and optimal, we're gonna try and come up with some interesting resources (laughs) that we use that have made our lives a little bit more efficient. Um, I think that we all come from different kinds of backgrounds with what we need and what we choose to use, but then there's a lot of stuff that we've crossed over with as well. So it'll be a combination of workflow tools, apps for your mobile phone, uh, strategies that we use for making life more efficient. Um, and then probably quite a bit of stuff that none, none of us realised that the other ones did, and then we're going to just mock each other about it.
- JOJonny
I especially-
- CWChris Williamson
Scob.
- JOJonny
... what he says.
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah. Scob does that a lot.
- JOJonny
I'm especially excited to hear more about your list. (laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
Who would like... Who would like to open up the first resource?
- YUYusef
(laughs)
- JOJonny
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
Right, Scob, are you gonna go first?
- JOJonny
Scob, go.
- 1:15 – 6:48
The Apple ecosystem as a productivity ‘lock-in’: syncing, capture, and iMessage
- YUYusef
Okay. Well, I'm just gonna begin very basic and just say Apple products.
- CWChris Williamson
Yep, that was, yeah.
- YUYusef
This was, this was Jonny's as well. The, because Apple contains a suite of syncing... But the problem is, you're roped in.
- JOJonny
(laughs)
- YUYusef
As soon as you begin, you get a MacBook, you have to then get an iPhone, or you get an iPhone, you have to get a MacBook. Otherwise, you just, you're, you're in this sync nightmare between a Android or a PC device and then something else.
- JOJonny
(laughs) I'm uncomfortable with you looking at the camera.
- YUYusef
Okay.
- CWChris Williamson
I quite like it.
- JOJonny
I, it makes me uncomfortable.
- YUYusef
(laughs)
- JOJonny
Does it? (laughs)
- YUYusef
Right. Okay. Sorry, guys.
- JOJonny
That's, that's just how I feel.
- YUYusef
Jonny's uncomfortable, so...
- JOJonny
(laughs) Well, because it's, it's them. Like, you're spe... You're over there and I'm like, "Well, do I, do I look over there?"
- YUYusef
(laughs)
- JOJonny
And then back at you when I reply, and then back at the camera or-
- YUYusef
I think nod and smile at me and then look at the camera here.
- CWChris Williamson
Gesture to the camera, yeah.
- JOJonny
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
Well, imagine, imagine that you're Alan Shearer doing the, the Saturday afternoon football-
- JOJonny
Okay.
- CWChris Williamson
... talking into camera, but you're gesturing to the lads.
- JOJonny
Ugh, oh hey, the lads. So the point Yusuf just made-
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs) Yeah, the lads have just said.
- JOJonny
... I think... Anyway.
- CWChris Williamson
It's a, it's a fireside chat. It's a roundtable. Okay, continue.
- YUYusef
This is such a rocky start to the podcast. (laughs)
- JOJonny
Or it's the smoothest start we've ever done.
- YUYusef
Maybe.
- 6:48 – 10:45
Morning ‘launch sequence’: routines to prevent phone-driven derailment
- JOJonny
(sighs) I'm gonna say the, the theme or the concept which encompasses loads of things, but the concept of having a series of things that you do in order every morning before you do anything. Why are you smiling?
- CWChris Williamson
A morning routine.
- JOJonny
Yeah, but like, it doesn't have to be like a, it might just be one thing.
- CWChris Williamson
Okay.
- JOJonny
Or like it's, it's, I think for me, having, rather than just saying I have a routine like things that I do, it's specifically like, because I, in the morning I'm so open to, I'll pick up my ph- I'm like half asleep, you're making coffee, pick up your phone, check email. Before you know it, you've been sucked into this-
- CWChris Williamson
Mm-hmm.
- JOJonny
... situation at work or whatever. If I just make things as baby simple as possible for myself.
- CWChris Williamson
Okay, so give me what-
- JOJonny
It's like-
- CWChris Williamson
Give me your morning routine.
- JOJonny
So okay. Wake up, downstairs, coffee, journal.
- CWChris Williamson
Phone's still upstairs?
- JOJonny
Phone's actually with me.
- CWChris Williamson
Right.
- JOJonny
So I've, I've, I'm trying to, to put less like physical barriers and just, I'm just not gonna look at it.
- CWChris Williamson
Okay.
- JOJonny
Uh, journal, do the work, meditate, downstairs, make my girlfriend a cup of tea.
- CWChris Williamson
Mm-hmm.
- JOJonny
Make me potentially another coffee, depending on how tired I am.
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- JOJonny
Back upstairs, roll my yoga mat out in the bedroom while Becka's getting ready.
