Our lives are the sum of our memories. How much are we willing to lose from our already short lives by … not paying attention?

Experts step outside their comfort zone and study themselves failing.

When you want to get good at something, how you spend your time practicing is far more important than the amount of time you spend.

...who we are and what we do it is fundamentally a function of what we remember.

What distinguishes a great mnemonist, I learned, is the ability to create lavish images on the fly, to paint in the mind a scene so unlike any other it cannot be forgotten. And to do it quickly. Many competitive mnemonists argue that their skills are less a feat of memory than of creativity.

The way to get better at a skill is to force yourself to practice just beyond your limits.

Woodworking requires a completely different kind of thinking and problem-solving ability than writing. With writing, you take a set of facts and ideas, and you reason your way forward to a story that pulls them together. With woodworking, you start with an end product in mind, and reason your way backward to the raw wood.