Limitless - Jim Kwik Page 0,9

are being fed by some of the greatest advancements that humankind has made in the last hundred years. They were given rise by technology. To be clear, technology is a vital part of progress and being limitless. It allows us to do everything from connecting to learning, making our lives that much more convenient. But it is possible that we consume digital technology at a rate that even its creators would find extreme. Much of the technology available to us today is so new that we don’t know the level at which we need to control our interaction with it.

Through our educational platform Kwik Learning, we have students in 195 countries and have generated tens of millions of podcast downloads. Our community has expressed a growing concern about their overreliance on technology and they come to us to upgrade their brains to find relief from these “four horsemen” of our age: digital deluge, digital distraction, digital dementia, and digital deduction. It’s important to note that overload, distraction, forgetfulness, and default thinking have been around for ages. While technology doesn’t cause these conditions, it has great potential to amplify them. The benefits of the digital age are plentiful, but let’s take a look at how the advances in technology that help you, can possibly also hinder you.

DIGITAL DELUGE

Do you have too much to process but not enough time? We’re privileged to live in a world with so much unfettered access to information. In this age of connectivity, ignorance is a choice. Compared to the 15th century, we now consume as much data in a single day as an average person from the 1400s would have absorbed in an entire lifetime. Not so long ago, information moved glacially through word of mouth, or a newspaper, or a posted bulletin in a town square. Now we have so much access to information that it’s taking a toll on our time and our quality of life. The average person consumes three times as much information as we did in the 1960s;1 a 2015 report indicated that respondents spent eight hours a day consuming media.

In an NPR interview, New York Times tech reporter Matt Richtel said that after 20 years of glorifying technology as if all of it were good, “I think science is beginning to embrace the idea that some technology is Twinkies and some technology is Brussels sprouts. If we consume too much technology, just like if we consume too much food, it can have ill effects.”2

In a University of California, San Francisco, study on the effect of downtime, researchers gave rats a new experience and measured their brain waves during and after the activity. Under most circumstances, a new experience will express new neural activity and new neurons in the brain—that is, if the rat is allowed to have downtime. With downtime, the neurons made their way from the gateway of memory to the rest of the brain, where long-term memory is stored. The rats were able to record memories of their experiences, which is the basis for learning.3

Doesn’t that make you wonder what happens if you don’t have downtime? There is a growing body of evidence that suggests that if we never let our mind wander or be bored for a moment, we pay a price—poor memory, mental fog, and fatigue.

As far back as the mid-1990s (when digital deluge was a fraction of the concern it is now), research was beginning to show that there were real health risks involved with navigating through an always-on world. A Reuters study, ominously titled “Dying for Information,” showed that, “Two out of three respondents associated information overload with tension with colleagues and loss of job satisfaction; 42 percent attributed ill-health to this stress, 61 percent said that they have to cancel social activities as a result of information overload and 60 percent that they are frequently too tired for leisure activities.” The study goes on to add, “Faced with an onslaught of information and information channels, they have become unable to develop simple routines for managing information.”4

What’s more, we also have to contend with the fact that the half-life of information has decreased. The half-life of information is the amount of time that passes before that information is replaced by newer or more accurate information. You can study to your heart’s content; the information you process now will be outdated sooner than you think. “Facts” written in articles, books, and documentaries are based on strong evidence and accepted as truth. But then they are