Skip to content

One Simple Habit that Changed My Life

2020-07-12 · Long video (solo, talking head or whiteboard) · Ali, Cliff Weitzman · recording, 15:41 · watch on YouTube

Topic: Books and reading · mode: Explanation and tutorial

Ali argues that speed listening to podcasts and audiobooks is the best way forward: it lets you consume more and lowers the time cost of each book; he answers the objections that it spoils enjoyment or life, and advises raising the speed slowly, with clips of his Deep Dive with Speechify founder Cliff Weitzman.

What is said

The parts of the video and what is said in each (★ — how much it matters to the video).

00:00:00 — Speed listening is the hill he will die on; plan of the video

  • ★★★ Ali says the one hill he will die on is that speed listening to podcasts and audiobooks is the best way forward. — 00:00:00

    “speed listening to podcasts and audiobooks is the best way forward”

  • ★★ Ali has listened to podcasts at double speed for the last few years and recently to audiobooks at about 2.5x, and is slowly working to raise that. — 00:00:00 · Audible

  • ★★ The first benefit of speed listening, Ali says, is that you consume more: he has listened to twice as many audiobooks over the last few years because of it. — 00:00:29

00:00:36 — The benefits: consume more, and a lower time cost for each book

  • ★★ Ali thinks it is much better to read two books than to read one book slowly, and better to listen to three podcasts than one and a half. — 00:00:58
  • ★★★ The main benefit of speed listening, Ali thinks, is that it reduces the time cost of listening to a book or a podcast. — 00:01:27
  • ★★ Cliff Weitzman says reading three books a year makes you pick only the most famous, while someone who can afford a hundred a year stops to look at every piece of art. — 00:02:30
  • ★★ Interviewed on the podcast Freshly Grounded, Ali was recommended by its host Faisal The Ride of a Lifetime, Bob Iger's autobiography, which he first came across on The Tim Ferriss Show. — 00:02:30 · The Tim Ferriss Show
  • ★★ Ali finished The Ride of a Lifetime on Audible within a day and a half, listening at 2.5x during his workout and on the drive to and from work. — 00:02:59 · Audible
  • ★ Ali calls The Ride of a Lifetime an amazing book that made him tear up in many places. — 00:02:59
  • ★★ At 2.5x the book took Ali about four hours instead of twelve; at twelve hours, starting it would have been a real decision about spending 12 hours of his life. (hedged) — 00:03:29
  • ★★ Reading and listening fast lets you discover books that can change your life, Ali says, such as The 4-Hour Workweek, Anything You Want and Show Your Work!, which he might otherwise have missed. — 00:03:29 · The 4-Hour Workweek

00:04:07 — The drawbacks: enjoyment, and the philosophical objection

  • ★★ Ali listens to podcasts at double speed because he does not need to enjoy a podcast: he mostly listens for the insights and the conversation. — 00:04:08
  • ★★ In long fantasy series, Ali says, most of the book is build-up for the climaxes, so you do not need to hear it at 1x to enjoy it properly. — 00:05:05
  • ★★★ Ali used to think speeding up spoils enjoyment and was a 1x purist for fantasy audiobooks for over two years; since a few months ago he enjoys them more at 2x to 2.5x. — 00:05:34 · Audible
  • ★★ For the climaxes of a fantasy audiobook Ali sometimes slows back down to about 1.5x to savour them. — 00:05:34
  • ★★ Cliff Weitzman calls the objection that life is not meant to be lived at double speed a huge fallacy, said by people who have not tried it. — 00:06:03
  • ★★ Cliff Weitzman says films such as Gone with the Wind were much slower than today's, which are faster because minds used to quick gratification online have got faster. — 00:06:48
  • ★★ Cliff Weitzman uses Video Speed Controller, a Chrome extension that plays every video at 2.5x by default and changes speed in steps of 0.1, and calls it a lifesaver. — 00:07:17
  • ★★ Ali does not buy the philosophical objection to speed listening: it is like asking why drive at 60 miles per hour rather than 30 to appreciate the scenery. — 00:07:42
  • ★★ Ali has noticed no negative effects of speed listening in his life; he feels he appreciates life even more because he can take in so many more things. — 00:08:20
  • ★★★ Ali suggests trying speed listening for a few weeks; the key is to raise the speed slowly, mindfully practising your listening speed. — 00:08:59