- CWChris Williamson
Mobility.
- JOJonny
Do ROMWOD, shower, downstairs.
- YUYusef
What's ROMWOD, Johnny?
- CWChris Williamson
That's mine. Get off.
- JOJonny
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- JOJonny
'Cause this is where it, it comes to so many things.
- CWChris Williamson
That's fine.
- JOJonny
Uh, prioritize for the day, start work. (computer error sound)
- 10:45 – 13:21
Phone boundaries and attention hygiene: sleep, visibility, and social effects
- CWChris Williamson
Um, so if you want us to do one on morning routine, drop us a message or, or give me a tweet or something and we'll, we'll put that together. I think as a sort of a little bit of a finishing point for that, the phone thing, it just comes back to it, we will be doing a number of episodes on how to not use your phone.
- YUYusef
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
But the main, one of the, the best thing that I've done is that I don't sleep with my phone next to me anymore. My phone is on the opposite side of the room next to the window. So for me to go and turn my phone alarm off, I have to get up and out of bed, go turn it off at the window, then pull the blind in the window to let light into my room, and then even if I get back to bed, I can't go to sleep again. Like as long as you're happy with the wake up time-
- YUYusef
And you feel like a dickhead for going back to bed?
- CWChris Williamson
I don't mind it.
- YUYusef
You've made a mistake.
- CWChris Williamson
I think I, I can go back to bed for like five minutes, but I'm, it's in, I'm in bright daylight now, so.
- YUYusef
Mm.
- JOJonny
You can always justify yourself, can't you? Justify it that like, "No, no, I, I need this extra 15 minutes."
- CWChris Williamson
Absolutely.
- JOJonny
I'm really tired this morning.
- CWChris Williamson
That n- that voice, that voice in your head goes and then, b- as soon as you're asleep you don't have control over how long you're back, back in bed.
- JOJonny
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
Um, it's just such a bad, it's a bad, bad way to start the day. Like, starting it with TV or starting it with your phone, it feels like, what's that thing that, um, Brian Johnson cites where he says that someone smoking a spliff drops their IQ by 15 points, but someone on their phone drops it by 25? So like in terms of the IQ effect that being on your phone has-
- YUYusef
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
... due to the amount of stimulus, your brain output suffers larger than if you'd smoked a joint.
- YUYusef
That's, like-
- CWChris Williamson
Put the phone down, pick the joint up, people.
- YUYusef
It's crazy. There's a-
- JOJonny
(laughs)
- YUYusef
... there's a lot (laughs) , there's a lot of things like that where, so when they say driving while texting is equivalent to driving under like six units of alcohol-
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah.
- YUYusef
... or whatever, sleeping with your phone in the room that you're in-
- GUGuest
... is equivalent to, like, psychologically or to the, to the impact that it has on your quality of sleep is equivalent to sleeping with your front door open. Um-
- CWChris Williamson
We've spoken about that.
- GUGuest
Yeah. (clears throat)
- CWChris Williamson
I, I see the point, but if ... Does anyone else feel that? Do you feel like when, when your phone's in the room and you we're probably so desensitized to it now.
- GUGuest
Not when it's, not when it's in the room, I don't think so. But I definitely notice a difference when I'm sat down and I can't see my phone. (laughs) Like if I can see, even if it's ... I always have it face down. The phone is always face down now. Even when I get into a meeting, phone always goes face down. But when I can see it, even out of the peripherals of my eyes, if I'm sat watching TV or I'm sat reading a book, if the phone is face down there, I can see the black and it, it draws my mind towards thinking that's not- That's another thing. So in social situations, this, I can't remember the, the number but it's, if a phone is even visible on the table, even if it's not in use, it still diminishes the sen- the perceived sense of connection and interaction with people you have.
- CWChris Williamson
I tend to, I think that you can get away with phone wallet.
- GUGuest
Maybe, yeah. (laughs)
- 13:21 – 19:41
ROMWOD: a prescriptive daily mobility system (and why prescription beats choice)
- CWChris Williamson
On top, that's probably okay. Um, I'm gonna do my first one, which I think we'll all agree with, which is ROM WOD. Um, actually Scobie, you might not agree with this, but I think you said the other day you were gonna go back on it.
