Speed Reading: How To Read 100 Books in 100 Days with May Ling Lai

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Sneak Peek:

Kristin:    00:00:30    So when you're reading, so if you think about typing 60 words a minute, talking a hundred or 125 words a minute, reading at 250 words per minute and then speed reading at like 700 or 900 or 15 words a minute. I mean this should have been taught in elementary school.  

May Ling:    00:00:50    Yeah, I think people stop teaching. Like how would you go about even doing it at about 200 words per minute after that? They're like, oh, she can read. Let's call it a day, da da. It's just that for my job, especially once I started managing money, it was like, so, you know, the penalty for being wrong and not being able to explain why you're wrong is so huge and there's so much pressure that I was just like furiously reading some of the things that I ended up doing. It was interesting when I finally collaborated with speed with someone who is a proper speed reading coach to try to like unlock some of the things that were letting me easily get over the 1500, which apparently is where a lot of speed reading coaches will end it.  

Introduction: Welcome to Badass Digital Nomads, where we're pushing the boundaries of remote work and travel, all while staying grounded with a little bit of old school philosophy, self-development, and business advice from our guests.

Kristin:   Before we get into today's show, thank you everyone who has been leaving five star reviews in the Apple Podcast store. Today's shout out goes to Ello who says, unbelievably insightful. Kristin has a way of explaining complex topics in an insightful, easy to digest way. I listened to her on my commute to work and I've learned so much about entrepreneurship and becoming a digital nomad. Highly recommend. Thanks, Ello. Today's episode is not about the coronavirus, but it's about a skill that you can master while being quarantined for the coronavirus and that skill is speed reading. My guest today is Ling Lai, who built a multi-million dollar company by the age of 24 before going on to manage hedge funds worth billions of dollars and traveling to more than 60 countries around the world.  

Kristin:    00:02:53    She is an entrepreneur, investor, world traveler and linguist who has just accomplished the amazing feat of reading 100 books in 100 days. And in this episode of Badass Digital Nomads, she's going to break down how she did it and give you guys a discount code to her 7 Skills of Speed Reading online course on Udemy that you can get for just $10 or $15. We'll link to that in the show notes below. It's time to learn some skills while you're locked in your house, and speed reading is a great place to start. You can watch the video version of this interview on my Patreon page at patreon.com/TravelingwithKristin. Become a Patreon today for just $5 a month support the podcast. And without further ado, here's May Ling.

Podcast Interview:

Kristin:  My guest today, ladies and gentlemen, is the queen of All Bad Asses <laugh>, and this is May Ling .  

May Ling:    00:04:01    I think you're the queen of all bad asses. We're just lucky enough to hang out. <laugh>.  

Kristin:    00:04:06    She, I'm so glad we met. I was talking to Johannes, the founder of Nomad Cruise this morning and thank you. Oh really? Johannes, because this is how we met. And now I know Ling is in New York at her home base and I am at New York Beach, AKA Miami, and we are living parallel lives. And the last time we saw each other was,  

May Ling:    00:04:30    it's been a while  

Kristin:    00:04:31    Over a year ago. It was in Brazil, right? Yeah. Getting off the Nomad Cruise. So I remember we did a live stream from my apartment in Barcelona or from my hotel, and then we went on the Nomad cruise and then you got sick on the Nomad cruise and then, oh  

May Ling:    00:04:52    My God, I'm sick. The entire cruise. Oh, <laugh> the worst that was,  

Kristin:    00:04:58    But so much has happened in the past year. Yeah. And so I wanted to have you on the show for a million reasons, which people will find out that you're too smart for everyone's good. So hopefully we learn something a lot from you. So I'm gonna take the burden off myself, although we're gonna do something that we've never done before. And at the end you're gonna ask me some questions for my advice about your new video project.  

May Ling:    00:05:23    Yeah, I'd love that.  

Kristin:    00:05:24    So it's gonna be like a massive mind at the end.  

May Ling:    00:05:27    Cool.  

Kristin:    00:05:28    That's  

May Ling:    00:05:28    So this will be, I'm into it.  

Kristin:    00:05:30   Well,  we're experimenting. Yeah, <laugh>, um, and only patrons will be able to see this video. So if you're listening on the podcast, you get the audio version. If you wanna see the video version, you can become a patron for $5 a month and see mailing's. Beautiful, beautiful face <laugh> and my normal face <laugh>. 

