How to Cram 2 Months of Learning into 1 Day | Josh Waitzkin | The Tim Ferriss Show
Engineering artificial reps for rare moments, the most important question protocol, and why the last three turns of any session matter more than the first thirty.
"It feels physiologically like between one and two months of training per session. Afterwards, I feel like I have to lie in a dark room with my eyes closed for 10, 15 minutes, just to process." — Josh Waitzkin
Josh Waitzkin, on the episode
Josh Waitzkin won a world championship in chess, then in Tai Chi push hands, then trained under Marcelo Garcia to a black belt in jiu jitsu, and is now applying the same learning model to foiling. The pop framing of Waitzkin is a prodigy who happens to be good at a lot of things. The actual operating system underneath is a repeatable method for manufacturing deliberate practice reps out of domains that resist them, and for structuring a day so the unconscious mind keeps working after the conscious mind clocks out. He now coaches investors, founders, and decision makers using the same architecture he built as a competitor. This conversation with Tim Ferriss pulls the mechanics out of three different disciplines: surfing, chess, and high-stakes decision making, and shows the single model running underneath all three.
Tactic 01
Josh Waitzkin, The Tim Ferriss Show
Engineer Artificial Reps For Rare High Value Moments
The play
Find a way to trigger your field's rare catastrophic moment repeatedly in one compressed session.
Josh Waitzkin says
The ocean is unpredictable and hard to replicate deliberately, unlike martial arts drilling where you can hit the same thing 10, 15, 20 times. Using an eFoil means entering the wave under power as a propeller, giving 54 minutes or so of wave time at faster speeds instead of two to four minutes of surfing. A boil is a huge upsurge of water pressure that can catapult you out of control, and most foilers rarely get chances to train at boils, so when they happen it is catastrophic. Going over 200 boils at top speed in two sessions felt physiologically like between one and two months of training per session. Afterwards it was necessary to lie in a dark room with eyes closed for 10, 15 minutes just to process.
Try this
Identify the rare catastrophic moment in your field and find a way to trigger it repeatedly in one compressed session this week.
