How to Succeed in Speed Reading Training

Making Speed Reading a habit and your automatic way to assimilate information requires a significant change in behaviour. Change is often difficult and can be scary. You can easily get sucked into fear and self-doubt: What if I missed something vital? What do I do if I don’t speed up?

In this short blog post I want to share with you the secret of success through smart persistence. It’s a simple method you can apply to avoid fear of failure, self-criticism and the resulting stress with the possibility of giving up and sinking back into old habits.

Tony Buzan came up with an acronym to manage change. It’s basically just following the scientific method in a clear logical process. In his book ‘Head Strong’ Tony says, “TEFCAS is more physics than psychology. It traces, step-by-step, what steps your brain is obliged to take while learning in the physical universe; the Laws of which it must both follow and use to its advantage.”

The steps are as follows:

Try-all (trial)

Don’t just Try - Try all options and persist. Everything starts with an initial action. Scientists talk about postulating a hypothesis. This is just a fancy way to say making a guess. Set yourself a goal of how fast you’ll read or whatever your desired outcome will be. Choose a technique and run the experiment – i.e. read for your allotted time.

Event

Each trial leads to an event – something happens. It is important not to jump to judgement too early. Just accept the result of the experiment. The phrase ‘trial and error’ it’s often used. This is setting yourself up for failure and putting unnecessary pressure on your try-all. It is all too easy to beat ourselves up when things don’t go according to plan. A much better phrase is ‘trial and event’. Even if the trial didn’t give the result you hoped for, you still gather valuable data.

There is a, possibly apocryphal, story of a man whose wrong decision cost the company he worked for many thousands of dollars. When this came to light he went to his boss to tender his resignation. The enlightened boss said, “I don’t want you to resign. I have just invested a lot of money in your professional development. You won’t make the same mistake again so why should I give the benefit of the lesson to my competitors?”

If you learn something, then every trial has value. In his quest to perfect construction of the electric light bulb Thomas Edison said, “I have not failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work.”

Feedback

The event will give you information through your senses. Measure your speed. Assess your level of comprehension. The more quantitative data you can collect the better. You also gather qualitative data by asking yourself questions. How did you feel? Was it comfortable or difficult? Did you get into a rhythm? Did you stumble over the tricky words?

Check

Once you have fully gathered all the data you can, check this information. In scientific terms, was the hypothesis validated or not?  Does the feedback lead towards or away from your goal? What relevant factors need to be considered?

Adjust

Having checked and interpreted the feedback you devise a new hypothesis. This is a course correction. Think about what you can do differently in the next Try-all. Adjust your strategy and repeat the above steps.

Success

Through the iterative process of adjusting after each trial you will ultimately reach success. It is very important to enjoy and celebrate your little victories. The brain comes to associate work and perseverance with reward. This is important motivation for overcoming setbacks. Don’t spend too long resting on your laurels. Set your next goal and your next try-all.

A friend of mine, Warren, cleverly said if you don’t follow the process, TEFCAS can stand for Trial and Error, Fail, Cry, Attempt Suicide. He was joking of course, but with a serious underlying message that overly self-critical thoughts can lead to mental health issues when things go awry.

Make sure you enjoy your Speed Reading Training. Take care of yourself with smart persistence and success will inevitably be yours.