00:09:03 — Getting started: raise the speed slowly in Audible, podcast apps and Speechify

  • ★★★ Cliff Weitzman advises always listening at the fastest speed you can while still comprehending, about 10% uncomfortable rather than fully comfortable. — 00:09:29
  • ★★★ Ali advises listening at the fastest speed you can comprehend and a little faster, so that the brain adapts to the speed changes. — 00:09:58
  • ★★ Ali says he will soon make a video about how he types at more than 150 words per minute. — 00:09:58
  • ★★ Typing fast, Ali says, is mostly a matter of a lot of deliberate practice, and then everything on a computer becomes much quicker, like playing an instrument. — 00:09:58
  • ★★ Learning to speed listen is much easier than learning to type fast, Ali says, because the apps do all of the work for you. — 00:10:27
  • ★★ Ali calls Audible the best subscription and a no-brainer: if he could have one subscription service, it would be Audible, though it no longer sponsors his channel. — 00:10:27 · Audible
  • ★★ Audible lets you set the listening speed from 0.1x to 4.0x in steps of 0.1. — 00:10:56 · Audible
  • ★★ Ali listens to most non-fiction audiobooks at 2x to 3x: he started at 2x, moved to 2.3 and 2.5, was at 2.6 last week (week of 29 June 2020) and is at 2.7 this week (week of 6 July 2020). — 00:10:56 · Audible
  • ★ The podcast apps Ali uses most, Castro and Overcast, have speed settings that can be changed for specific episodes. — 00:11:25
  • ★★ Ali sets the speed by how dense a podcast is: the chatty Video Creators Podcast at 3x, the information-dense episodes of Ezra Klein's show at 1x. — 00:11:25
  • ★★ Ali finds Speechify not quite as good as Audible for audiobooks, because Audible is narrated by real people and Speechify's AI narration sounds a little robotic. — 00:11:25 · Audible
  • ★★ For texts with no narrator, such as PDFs, Speechify has an adaptive speed setting that raises the listening speed slightly every thousand words or so. — 00:12:12
  • ★★ Cliff Weitzman learned English by listening to Harry Potter: understanding two words in ten at first, he listened at 0.75x for the first three times, then rose step by step to 2x. — 00:13:33 · Harry Potter (book series)
  • ★★ Cliff Weitzman: Speechify's Automatic Speed Ramping Algorithm, when turned on, raises the listening speed by three words per minute every thousand words. — 00:14:02
  • ★★ Whether or not English is your native language, Ali says, practising and slowly raising your listening speed lets you listen to 25 books a year instead of 10. — 00:14:02

00:14:47 — Links to Audible, Speechify, Freshly Grounded and the Book Club series; sign-off

  • ★ Speechify was first aimed mostly at dyslexic people, but now about 85% of its users are not dyslexic. — 00:14:47
  • ★★ Ali still reads much faster than he listens, but he cannot read while driving or at the gym, which is where listening fits into his life. — 00:15:08

Threads in this video

Where the stories that moved here went next

Mentioned

Central: Audible · Speechify

Also: People: Bob Iger · Cliff Weitzman · Kate Reading · Michael Kramer · Sam Harris

Projects: Book Club · Deep Dive

Works: Anything You Want · Freshly Grounded · Gone with the Wind · Harry Potter (book series) · Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone · I Will Teach You To Be Rich · Show Your Work! · The 4-Hour Workweek · The Ezra Klein Show · The Ride of a Lifetime · The Tim Ferriss Show · Video Creators Podcast

Concepts: speed listening

Products: Castro · Google Chrome · Overcast · Video Speed Controller

← Previous: My Creative Workflow with Notion · Next → What We Learnt In 2 Years of Being Doctors - Deep Dive with Molly Hunt