- GUGuest
(laughs) I'm so ... ah, yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
You're gonna go back on... So ROM WOD is a daily range of motion, um, programming website. Every single day, they release a round about 20-minute routine of mobility to do. It's based on yin yoga, which is a slow, slow long-held stretches. Essentially it's mindful stretching. Um, the reason that it's so good, I think, is that it's so prescriptive, and it is something that everybody almost universally, whether you're an athlete or not, whether you do a lot of physical exercise or not, almost everyone ha- w- would benefit from having an improved range of motion from doing some stretching day to day. There's so many people that you hear that say, "I'd love, you know, I'd love to do some stretching, but I just either can't find time or don't know what to do." And the fact is that ROM WOD makes it so easy for you to do it. You put it on, either on your laptop or on your phone. There's a good mobile version of the site. And put either headphones in or play it through the speakers, and a guy talks you through the movements that you're going to do, and some good-looking guys and girls on screen demonstrate them, and they stay in the poses with you for the entire time.
- GUGuest
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
And then sometimes there's controlled breathing that you have to do along with it. The ... It's, it's just fantastic. It's such a good resource. You have access to every workout that they've ever put out before, and you can refine those down by what's tight. So you got a bad back, you got a bad neck, you got bad, you got tight hips, you got tight whatever, you can put in the things that they, that are, are bothering you, and it will do a meta-search through everything else and then come up with a routine that it thinks is good for you, or a res- a selection of routines. And, um, yeah, I think, uh, when I started doing crossfit, which is functionally a more demanding sport in terms of my range of motion, I, my mobility is still not good enough, but was terrible from years of not looking after it. And now, if you can imagine the stretch that you do that you used to be able to do in school where you put your hand, one hand goes up and behind your neck and the other hand goes up your back, and I was never able to get my hands to touch behind my back. Whereas now quite easily from cold, I can fall into it. If you're just listening, you'll have to imagine how lovely that looked. Um, but you-
- GUGuest
Can you do that, Johnny? I can't do anything close.
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah. Can you do arch your arms?
- JOJonny
I was doing it this morning.
- CWChris Williamson
Straight in.
- GUGuest
Nice.
- CWChris Williamson
Perfect. And you, you were miles away, right?
- JOJonny
I was, yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
At the start of the year? But what I still can't do is- Eagle arms.
- JOJonny
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah. I think that's because the dimensions of your ... so long.
- JOJonny
I'm just too Titanically muscular for you, aren't I?
- GUGuest
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
You're fucking huge.
- JOJonny
No.
- GUGuest
So tell me about ROM WOD.
- JOJonny
It's my, it's internal rotation on one side's worse.
- CWChris Williamson
Is it?
- JOJonny
Yeah.
- GUGuest
Right.
- JOJonny
Right, I think for me, ROM WOD is the same benefit as having, as outsourcing my training and nutrition to a coach.
- CWChris Williamson
Mm-hmm.
- JOJonny
In the sense that, like, I think mobility, because there are so many different ways, resources, uh, methodologies and, like, schools of thought in how you should manage it, it's so easy to get caught up so much in it that you just don't do anything, or you do something and overthink it and worry that it's not the best way to do it.
- CWChris Williamson
Mm-hmm.
- JOJonny
So for me, it's having someone else's put at least some level of thought into it.
- CWChris Williamson
Mm-hmm.
- 19:41 – 22:17
Consistency over novelty: ‘stick to the program’ and delayed performance gains
- CWChris Williamson
I think there's, there's a- an underlying assumption here or an underlying problem, and you guys, Propain wrote an article, Just Stick to The Programme, and I think the point is that-
- JOJonny
I don't remember writing that book. I'm more than happy to admit-
- CWChris Williamson
Take credit. (laughs)
- JOJonny
I did write it.
- CWChris Williamson
Past Johnny did it.
- JOJonny
Yeah. I must have, or I must have done.
- CWChris Williamson
And yeah, it was, uh, it was really, really good. Basically what it says is that if you've got something which is a system which works or something which is a system which is prescriptive and laid out, stick to it long term, because people are too, too prepared to flip between different approaches to anything that they're trying to achieve. And within the space of two weeks say that they didn't see progress.
- JOJonny
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
Like, well, there's entry barriers to everything that you're doing.
- YUYusef
Well, we get it with clients a lot and they, they complain about the results they didn't get from the programme that they didn't follow.
- JOJonny
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- JOJonny
See? (laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
There we go.
- YUYusef
And it's just like, well, if you stuck to something enough to see the result, you'd be able to make the decision yourself as to whether it's working or not.
- JOJonny
But yeah, the place to be in is to be able to say, "That didn't work." Or, "That did work." And-
- CWChris Williamson
If you can say neither-
- JOJonny
Chopping and changing doesn't give you the privilege to say either.
- CWChris Williamson
Mm-hmm.
- JOJonny
So I actually gave up RomWod. Chris will remember this day.
