Forums IMPORTANT: PLEASE READ PhotoReading, Memory Optimizer ummm...isn't this just skimming?

I purchased the Deluxe Course. I am nearly ready to return it. I just don't see how the photo reading step has any relevance to the process. The meat of what is happening is in the looking through the book and finding what you need. Yes, skimming. Who hasn't skimmed a book looking for what they wanted.

What the program seems to be suggesting is purposefully skimming and reskimming the book until you have the info you want. Again, this isn't reading of any sort. You gain some info, but only at a very superficial level...the level to which you skim and then actually read. Yes, you still have to do that old fashioned reading...you just aren't doing it in a linear fashion.

If anyone cares to respond to this, tell me I'm wrong, looking at in the in the wrong way etc. I'm open to hearing what you have to say.

Right now, I'm not feeling particularly good about this program. I do want for this to work out and am willing to give it another shot. I could use a skill like this, but right now it doesn't appear to be more than faking out the book.

Regards,
Sasha

Hi Sasha.

You are dismissing one of the most powerful components of the photoreading system. Let start me by saying that when you photoread you are involving the other than conscious mind which is way more powerful than the conscious mind. Keep in mind that the conscious mind can only attend to 7 to 8 bits of information at a time. Also consider that the other than conscious mind outweighs the conscious mind 10 billion to one. So the other than conscious mind is way more powerful than the conscious mind.

So when you photoread you have the book operating on 2 levels now instead of just one. You have the book operating on the other than conscious level and operating on the conscious level. You do not have that when you do not photoread. When you only activate without photoreading you are only operating on 1 level the conscious level.

When you photoread you are providing your brain another opportunity to create neural networks from the book. Also photoreading will help you learn the material more easily something that can not be achieved by regular everyday reading. Let me put it this way you would have to make many more passes regular reading with a lot longer time to achieve the same thing by photoreading and activating with less time.

Why would you want to stop yourself from getting the most benefits that you can get from photoreading?

Photoread4me

Oh I understand the theory behind the photoread step. I just question the efficacy.

What I'm getting from the materials and from the commentary on the forums is that repeated encounters with "activating" makes or breaks the experience in photo reading. In activating you are skimming whethere yo are using super reading, skittering or rapid reading...they all essentially do the same thing--give you a quick visual refernce to go and read what you need.

If you know what you are looking for, the skimming will lead you there (especially if you previewed) whether you photoread or not.

I think you are completely missing my point.

With photoreading you are completely taking in the whole book in a very short period of time. You don't do that by just skimming. You cannot take in a whole book skimming in 3 to 5 minutes. Rapid reading is completely different from superreading. You say rapid reading & superreading is the same thing? You are talking about about 15 seconds a page with superreading you definitely are not doing 15 seconds a page with rapid reading and rapid reading is the slowest of the activation techniques.

You are ignoring what i said about having the book operating on 2 levels the conscious level and the other than conscious level. What is the big deal about spending 3 to 5 minutes photoreading a book so you get even more from the book. The other thing is you are so quick to rush to judgement you have not even given this process a fair trial. You photoread once and you say this doesn't work. Go photoread 30 books over a period of a month and then tell me that it doesn't have any impact. You believe what you want to believe. If you want to convince yourself photoreading does not work you will convince yourself. It becomes a self fulling prophecy. You can keep saying these affirmations photoreading doesn't work,photoreading doesn't work & guess what? Your mind agrees with you.

Some skepticism is fine & healthy but keep an open mind. 300 years ago if you told somebody that one day someone is going to build this big machine and this big machine is going to carry a smaller machine and that the big machine was going to leave the earth and that the smaller machine would fly to moon and land on the moon and then fly back to earth they would have thought you were absolutely crazy. If you also told them that another machine was going to fly to the planet mars land on mars and send pictures back to earth from mars using a computer they would have thought you were crazy. My point is just because you may not understand how something works do not be so quick to dismiss it.