May Ling:    00:05:52   Is  it not the Patreon that, that new um, website that is paid only that the Patreon one? Is that the, is that how you're doing that? Just curious. 

Kristin:    00:06:01    Yeah,  so that's cool. I just relaunched my, um, Patreon account. Sweet, exciting. And I'm adding just tons of really cool stuff behind the scenes for people. Uh, so normally nobody would see this, but yeah. So that's that. But let's just jump into it. Um, for people who don't know you for, haven't had the pleasure of meeting you in real life yet, can you give us just the mailing's life in a nutshell, <laugh> just a little bit how you are. 

May Ling:    00:06:32     I, it's gotten shorter the way I described it. Hass gotten shorter because it's so awkward. I think always talk about yourself. Um, I started out in um, banking and research sales actually at Goldman. And then I, um, had my own company with a very dear friend, built it to like 2 million in revenue. She still runs it, it's an awesome company. It, uh, was actually herbal distribution products. So we would source herbs from all over the world and sell them in the us but we had a few that were like really marquee, high science type herbs. Um, then I went back into finance. I worked at Morgan Stanley when they had just purchased Barra. So I worked in quantitative finance and then ended up in the hedge fund world, um, managing money, um, on the short side. Then I worked as, um, at, at a startup and became a partner at a quant shop that basically did outsourced risk for different asset management firms. We also had an asset, a broker dealer, uh, anyways, big time financey kind of stuff. And then I, um, resigned three years ago, I think now. And uh, just started traveling the world and that's how we met. How awesome is that  

Kristin:    00:07:41    <laugh> And you've been to now almost 60 countries, so, or pretty much even on the country count.  

May Ling:    00:07:49    I know you have been traveling like a rock star. I've actually been taking it easy recently and just going back to some of the same countries, it's always tough choice. Right.  

Kristin:    00:07:57    What are some of your favorite places that you've been going back to? 

May Ling:    00:08:01    For whatever reason? I have fallen in love with Vietnam. I really like Vietnam. You should check it out. Oh, I haven't been here yet. Um, yeah, I mean there is, people tell me a way to get a 10 year visa, but I have never gotten my act together fast enough to do that. I would just get the 10 year visa because it's, I mean, and there is a possibility that they just discontinue the visa. Although with the recent events, I think all of Asia's getting a little strange, so maybe not. Um, but um, because you know, that stuff all affects visas. Like anytime there's like a major outbreak or something like that, everybody freaks out. And then the visas that we're gonna go away magically stay there for an extra couple years, it sucks.  

Kristin:    00:08:40    Yeah. We can't live in fear. We just have to still live our lives and, and not be afraid. It's, it's like for a while I was, um, I was afraid to even go, not afraid, but whenever I was in Europe or like in Paris, I was thinking about terrorism because, oh yeah. The week before there had been an attack and it's like you get that kind of stuff on your mind, but at the end of the day you can't predict or control it.

May Ling:    00:09:05     Yeah. Just keep going.

Kristin:    00:09:05     Just keep going. And if, and people are always asking me too, like if certain places are safe and I'm like, Hey, everywhere is dangerous and safe and yeah, just use your head and take normal precautions. And um, I used to tell my friends and family that I was better off living in Nicaragua than I was going shopping at Walmart at night and walking through the parking lot. So you could be, you know, there things could happen anywhere. So just, yeah, just yeah.  

May Ling:    00:09:40    And you know, terrorism, if it's gonna happen, we happen to be one of the cities where it happens <laugh>. So like I got way bigger problems here, uh, than like some of the places I'm going to Frankfurt and then I'll be in Mumbai. I'm going that route. 'cause I actually never, I, I don't feel like I've spent enough time in Germany. 

Kristin:    00:09:56    I love Germany and it's so funny because Germans don't seem to like it. Like all the Germans are always leaving, going to different places. And I love Germany actually wanna go this summer and spend a couple months there because it's just a very livable place. It's great for remote workers. There's so much, there's like smart cities, you can bike, you can walk, you can use public transport. Um, they're  

May Ling:    00:10:21    Efficient cities.  