- CWChris Williamson
Mm-hmm. That's sad.
- JOJonny
I messaged him. I was like, "Chris, I've got some terrible news. I'm gonna stop doing RomWod." And it was just, I think probably just out of not really seeing much benefit from it after six months. Changed, did something a little bit different, and then decided to come back to RomWod. And funnily enough, another two or three months and sort of all these improvements have come through at once.
- CWChris Williamson
Mm-hmm.
- JOJonny
And that just shows that, like, it took me, it literally nearly took me a year of doing it, but suddenly-
- CWChris Williamson
But you don't-
- JOJonny
... a lot, a lot of the poses feel much easier.
- CWChris Williamson
Mm-hmm. I started to see improvements fairly quickly, I'd say, although they manifested themselves in my performance a lot later. But no, RomWod, you should try it. If RomWod isn't for you or if for some reason you can't access it, then find yourself a similarly prescriptive stretching routine that you do consistently. But RomWod, as far as we're concerned has been the, the most effective one that we've found.
- JOJonny
I- I can't do, 'cause I know your suggestion is like find a yoga routine online and follow that. I just can't do that. I don't find-
- YUYusef
You, you could do, but I think the best thing is you should go to a class 'cause it's just the most foolproof-
- JOJonny
Yeah.
- 22:17 – 25:11
Capturing and curating media: Toby (Chrome) as a ‘read/watch/listen’ queue
- YUYusef
So I've been... I've just had a look through my list and everything falls into capture, habits, or media consumption.
- CWChris Williamson
Okay.
- YUYusef
So-
- CWChris Williamson
Let's go media consumption. I want one, I want one, one from the top and three from the bottom, please.
- JOJonny
(laughs)
- YUYusef
Oh, God. Okay.
- JOJonny
A consonant and a vowel.
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- YUYusef
Media consumption. So you know what? I'm gonna have to cover capture first because-
- JOJonny
You can just ignore me.
- YUYusef
You're gonna...
- JOJonny
Barefacedly.
- CWChris Williamson
Carol. Carol.
- JOJonny
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
I said...
- YUYusef
(laughs) So the way that you know which media to even consume is through your capture process. So either-
- CWChris Williamson
What are you using?
- YUYusef
Either stuff that trusted people send you-
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah.
- YUYusef
... and you know is gonna be good. I put it into-
- JOJonny
Which is open to abuse.
- YUYusef
Which, open to abuse, but I'll, I'll put it into a play queue. There's either a read queue or a play queue. This is done through Toby, which is a Chrome browser extension. You then can split things into libraries of things to watch, things to listen to, things to read. Um, you can then, if you want to, allocate them on the top or the bottom as to different varies, varying grades of procrastination. Either it's full bait, like really procrastination, really procrasti... soul frustration, um-
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- JOJonny
(laughs)
- YUYusef
(laughs) Or, uh-
- JOJonny
Procrastinator-y?
- YUYusef
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
So, so-
- YUYusef
Or quite, uh, productive on the top.
- JOJonny
That's probably it, yeah.
- 25:11 – 27:08
Audiobook workflows: Audible vs ‘snide’ MP3s, speed control, and frictionless listening
- YUYusef
... lectures, audiobooks, that kind of thing is what I'm into. Um, as I, so Toby is for stuff on browsers. MP3 Audiobook Player is something that is in the phone app-
- JOJonny
Mm-hmm.
- YUYusef
... um, that keeps-
- CWChris Williamson
That sounds really snide.
- YUYusef
It is very snide.
- CWChris Williamson
Is it? (laughs) But that's why it works.
- YUYusef
Yeah. It works very well. There's many MP3 audiobooks that you can get, or YouTube has a huge number of audiobooks for free.
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah.
- YUYusef
And if you use YouTube to MP3 converter, you can download them into an MP3, put it on your phone.
- CWChris Williamson
Mm-hmm.
- YUYusef
When you play, it'll store you a spot. And there's also a sleep timer, and you can adjust the speed as well. So there's, it's a full-
- CWChris Williamson
Sounds-
- JOJonny
It sounds a lot like Audible.
- CWChris Williamson
... audio experience. (laughs) It's audible. It's audible.
- YUYusef
Yeah. It's, it's-
- CWChris Williamson
Snidey Audible for when you've downloaded it yourself.
- YUYusef
Exactly. Snidey Audible. And I use Audible too, so, which is excellent. So, um-
- JOJonny
Is there anything on, that's not on Audible that you can get on MP3?