Photoread4me

Sasha

I totally sympathise with what you are saying. Before learning to photoread, I skim read anyway. I had to for my work. So I was already very good at extracting information from documents. Yet I would still miss stuff - skimming takes a lot of concentration on a large text because you are still consciously processing the text, albeit sampling the words and looking for keywords.

So photoreading taught me a few extra things that made my (conscious) skimming better... previewing, the importance of purpose, and state management for concentration. Those alone were enough to make it worth while, whilst I remained highly skeptical about the benefits of the photoreading step.

So just for experimentation, I stuck with the PR step and took the view that if it works, it works. Then after a few books I decided to play with it. After PR'ing a book and leaving it alone for half an hour, I took a deep breath, relaxed, and wondered if there was a page in this book that told me everything I really needed to read that met my purpose. A number popped in to my head and I turned to that page and there it was....

Since then I've begun to listen to my unconscious mind and find that it directs my attention to the sections that are of interest to me, and I don't really have to (consciously) skim the whole book, I just know if a page is of interest to me or not. I've even photoread commercial documents followed by a postview just minutes before a meeting, and surprised with deep, intelligent comments on the document that even impress me!

So my suggestion is stick with it - the PR step takes only a few minutes extra, and free yourself from the need for proof, and I think that you will be pleasantly surprised!

Matt
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gently dude...I get that you believe in the system.

I don't have any particular beliefs about the system...I already invested in it which should indicate an already open mind. Please don't rush to judge what my perspective is...you don't know me or how I think at all.

I am not completely missing your point either. I'm disagreeing with it...or to be more accurate, questioning it. All I'm doing is relating my experience with the materials.

Now if you have some actual helpful advice I'm all ears. But cease with the regurgitation...I've already listened to every bit of verbiage you've stated...they are things Paul Scheele states through out his materials.

Matt thank you for this.

I'm getting hung up during activation. As I review the materials again it just feels so much like I'm skimming that it's as if I'm picking the book up for the first time. I do preview as prescribed and have been photoreading regardless. There is no harm in that step and it only takes a minute or two.

It just appears that the previewing/keyword pulling is the most helpful step. As a study technique it's excellent. I still feel extremely unfamiliar with the text and if I am investing in multiple activation techniques which include lots of dipping I might as well read the book.

I'll keep at it for a while longer. Thank you for your commentary.

My pleasure - one of the challenges I found was that if I am (consciously) frustrated with my unconcious, then I'm not listening out for the signals.

For me it's a little like that "gut feeling"... have you ever thought to yourself that your "gut feeling" about a person was right and you should have listened? Well that is your unconscious (which communicates non-verbally) giving you some advice that you chose to ignore.

So my point is... your unconscious is communicating with you all of the time, so if you have set your purpose such that your unconscious can interpret it (it's a very literal creature), then you are receiving the unconscious signals guiding you to that purpose. Your challenge is to notice them and act accordingly. The unconscious mind loves it when you listen... the more you listen, the more information you will receive and the more intuitive your reading will become.

So kick back, relax, and invite your unconscious to guide you, eventually you'll hear what has been there all along.

Matt

I've heard of experiments where a person was
put under hypnosis and asked to describe what
was going on around him. To his surprise,
the hypnotized person began describing events
that were going on around him that he
hadn't been aware of when it happened in
an unhypnotized state.

It has been a long time since I remember reading
this and would appreciate someone jumping in
with some facts on this.

Anyway, it's the same with photoreading. You are
picking up lots of information that you are unaware
of and that sits there waiting to be activated.
If you skim, it is not the same thing. It seems that
in the skimming you are focused and not relaxed
as you would be photoreading.

Hopefully, someone will add to this discussion
and supply missing information or correct me
if it be the case.

The conscious mind is just the tip of the iceberg in terms of what your brain stores and processes...

It's not about focus with skimming... it's about listening to your intuition, paying attention to the messages that your conscious mind is receiving, guiding you