Extremely Busy People’S Guide to Read Faster! Memorize Better! Think Clearer!: Three Essential Skills to Achieve Greater Productivity and Profitability

By Daniel Theyagu and Sandra Daniel

Develop your muscle memory to read faster and comprehend better with the PQRIM method.
Boost your memory to remember anything and everything whenever and wherever you want to.
Supercharge your mind to think creatively and critically and synthesize what you have read effectively.
Read Faster, Memorize Better, Think Clearer is an accessible, practical guide to the three most essential
skills to achieve greater productivity and profi tability in your work, study and personal life. Whether you
are a CEO of a large corporation, a manager, a supervisor, a student or a person in-between careers this
book will serve you well by equipping you with the necessary corporate survival skills.
The world is changing so rapidly that if you are not quick enough to learn, unlearn and relearn at the
blink of an eye you will be redundant and a derelict. Whether you want to be a better leader, a more
resourceful employee, and a strategic learner in school or university you need to train yourself on how
to get to the key information that you require fast and have the ability to synergize and synthesize them
productively. This book will show you how. Read it once and apply the techniques shared. Read it again
and share the techniques with others. Read it again and again until you achieve a sense of unconscious
competence that you can do it in any circumstances and situation. That is your returns on investment
for taking time to read this book.
Effective outcomes
?? Develop the necessary mental skills that allow you to read
faster and actively
?? Master the PQRIM technique to help you comprehend even
the toughest textbook, journals and articles.
?? Train and confi gure your brain to remember and recall
whatever you want and whenever or wherever you want it.
?? Unleash your creative potential with SCRAM
?? Sharpen your critical mind

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris AU
• Release date: Jun 24, 2014
• ISBN: 9781499001884

Daniel Theyagu

Sandra Daniel is an international corporate trainer, university lecturer and writer. She has written several self-help books and is actively involved in training, curriculum and courseware development. Her training programs are highly popular and attended by many participants from many well-established SMEs and MNCs. Daniel Theyagu is a corporate trainer, performance evaluator, motivational speaker and writer. He has trained more than 200000 people from all walks of life from more than 100 countries. Daniel is well known for his humorous and light hearted approach to training whereby he uses parables and metaphors to impart complicated aspects of his training to his participants with ease.

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Copyright © 2014 by Daniel Theyagu/Sandra Daniel.

Library of Congress Control Number: 2014908114

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Rev. date: 06/19/2014

To order additional copies of this book, contact:

Xlibris LLC

1-800-455-039

www.Xlibris.com.au

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CONTENTS

About The Authors

Preface

Acknowledgement

PART ONE READ FASTER

1. Reading Intelligently

2. Understanding How You Read

3. Techniques For Reading Faster

4. Comprehending What You Read

5. Taking Notes

6. Further Practice Materials To Read Faster

PART TWO MEMORIZE BETTER

7. Your Memory! Your Asset!

8. The Art Of Visual Imagination

9. Do The Math

10. Getting Total Recall

PART THREE THINK CLEARER

11. The Way We Think

12. Think Creatively

13. Think Critically

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

Daniel Theyagu has been a trainer, lecturer and author since 1989. He has trained well over 200 000 people from 50 countries in 300 over organizations. A highly humorous trainer, Daniel is well known for his light-hearted style of training and using parables and metaphors to get complex issues across to participants effectively. Daniel has appeared on radio talk shows and has contributed more than 300 articles to the press on issues of ethics, law, and personal effectiveness.

His website and blog are at: www.lateralsc.com

Sandra Daniel has been a regional trainer and lecturer specializing in curriculum development on academic writing. She has also designed and delivered value-added program at tertiary level in areas of Emotional Intelligence, Critical Thinking and Speed Reading. Sandra is a highly competent and much sought after trainer by many academic institutions because of her ability to simplify and deliver complex materials.

PREFACE

Having been corporate trainers and performance evaluators since 1989, we have had the wonderful opportunity to meet and train more than 200 000 people from different walks of life. In the process of being trainers we have come to realize that whatever skill a person intends to master requires three strategies.