- YUYusef
There, yeah, I mean, I just-
- CWChris Williamson
There's a number of things, there's, there's a number of things that you can't put... Audible's only got 200,000 titles. I'm aware that they're the main 200,000-
- JOJonny
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
... and anyone who's releasing a book now is releasing it on Audible as well. But 200,000 titles in the entirety of our litera- literacy history-
- JOJonny
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
... history is not tremendously, like, comprehensive, is it?
- JOJonny
I would just would have thought that the limitation for that is that they aren't in audiobook rather than they aren't on audio.
- CWChris Williamson
Combination probably.
- JOJonny
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
Combinations.
- YUYusef
That's, so the reason I go Audible is for modern titles that-
- JOJonny
Right.
- 27:08 – 29:34
Guided mind sweep: David Allen’s brain dump to eliminate the ‘background hum’
- JOJonny
Um, I had a really good one a second ago. I'll talk, I'll, it's, I'll link it to that, which is, is just something that I decided to do. What was the thing I was going to say? Ah, (snaps fingers) got it. Sorry.
- CWChris Williamson
It's fine.
- JOJonny
Um, so with Capture and the David Allen, Allen thing.
- CWChris Williamson
Mm-hmm.
- JOJonny
Um, there's, there's definitely, and this, this applies to anyone, I think. You have stuff that is just accumulating in your life every day, all the time. Someone says something to you, message pops up, email, whatever, stuff to do. And I think, like, as much as we'd all like to always have something there to capture and write it down, we don't always have that.
- CWChris Williamson
Mm-hmm.
- JOJonny
So there's an, there's two things. There's a, a PDF and there's a podcast that David Allen's done, which is a guided brain dump, guided mind sweep. There's a podcast of him literally just talking, and he goes through things. He's like, "Okay, professional life. Think about things that were said to you yesterday. Look at your calendar over the last week."
- CWChris Williamson
Mm-hmm.
- JOJonny
It sounds weird, but if you sit with a bit of paper, like a blank document and just listen, there's stuff that comes out of your head of like, like something that someone said to me ten days ago that I would have completely-
- CWChris Williamson
Totally forgotten.
- JOJonny
... you know, the sort of thing that you just sat watching TV and suddenly it goes like, "Oh, damn it." Yeah. Prevents that.
- CWChris Williamson
I think a, a lot of the time when I'm meditating, I'll sit down to meditate, and I'll have an idea that will come to me or a memory of something that I need to do for later in the day.
- JOJonny
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
And it's that silencing of the amount of, uh, stimulus that we've got going on. So-
- JOJonny
Suddenly it-
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah.
- JOJonny
... front of mind. And you go, "Oh, fuck."
- CWChris Williamson
Mm-hmm.
- JOJonny
And then once I finish meditating, it's there, it is still there. And I think spending a little bit of time with a, with a bit of silence or actually, um, rechecking through the last few days of inputs-
- CWChris Williamson
Mm-hmm.
- JOJonny
... is probably a pretty good idea.
- YUYusef
If you don't get that stuff out your head, it does create this background hum.
- JOJonny
Definitely.
- YUYusef
Stress all the time, so.
- CWChris Williamson
It accumulates just, uh, there's something that I need to do but I can't remember what it is.
- JOJonny
Mm-hmm. Yeah. Oh, gosh.
- CWChris Williamson
It's just, it's just a cr- it's just a chronic version of that.
- JOJonny
So, so doing, doing that like a couple of times a week I think just really helps.
- CWChris Williamson
Where can people find that?
- JOJonny
If you search David Allen, Google David Allen guided mind sweep.
- 29:34 – 35:36
Optimize.me: book summaries and masterclasses—powerful, but information overload risk
- CWChris Williamson
Mm-hmm. Okay. Next up, um, I'm going to do Optimize. Hey, guys.
- JOJonny
Hey, guys. (laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
Um, so optimize.me is a website by a guy called Bryan Johnson, who is not the lead singer of AC/DC.
- JOJonny
He, he might be.
- CWChris Williamson
Well, he might be-
- JOJonny
We don't know for sure.
- CWChris Williamson
... but I'm pretty certain he's not, unless he's leading an outlandish double life as a bald American guy that's a life coach and also a-
- JOJonny
Tall, bald American man.
- CWChris Williamson
... rocker from Newcastle.
- JOJonny
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
Um, so it's, it's a website where he summarizes books and concepts. Um, there's so much. I think he's topped 500 book summaries now.
- JOJonny
Yeah. There's a lot.
- CWChris Williamson
His intention is to do 1,000. That's his goal, to do 1,000. He's done 500. A lot of them are non-fiction, self-help, personal development, spirituality, but it goes full range of topics. He's done ones on, um, breath methods, uh, endurance running, body building, a lot of stuff like all the classics in terms of personal development. David Allen's books on there. We've been talking about How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie.