Kristin:    00:10:22    Yeah, they're efficient cities. There's great culture and music and history and uh, big international population. There's tons of coworking spaces, tons of co-working spaces. It checks all the boxes and  

May Ling:    00:10:34    Totally  

Kristin:    00:10:36    All the cities are different and the regions are different. So you can kind of get what you're looking for.  

May Ling:    00:10:41    And it's crazy 'cause every major city that you go to within an hour of it is another really cute super instagramable little place to go to <laugh>. Yeah, so Germany, Germany does really well on that front. Like if you're an Instagram person, I think you could be very happy in Germany <laugh>.  

Kristin:    00:10:57    Yeah. But they, I think Germany has one of the best passports in the world and yeah, all the Germans are like living in different places, but they still get a lot of the benefits of the social welfare system in Germany. And I am really jealous. But yeah, maybe I'll see you there. I hope we get to cross paths somewhere. But what I, what I wanna talk about because, well I wanna talk to you about a million things, but I'm gonna direct people to episode one of Matt Bowles the Maverick show because you were the first interview on that show, which is is like at 60. Yeah, that's great. Or a hundred episodes or something now. And so Matt did such a great job of getting into your background and how you are managing a $2 billion portfolio in New York and all of these  

May Ling:    00:11:47    one and a half, not quite two, but I love that it gets bigger every time  

Kristin:    00:11:53    You are managing, building $2 million businesses at age 24. You are doing so much cool stuff. You're still doing cool stuff now. Yeah. But um, he did such a good job in that interview that I will link to that one in the show notes so that people can hear about more of your business background. But we'll have to have you on the show multiple times to cover everything. Um, but today I just wanted to cover more about um, your travel experience and also how you're reading one book a day for a hundred days speed, reading a book and uh, a different book every day. And yeah, tell people that this is even possible <laugh> and that they can learn how to do it for 1399. And so I can't think of a better investment and a better use of your time than learning how to speed read. And when I saw that you were doing this 100 books in 100 days, I was so impressed. And I'll pull up your Instagram right now. I wonder if I can,  

May Ling:    00:12:58    Oh, while you're doing that, I'll just tell you actually I'm like every other videographer or vlogger. So like the actual book reading doesn't take that long. I'm probably reading and I did this on my 50, I'll do it on my a hundred and I'm probably reading more than a book a day because I read them all for the week, like in one or two days and then I just do the video afterwards. I think actually the video discipline is way harder than the actual reading part is by a lot <laugh>  

Kristin:    00:13:28    So. Wow. Well I'll tell, I'll give you some tips on the video too. So if anyone's interested in using video for their business, I'll give you some tips at the end. But um, that's awesome. Everybody go to instagram.com/whereismayling, M-A-Y-L-I-N-G and you can see a really beautiful picture in a video of Instagram TV of every single day, every book that she's read. And today is day 58 and yeah, it's so funny because right after I saw this, 'cause I deleted Instagram from my phone for productivity reasons. <laugh> so good for I had for you  

May Ling:    00:14:09    You not sad, but good for you  

Kristin:    00:14:10    <laugh>. I know, I feel like I've missed out a bit, but I just needed to finish my book. I've been on this book deadline and I, I needed to get away so I was addicted. Um, yeah, admittedly, but I saw this and then I think I went to, I went to dinner in downtown Miami and I've been having the coolest Lyft drivers and Uber drivers. Nice. And my Lyft driver was a former manager, like a middle manager who hated his job and so he quit and he had all of these side hustles. He was DJing, he started a landscaping company, he was working in medical sales of some kind and he had all these different things and he couldn't travel 'cause he has kids and they're in school and stuff. But um, he was talking about like asking if I had any book recommendations and I told him about your speed reading and he was like, no way. I'm googling that <laugh> as soon as I get home. He's like, you're my last ride of the day and I'm gonna go home and Google speed reading because that seems like a really good use of my time. And I was like, I agree. Yeah.  

Kristin:    00:15:24    So that's awesome. 

May Ling:    00:15:25    Thank you for that promo there. I appreciate it. <laugh>.  

Kristin:    00:15:29    So tell us about, yeah, okay, so how did you get into speed reading and can anyone do it?  