The first is a positive mental attitude that he or she is capable of achieving the skill and the second is a level of commitment to practicing the skill until such time that he or she become unconsciously competent in the skill. The third strategy is a higher sense of inner motivation which serves as a driving force to thrive and focus on the skill until he or she achieves success and is able to reap the rewards of their endeavor.

We live in a fast pace world and the changes that is occurring all around us are dramatic and disruptive at the same time. Just think of you entering a shop and buying a cell phone or some other kind of electronic product. The moment you walk out of the shop there is a newer and more functional model of the phone or electronic product out on sale.

In this whirlpool existence, it is important that you keep abreast of the ever-changing knowledge and skills that is required to survive. Today there are simply too many materials to read, digest and comprehend. Alvin Toffler mentioned: The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn. This means that for you to survive the onslaught of the information and knowledge overload it is important that you find some workable strategies that allows you to be able to extract the relevant information that you require, be able to memorize them so that you can recall them where required and finally be able to apply this information to those areas of your life where it is most required.

This is the reason for writing this book. We have noticed that in our careers as corporate trainers, that there is a need to develop three essential skills which will help lay the solid foundation to achieve everything else. These three essential skills are the basis of the title of this book. You will come to realize that you have to learn to read faster to manage all the information that you need to know as most of us do not have the liberty of time to read with pleasure.

Further, you need to have a good memory so that you can remember the key concepts and theories that you have read and learnt and be able to recall them when required in necessary situation. In sharpening your memory you will realize too that there is a need to think clearer of how you want to use the information that you have gathered. Much as knowledge is power if you are unable to use the knowledge you have gained in practical ways then it is quite useless. To do this you need to develop some powerful thinking strategies that will allow you to become an excellent problem solver, decision maker and a solution finder.

In order for you to develop these three essential skills, this book is therefore divided into three parts.

Part one deals with the various techniques and mental tools that you require and need to acquire to read faster. Note that reading fast is one thing as what is equally important is your ability to comprehend what you are reading as well. Here we will show you how by using a special technique called PQRIM you could not only train yourself to read faster but at the same time being able to comprehend what you read.

Part two of this book will focus on some proven, easy to apply and adapt techniques that allows you to improve your memory. With consistent practice and application of the concepts taught you can sharpen your memory and recall any information you want at any time you want it.

The final part will show you three relevant and effective thinking strategies that you can use to enrich your life and be able to apply the information that you’ve gathered in the practical world. These thinking strategies will also assist you in making sense of what you read and allows you to spot deceptive reasoning as well as to see whether there is any sort of author’s intent to emotionally manipulate your thinking and perception. Here you will also appreciate the process of how to identify redundancy of language and learning to summarize and condense what you have read practically.

Whether you are a student, a CEO, a manager, a teacher or someone who is in the process of looking for a new career, these three essential strategies will serve you well. As you go through this book, keep an open mind to the various strategies being introduced and practice what you learn as you go along.

To motivate you as you journey through this book take the cue from T. E Lawrence also known as Lawrence of Arabia who said in his book ‘The Seven Pillars of Wisdom’: All men dream: but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake up in the day to find it was vanity, but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dreams with open eyes, to make it possible. Become the dreamer of the day and not the night. Put to practice what you have learnt and you will see the fruits of your investment. We wish you and congratulate you in advance for the skills and strategies you are about to acquire.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

This book is dedicated to all our training participants past, present and future that gave and will be giving us the opportunity to train and impart these life skills. Much as we may be the trainers, we are also the trainees as much of the information in this book is the valuable feedback, comments and suggestions that our participants have given us that allowed us to synergize and synthesize the information from which is born this book.

PART ONE

READ FASTER

I can read a book twice as fast as anybody else. First I read the beginning, and then I read the ending, and then I start in the middle and read toward whichever end I like best.

Gracie Allen

CHAPTER ONE

READING INTELLIGENTLY

Introduction

Notice the way we have written the following sentences:

1. I know you are an extremely busy person.

2. Otherwise why else would you have picked up this book?

3. Time is money and you have to work hard for it.

4. At the same time every day you are confronted with tons of materials to read.

5. It is frustrating.

6. There are reports, journals, memos and the whole lot of junk articles that sometimes you just have to know what it is all about just in case there is some beneficial information in them.