- YUYusef
He's got master classes as well, hasn't he? So-
- CWChris Williamson
That's what, that's what's really good, and I think-
- JOJonny
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
... Johnny, that when you were on Optimized, that's what you liked. So-
- JOJonny
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
If you can imagine that this guy is doing around about every week to every five days is releasing a book summary, and then around about every month to every two months, he will compile 10, around about 10 key concepts within a field, and he'll then release a master class. So if you can imagine that he s- skims the, the top filtering of the best stuff out of each book, and then skims the top filtering of each book into a concept, and that is what creates the master class. So if you're the sort of person who maybe struggles to read or sink themselves into a book for extended period of time, this, uh, s- which was me, is me still, was me specifically a year and a bit ago and still is me now, this is really, really useful because you just get the key take-home points with some really, really good examples. So he'll go through 10, 10 key, um, lessons within a particular concept, usually from 10 separate books, maybe a couple that, that'll cross over. So let's say Breathing 101, Nutrition 101, Sleeping 101, Depression 101, um, How To Make A Habits, Anxiety, everything, and all of this stuff's backed by whichever book he's been in. So you get the best of the best displayed in, uh, maybe a 90 minute, either MP3 or a video. Um, and the amount of resources that you get with it is really impressive. There's a workbook that's attached with each master class. There's a poster that comes that's attached with each book. You can either read a blog version of most of the book summaries, which is the transcript from the audio version. There's also a video version. There's a mobile partner app which saves your position that you have if you're doing it on desktop. The desktop thing's really good. It, it really is, um, it's a pretty powerful and overwhelming resource once you get into it.
- YUYusef
(clears throat)
- CWChris Williamson
I do feel like his demeanor is probably a bit testing at times, and that might be one of the mitigating factors in why you've stopped doing it. I'm not too sure.
- JOJonny
Uh, yeah, I think his... So, uh, a lot of the books that he covered are not really of interest to me. Like-
- CWChris Williamson
Mm-hmm. He's start- he's, uh, recently he's done every single one of the Harry Potters.
- JOJonny
All right.
- YUYusef
Really?
- JOJonny
So that's-
- YUYusef
That's interesting.
- JOJonny
That's not the sort of thing you want to read a summary of, is it? Or maybe it is. Obviously it is, otherwise he wouldn't have done it.
- CWChris Williamson
Oof. I'm not sure.
- JOJonny
But, like, I, I think there's a lot of sort of very niche diet books that he was covering-
- 35:36 – 38:17
From learning to implementing: slow down, take notes, schedule reviews, and ‘read to revelation’
- YUYusef
So my, so my workflow to solve that is I've gone back to listening to full audio books, giving myself full time under exposure. I'm not doing two times speed as much, or, or three times speed in some occasions (laughs) .
- CWChris Williamson
You're gonna have to explain why you were even doing that in the first place.
- YUYusef
Uh, just simply the mindless acquisition of efficiency and cramming more information in one. Um, so-
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- YUYusef
... you were, you were using, you were using I think YouTube. YouTube natively has a speed, up-speed, right?
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah, but I've got a, I've got a little hack for that as well which mov- moves it up to four times speed, but I-
- JOJonny
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
What can you listen at four times speed? Could you actually understand anyone?
- YUYusef
It depend, depends on the speaker. Some people (gibberish)
- CWChris Williamson
But normal ca- but a normal ca- a normal cadence, could any, could you understand anyone at four times speed?
- YUYusef
N- no, only non-technical information. When you start learning about like, y- y- trying to do like physiology of, um, urination and you're listening to it on four times speed, you're like, "Hang on."
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- YUYusef
"I'm just gonna have to listen to this four times on four times speed just to..."
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- JOJonny
(laughs)
- YUYusef
So this is pointless. Um, so I've slowed things down.
- JOJonny
Just imagining the... y- you sat in your room going-
- YUYusef
Holding one of those hard in my hands. (fast forwards)
- JOJonny
And you're like, "Ah."
- CWChris Williamson
We're gonna have to dia- we're gonna have to dial it back a little bit. We'll go three and a half.
- JOJonny
The slow realization-
- CWChris Williamson
We'll go three and a half.
- JOJonny
... being beaten by urination.
- YUYusef
The, the flatmates would always like, they'd come in and just hear like (gibbers) and then they'd always take the piss (laughs) and move on.
- CWChris Williamson
Verbal diarrhea.