May Ling:    00:15:38    Speed reading is kind of like, um, running right? It really is the, because I have no other real sports analogies 'cause I'm so bad at sports running is the way that I describe, it's like my metaphor for life. Um, but I probably am a pretty fast reader and like I would say that if we were gonna equate it to running, which a lot of people have some background in, um, it's kind of like I would be like a seven minute pacer, which is fast, right? For a marathon, right. So can anyone become a seven minute pacer kind of Yes. Kind of no for a marathon speed, do you know what I mean? So things that I don't really like to do there is officially a speed reading competition that I learned about on the boat. Um, I will never do that competition because that is like a sprint com competition.  

May Ling:    00:16:27    It's like really short form, you know, you're reading for five minutes and then taking a comprehension test. I'm not that kind of reader. I mean I will probably read it really, really fast, but it's not like my favorite demonstration of speed reading because I actually think that for the first five minutes my pace is slower and then I'm running much faster in the middle of a book and then coming down, um, you know, finishing strong, it, it's exactly like running, you know, only very, very trained sprinters can hit max pate immediately and run all the way through. Um, but most people can definitely run the entire book. They can do it at probably faster than they're currently doing it. Uh, can they get to my speed through the act of making the course with a woman who does properly teach speed reading? I now realize I'm probably like a seven minute pacer, not like an eight minute pacer In the course she reads at like about two thirds my pace, 1500 words per minute.  

May Ling:    00:17:27    So like if it took me 45 minutes to read the book, it would, it would take her an hour and a half. And when we were making the course, literally I would read a book at the library, I would send her the PDF for the book and then she would read it. I would go to lunch, change, take a walk, walk to her office and she did finish reading it. And then we would talk about whether or not we're gonna use the book as part of our course overall. Um, and these books were like maybe 170 pages, 180 pages. Um, she actually, English is her second language so, and she was diagnosed with dyslexia and she got to her speed at first she was telling me her speed was 900 words per minute, but I was like I bet that's wrong. Let me show you a couple things. And then she got to 1500. So it depends where you're starting and what you're doing.  

Kristin:    00:18:16    Where do most people start at? Like I read a chapter a day of a book maybe at breakfast or something like that, so Oh that's great. You think my reading pace is  

May Ling:    00:18:26    Well, okay, so most, it's really hard to tell what most people's reading speed is. They say, and there are so many statistics, but I see no evidence of the actual studies that were done. So I think this is false, but they say that people read at 250 words per minute. So they are at 250 words per minute. You are talking at a very, very fast pace. So if we, if someone's listening to this on two times speed, you're getting close to what your brain is doing at 250 words per minute. But the thing with reading is you don't actually have to speak anything. Your brain can take in visual information much faster than you think. So um, and I think I've always known that because Chinese actually looks that way and I don't read Chinese perfectly, but I noticed very early that that a, a book in Chinese in the same book in English, the English book is like three times the size.  

May Ling:    00:19:19    So it was like, okay, well there's not a problem with your brain taking in the words faster. There's something else going on. Anyways, my point is, is that if you, if you are probably, it depends what you're doing. If you're reading that chapter and you're hearing every single word in your head, then you're probably reading around 250 on the high end, 300 words per minute. If you're not doing that, you're probably over 300 words a minute to 500. Uh, most people are actually doing it by speaking every single word that they read. Um, and that comes from childhood. When you're first learning to read, people will say, okay, read out loud. 'cause they're trying to check that you actually can read the words themselves and then they'll say, all right, read to yourself silently. But they don't tell you that you no longer have to say each word.  

May Ling:    00:20:06    And so if no one ever gives you the heads up or if you don't just magically figure it out on your own, you just keep doing that activity which is reading out loud in your head. That would be a little bit like if you were driving, you know how you're driving down the road and you like called out everything you were seeing in order to take the next step of driving. That to me is the fastest proof to understand what your brain actually needs to do. So like when you see street signs stoplight, you don't need to be like, hmm STOP stop. I think I'll stop. Right? No, you're like sign, sign, sign. You're going at like 75 miles per hour. You still see all the signs as you go. You know, it's not like you memorized that there was a speed limit sign there. If in any city that I put you, you will magically see it very fast. Um, the same thing in music. So like if you're just first learning to read music, you'll go very slow, you'll mess it up, you'll have a lot of confusion. But if you're like a pro, you don't even need to see the music in advance. It doesn't matter what the tempo is, you can read it very fast. Actually the same thing is true in books. Right.  