7. The Internet era has not alleviated our burden.

8. Now there are more things to read.

9. We are going paperless and live in a world of tablet PCs and smartphone.

10. Can we read faster with these contraptions?

11. If you facing these insurmountable challenges then this book is just for you.

12. In this book you will learn how you can train yourself to read faster and at the same time memorize better.

13. In this process you will also realize your innate ability to think clearer.

14. You will learn to read in access of 1000 words per minute.

15. Most importantly you will realize that by reading faster you can actually comprehend information much clearer as ironic as it may look like right now.

16. Reading at 1000 words per minute is just our target objective however it will be your level of commitment, motivation and practice that will assist you to supersede this expectation and help you read faster than this limit.

17. So! Let’s get started.

Did you see how I have written so far and how easy it was to read? The spacing and the short sentences helps you to go through the information faster and easily. Read on a little more so that we can convince you further.

Beginning with the end in mind

Reading faster is not impossible.

However your ability to do this is not going to happen overnight.

What you need to appreciate now is that reading faster involves the training of your eyes to move quickly so that it can capture more words in a single glance.

All of us have the ability to read faster and comprehend better what we read.

You don’t have to have an IQ of 170. Just average will suffice.

But if you do have a high IQ then good for you! Perhaps you can read more.

The whole concept of reading faster is about your ability to read the idea rather than the words.

Notice the way we’ve written so far.

You will realize that it is quite easy to read as our sentences are short.

Our paragraphs are short as well.

This allows you to grasp the concept of what you are reading easily.

Unfortunately, books are not written in this manner.

Publishers and printers are always trying to squeeze as much information as they can in a page.

There is an economic reason for this.

More pages simply mean more money.

And we do not want to spend too much money on books.

We had a difficult time convincing our publishers to print this book in this manner.

They said, Hey! It’s going to be expensive.

But we managed to convince them anyway.

Once we convinced them that it is possible to read faster in this manner.

Why reading faster is possible?

Okay! Here are the facts.

The average person reads approximately 220-250 words per minute.

This data is derived from scientific discovery in the way the brain perceives and processes information through the eyes.

The fact of the matter is that our eyes are a great evolutionary innovation.

The human eyes have the ability to register an image or a word in ¼ of a second.

That is 250 milliseconds.

That means that in one second we are able to register four images or four words.

Using this data in one minute or 60 seconds—we can read about 240 words.

So give or take a little the average reading speed is roughly 200-250 words per minute.

However the great news is that you can train your eyes to capture words faster than this and it is just not one word per glance.

With the proper training and mental focus you can capture anything from four to six words in a single glance lasting 250 milliseconds or ¼ of a second.

That means that in 1 second you can see anything from 16 to 24 words.

This works out to be 960 to 1200 words per minute.

Think about it!

The Science of Reading Faster

Much as you may find it impossible to achieve this right now, you have the ability to read faster and comprehend what you are reading better. There is a whole science to how you can read faster and by doing this you can not only improve your knowledge base but also improve your memory and acquire the ability to think clearer. It is important before you proceed reading this short book to have a working definition of what reading faster entails.

The underlying premise of being able to read faster is being able to train your eyes to capture the words faster and training your brain to process the information effectively. Think about how you are reading this text right now. Your eyes are probably going from one word to another at a certain pace. If you want to read faster by almost four to six times you need to start training your eyes to move at a quicker pace and capture more words in a single glance.

You might find this hard to believe this but actually it is quite possible to achieve this. We will be sharing with you on how you can effectively read faster in double quick time. What you’ve got to promise yourself is to be committed to practicing the techniques that we will be sharing with you and wherever possible to apply these techniques until you see a certain level of improvement in your reading speed and your ability to recall and understand what you’ve read.

Cut to the chase

In order to read faster there are three things you should know. The first is to identify and overcome the barriers that prevent you from becoming a speed reader.

The second is to become familiar and proficient in the various techniques of reading faster. Here, we will be sharing with you four effective and proven technique that when you put to practice