- YUYusef
Um, so-
- JOJonny
(laughs)
- YUYusef
So I've slowed things down.
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah.
- YUYusef
Audiobooks. I then take notes and summaries as I go along, just in a little Apple Notes file on my phone or whatever.... just some of the key points, put that into an Evernote file, and then set a reminder through Evernote, which gives you a- a option to set a note to have a date to remind you or to send you an email and a, and a push notification to then be the review. And so then you can take the actionable points that you've taken in context and you've learned in a bit more of a structured skeleton-
- 38:17 – 42:58
Evernote as a ‘prosthetic brain’: web clipper, Scannable, and storing life admin
- CWChris Williamson
You might as well do Evernote straight after this.
- YUYusef
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
Just let this flow into Evernote, because if anyone doesn't know how Evernote works-
- YUYusef
Oh, God.
- CWChris Williamson
... they're gonna be confused.
- YUYusef
It's, it's a, it's an external brain. It's a prosthetic brain.
- JOJonny
(laughs)
- YUYusef
Um, I've got... yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
It's a USB drive for, for your, your thoughts, is it?
- YUYusef
Yeah, exactly. 58 notebooks. Two thou- two, three, four, five notes. Nice number.
- JOJonny
How would you feel, in a, in a single word if you can, if Evernote went down forever?
- YUYusef
It, it has in the past, so you have to take backups.
- JOJonny
Okay, so let's say-
- YUYusef
Oh, you mean if the app was lost, if it was irrever- irreversibly lost?
- CWChris Williamson
In one, in one fell swoop, all of your backups and all of Evernote was gone.
- YUYusef
I'd just have to start again, like a skewer point.
- CWChris Williamson
But how would you feel? That doesn't say.
- YUYusef
It's, it's the same way as, like, your house burning down.
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- YUYusef
Like it's... um, the, the, the thing is-
- CWChris Williamson
Would you rather your house burn down or your Evernote be removed? (laughs)
- YUYusef
Oh my God. It's, it's a tough question. Really is.
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- JOJonny
'Cause obviously, I think when you and I travel together and we both have our laptops with us-
- YUYusef
Mm-hmm.
- JOJonny
... I don't know anyone else who feels... so, like, I won't leave my laptop in a car, or, like, carry my backpack with my laptop in.
- YUYusef
Mm-hmm.
- JOJonny
You're worse than me, and it's because there's all of your Evernote in there as well.
- YUYusef
Luck- luckily, Evernote is backed up and it's synced into the cloud and everything, but-
- JOJonny
So right, take us, take us through, do 120 seconds on what Evernote is. Go on.
- 42:58 – 52:52
Memory systems and ‘mind palace’ techniques: resonance-based recall and frameworks
- CWChris Williamson
Um, a good, a good point, uh, the story that I love about what you did before you went to go and do your medical degree, was that you absolutely pounded that, like, Russian-
- YUYusef
Oh, God.
- CWChris Williamson
... memory system or whatever it is.
- YUYusef
(laughs) That was a-
- CWChris Williamson
Where you've got a mind palace now.
- YUYusef
That was a big undertaking.
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- YUYusef
That was one of, one of the hardest courses.
- CWChris Williamson
Do 60 seconds on that.
- YUYusef
Oh, man. Okay.
- CWChris Williamson
See if you've got a mind palace.
- YUYusef
Yeah, so the-
- GUGuest
(laughs)
- YUYusef
... the, there's a Russian memory system that-
- GUGuest
(laughs)
- YUYusef
... allows you to geometrically increase the, uh, um, the capacity for... The, the p- the problem is, it's not like, "Oh, you read it and it'll improve your memory." It's a technique, so it's not like a, (sniffs) it's one
- GUGuest
It's learning how to bench, it's not getting a 300 kilo one rep max.
- YUYusef
Yes, exactly.
- GUGuest
Right.
- YUYusef
But, um, there's a lot of tools in there, but it's, it's just, it's very laborious and very long.
- GUGuest
How many volumes was it? Was it multiple volumes?
- YUYusef
Yes, there were maybe, mm, 30, 40 volumes or something.
- JOJonny
Uh, this isn't gonna, this isn't presented in like nice, polished Vimeo videos either. It's like-
- GUGuest
There's lots of the apps. (laughs)
- JOJonny
... oh, the Russian text-
- YUYusef
(laughs)
- GUGuest
(laughs)
- YUYusef
... you know, dusty cellar somewhere.
- GUGuest
Yeah. Yeah.