Kristin:    00:21:09    And I guess with any kind of learning, because  

May Ling:    00:21:12    Any kind of learning hundred percent 

Kristin:    00:21:13    you get that elasticity.  

May Ling:    00:21:15    Yeah, yeah. It's just pattern recognition. That's all it is. Um, and the, and while there are a lot of uh, just if you know the technique, it can help you. I think that a lot of courses that are trying to say that they can double your speed really quickly. It depends where you're starting place is. 'cause if you're truly doing something wrong, then yes, but I do think that you need some time to practice this skill. Do you know what I mean? So it's a little bit the same as if you're running or if you're working with a coach, you'll get that first initial pop because they've corrected some of the stupid stuff you're doing. But to truly get to like 1500 words per minute or where I'm at, you're gonna have to actually practice your way through that. But the  

Kristin:    00:21:58    Bottom line is that you can get gains and let's put this huge chains.

May Ling:    00:22:01    Yeah, let's absolutely  

Kristin:    00:22:03    Put it into like a metaphorical context because I remember now just from hearing you say this, I'm remembering when I learned how to type in elementary, no middle school, high school. I'm pretty sure what is fast at typing 60 to 80 words a minute or something. 60.  

May Ling:    00:22:20    Fast. Yeah.  

Kristin:    00:22:21    Yeah. So think about if you're typing, so many people are wasting their lives typing messages to each other. And this is why it's a waste of time because what you can type on a keyboard if you're doing 60 words a minute is super fast. If you're doing it on your phone, it's slower. Um, so that's why these new apps like Loom and Yak and anything where you're using, oh wow, that's cool. Audio or video to communicate is like up to, I forget it's, 

May Ling:    00:22:53    Is it  six so much faster   

Kristin:    00:22:54    600 times faster or something like that because it's like this whole video audio sensory experience where you're taking in information visually and, and audibly in different ways and you're not just reading or typing. And so I just want everyone to think like if you could just eliminate an hour a day of typing or sending messages, you would get back like 400 hours of your life at the end of the year. And so even if you don't care about reading or you don't wanna speed read, it's just thinking that you are texting unless you're using shortcuts on your phone, which is a really good hack. But um, if you're texting or if you're typing emails or if you're typing in a slack box all day long, that is still gonna be slower than if you're talking or or doing something else.  

May Ling:    00:23:45    So when you're, yeah, he's pretty efficient.  

Kristin:    00:23:47    Yeah. So when you're reading, so if you think about typing 60 words a minute, talking a hundred or 125 words a minute, reading at 250 words per minute and then speed reading at like 700 or 900 or 15 words a minute. I mean this should have been taught in elementary school.  

May Ling:    00:24:07    Yeah, I think people stop teaching the, like, how would you go about even doing it at about 200 words per minute after that They're like, ah, she can read, let's call it a day, da da da da. It's just that for my job, especially once I started managing money, it was like, so, you know, the penalty for being wrong and not being able to explain why you're wrong is so huge. And there's so much pressure that I was just like furiously reading some of the things that I ended up doing. It was interesting when I finally collaborated with speed with someone who is a proper speed reading coach to try to like unlock some of the things that were letting me easily get over the 1500, which apparently is where a lot of speed reading coaches will end it. I think like a lot of lawyers can read around 700, so that's why they seek out speed reading coaches to try to get them to 1500.  

May Ling:    00:24:58    But a huge part of it is that I do reflect and review and that's in the course, it's like the last module. And that really entails what I do after I close the book. And I think because the reading itself isn't this like huge massive effort and commitment, then I have time to actually think about what I read. And that is why retention and comprehension is typically higher for me than um, someone else, uh, that has just read. You know, 'cause I'm, I'm essentially reading it again, the, when I go to do the notes by just going back to the things that bothered me or that I found really fascinating. But now I have the whole argument of the book to reflect upon, um, that one page that I, that I earmarked for myself.  