- YUYusef
It's very, very good stuff though. It's, so, okay, I'm gonna run through, you and the listeners through this quick experiment. So, I want you guys to, between you, think of 10 objects. So, one to 10. Before you do, I'm gonna give you a, a skeleton to h- hook these onto. Bun, shoe, tree, door, hive, sticks, heaven, gate, pine, hen. Okay, you can remember the, those words because they are rhyming with one to 10, yeah?
- 52:52 – 1:02:06
Final rapid-fire ‘basic hacks’: meal prep, shoe horn, coffee thermoses, and tracking gadgets
- CWChris Williamson
I'm too far in the acquisition, not enough application. Some people read a book every five years, and so maybe they need to- Obsess over them a little bit, yeah. Yeah. Right. Let's do, let's do a full round. We'll do a final round for this episode.
- JOJonny
Okay.
- CWChris Williamson
And we will do a full round on the most basic one that you can think of. So my most basic one to get us started would be prepping your food every day.
- JOJonny
Okay.
- CWChris Williamson
And it's something that not everybody does, but the benefits of prepping your food are so ridiculously large from an economic perspective, from a time perspective, from a dietary control perspective, from a mood perspective. Um, if you get up on a morning and instead of eating your breakfast whilst watching the TV, the time that it takes you to eat your breakfast, I promise you, if you have a coffee, wait for the coffee to cool, and have a normal-sized breakfast that doesn't take too much cooking, you will be able to wash up yesterday's washing-up, cook your food for the day, and pack it by the time you've eaten your breakfast and had your coffee. Takes about four, about half an hour to 40 minutes or so. And by that time, you've done two things that you needed to do on the morning, but one of them will benefit you for the entire rest of the day. So batch cook your food together, make sure that you've got chicken defrosted in the morning or you've got your meat for the day, you've got some sort of carb source, potatoes or whatever it might be, and then throw some vegetables in. And you can just boil everything away while you're thinking about your day and you're cooking your food, doing whatever. I really admire how consistent you are with that. It's just habit. It's just force of habit, uh, for me now, and it's been so drilled into me that when I see people ... Some of the guys will have to leave the office at four o'clock in the afternoon to go cook. To go, or to go, to go to a restaurant and have food, and that's sweet. If you're eating out, that's fine. You can also plan to eat out. And yeah, maybe you're going to end up wasting some food every so often, because you've cooked food and then you end up going out for a meal. But the price that you pay for- You'll just pull it over the next- The price that you pay for, for wasting the food that you're maybe not going to be able to eat and you're going to have to throw away is far lower than the price that you're going to have to pay by not cooking the food- Mm-hmm.
- JOJonny
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
... and then all, you have to eat out then. Your dietary control is a lot less. Um, so yeah, just in whatever, um, to whatever degree that you can, try and prep at least one meal a day, even if it's just your lunch. Let's say that you, that you're working a, a more typical job, daytime job. You can eat your breakfast on a morning, you can prep your lunch, and come home to cook and eat your tea. Uh, it's, to me, it, it's just such a no-brainer. I know that you guys are, are on and off with your food prep. The thing is, like, that, that's just our failing, because it's g- I'm completely sold on the idea. Like, it's a money saver, time saver, and eliminates the possibility for you to go off the rails with your diet, because the decision is made for you at the start of the day. Mm-hmm. Like, it's such a-
- YUYusef
... like, so many benefits.
- CWChris Williamson
Why, how come, how come, how come you don't tend to do it, then?
- YUYusef
The reason I don't do it now is 'cause I, I, well, I, I do the next best thing, which is ready meals.
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah.
- YUYusef
Plus, like, a protein booster or a, a veg booster or whatever.
- CWChris Williamson
Mm-hmm.
- YUYusef
Which works for me but, like, I'd very much want to get back into ... Like, I, I, I do prep occasionally, like every third day.
- CWChris Williamson
Mm-hmm.
- YUYusef
But it's not as clockwork as you.
- CWChris Williamson
Jesus.
- YUYusef
It's like I would do, I would put things in the slow cooker.
- CWChris Williamson
Mm-hmm.
- YUYusef
I'd put just chicken, lemon, rosemary, and sweet potato into a slow cooker, leave it for 12 hours.
- CWChris Williamson
Mm-hmm.
- YUYusef
It's tender and ready to go.
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah.
- YUYusef
Um-
- CWChris Williamson
Okay. So have you thought of a basic one?
- YUYusef
Yeah. Shoe horn.
- CWChris Williamson
Shoe horn? (laughs)
- JOJonny
(laughs)
- YUYusef
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
This, this is one of my favorite ... Can you remember your Facebook state? It's from five years ago.
Episode duration: 1:02:06
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