Kristin:    00:25:43    That's so interesting. Yeah, because you're basically getting the gains from reading something for a second time, but you're still reading it faster. So you're reading a book Yeah. Really quickly and then you're getting the benefit of reading it a second time. But even reading it those two times, you're still reading it in a fraction of the time of just sitting down and reading it at 200 words per minute. And that is mind boggling.  

May Ling:    00:26:09    It is mind. Yeah. So like for example, the one that I was just talking to someone the other day 'cause he was, he was asking the same thing. He's like, I read, I took one of the books that you read 'cause I just wanted to get a sense for what I could do relative to you <laugh>. And he's like, and I, and then I didn't look at your review and I look, I I made my own kind of thoughtful, like, what did I take away? And I looked at yours and I was like, yep, she's getting more than I get out of it. Slow reading. It was actually win Marcell's book for whatever reason, the way he writes that guy is brilliant and he is actually here in New York City. So I've met people that have met him. So subsequent to that, I I have had a couple conversations with people that have actually met him and you're like, they've told me like that You're right.  

May Ling:    00:26:48    That guy's brilliant <laugh> actually beyond the instrument itself, um, he's, I don't know if you know Wynton Marsalis, but he's a famous trumpet player, really famous. I have known about him for 25 years because he used to do the circuit in Florida as well. Um, he's just super well known. So for whatever reason that book's like 119 or something pages, it's sub 150 pages. But I read it in like 19 minutes and then I did a review on it, the review portion, to be fair, because I have to type I the way that I do it, I, I do like, I sit for a second, then I type it in and then I add like notes to the paragraph that I did. So all of my stuff is also in good reads. Um, the full notes, um, anyways, that takes probably another 19 minutes. So all in 'em at 38, 38 minutes, but 38 minutes for a hundred and something pages. I think a lot of people would feel that that's quite fast. So yeah,  

Kristin:    00:27:39    That's like me reading one chapter of a book in 20 minutes or something.  

May Ling:    00:27:44    All right. Well you can, you can, you should totally grow it then. Girl. You should grow your skills there <laugh>.  

Kristin:    00:27:47    I will. Is there anything that people can do, just, you know, if you just give a tip on the podcast, is there anything I can do? 

May Ling:    00:27:54     Totally. I'll give, yeah. 'cause I think I, the course really goes crazy in depth. That means it's like eight and a half or nine hours long, I think ultimately is what it came to. 'cause we go through literally every possible skill. There's seven skills total, but we really break it down. Um, I would say that the number one thing that I probably don't emphasis en emphasize enough in the course, um, is that the thing that holds most people back is the belief that they can't read faster. And associated with that is the idea that, um, you are somehow gonna magically get a hundred percent comprehension by reading slower. In fact, you will not get a hundred percent comprehension for a number of different reading reasons. Not the least of which is it might be the first time you're experiencing the material. It's a little bit like if we were having a conversation about travel and somebody who had never traveled decides to come in and hang out, they will get a lot.  

May Ling:    00:28:49    But like someone like Johannes who's traveled, he's gonna be like, yeah, yeah, yeah, I know exactly what you mean, dah dah dah. Right? Like, you can't, it's not even a fair thing. Like if we're talking about something visa related, some people will be lucky if they even know approximately the steps, you know, whereas other people would be like, wait a second, when you did it for that country, did this, this. So, so that's I think the number one thing that we, that has to be unlearned and I, I think it comes from school where you're tested on comprehension and made to feel really badly if you fail to get it. But you may have a totally different background from other people in, in the class. And so your interpretation is different and what you really need is someone to chat with you about it or to have a, have a beat to think through why you felt the way you did.  

Kristin:    00:29:35    Yeah, that's um, very interesting that you use that example because when you think about when, when people are wanting to change careers or learn a new skill or start traveling or doing something for the first time, for some reason as adults we forget that it takes time to learn things. Totally. And if we're starting something new that we're unfamiliar with, we are going to suck at it. We aren't gonna know what we're doing. We are gonna make mistakes. And you know, 20-year-old me who was like, I'm gonna live in Australia and I had no idea what I was doing and I couldn't find a rental property and like all of this crazy drama or,  

May Ling:    00:30:17    And even if someone told you, you'd still be like, all right, I kind of got that. Let's see what actually happens.  

Kristin:    00:30:23    Yeah. Like the first time I was exchanging foreign currency, I was like, what am I doing? And then, yeah, and we, we take things for granted when we become adults. Like when you're learning how to walk as a baby, you're really, really thinking about each step that you're taking. Totally. But then it becomes an autotomized like motor function of your body, just like reading a stop sign. You can't even look at a sign without reading it. Like you just automatically totally take in the info. Yeah. And when you go to a new country, you take that for granted that that's why people get really drained when they travel too fast because yeah, they don't take into account that their sense, it's like a sensory overload that their brain is having to operate at a higher level to take in all of this new information in a place you've never been to.  

Kristin:    00:31:09    And the signs are in a foreign language and the, you know, people are talking in a different language and it's just everything takes more energy. And so the point I'm trying to make basically is that just because we're adults, it doesn't mean that we have to learn something faster. We can just take our time, but we can also take advantage of opportunities like speed reading to just increase our efficiency without compromising our, our comprehension. And I think that's really important. And something like learning a language. You can take five years of classes one day a week in high school and college and really not learn anything. Or you can go immerse yourself for a month in another country, you're gonna learn a lot faster. And it's like, yeah, I can still remember going on surf trips to Mexico in high school and college and I couldn't even be like, I was like, hola, you know, like my <laugh> my Spanish was so bad. And then like a few years later it didn't even dawn on me where I was like reading literature in Spanish, like just as if I had always spoken Spanish. Like that doesn't happen overnight. You have to figure things out basically. I'm just saying like everyone can have just have patience with yourself when you're learning something new. Yeah. If you can take a 1% improvement, take it.  

May Ling:    00:32:33    Yeah. And like for example, I think Spanish is a really good example. Like I can't read as fast as Spanish for sure. And I bear, I, I saw way too much vocabulary loss, which is the second skill you have to really build up vocabulary. But what I would say is that you're, when you're learning a second language, you're not as hard on yourself, right? Like if you didn't understand the chapter perfectly, you don't freak out or whatever. For whatever reason we do this to ourselves in English. So if you just remove that constraint and allow yourself to try to be more in the flow when you're reading and less in the like, I suck because I'm not reading this fast or I must read this to have like this optimal thing that's crazy, you're no one's testing you afterwards. Um, but we're trained  

Kristin:    00:33:15    That we're gonna have a test later train and that we're gonna fail it if we don't try really hard and study really hard.  

May Ling:    00:33:21    Yeah,  

Kristin:    00:33:21    Yeah, yeah, yeah. So it's that fear that like, it's like anxiety and fear that if you don't get this right, you're gonna fail the test. Except there is no test, it's just life and we're just going through it. So we've got totally the fear of sucking and yes, we have the discomfort of learning a new skill and then probably like some form of procrastination goes into it. 'cause anytime we have to learn something new, we, we can get tired. Our brain is like resisting like, oh no doing stuff. It's don't stop, you know? So what is something else that is one of the practical elements of speed reading that's part of like the foundation of how it works?  

May Ling:    00:34:04    Oh well there are seven actual skills. There's the first three are, and this is in the intro. Even if you don't listen to the whole course, this, this video is, is one of the free ones, um, on udemi. Um, the first three skills are very practical skills. I call them the essentials because they're not basic because you do spend a lot of your time learning them in in high school. Um, the first one is decoding. So that's just basically, uh, phonetics plus. So there's a lot of words that your brain just takes in and doesn't even bother to read, like stop on a stop sign or yield or what have you. Um, and then phonetics actually allows you, uh, mental capacity beyond that. So even if you don't, if you don't recognize the word in a split second, um, you will still be able to read and understand and comprehend.  

May Ling:    00:34:50    So decoding, um, is a key element. That's the first one. The second one is vocabulary. So you have to have enough vocabulary to be able to read what you've chosen. Like side note to that is if you're reading stuff that's really technical but is using words that seem very common, you'll also have problems with that kind of, um, literature or or nonfiction, whatever it is. And the third one is actually sentence structure. And this huge component is that we've removed sentence diagramming from the curriculum. It was removed in the seventies but is almost barely taught now. Um, if you, if you were in high school in the um, in the 2000 period, then you'll probably not, you'll probably not have a huge sentence diagram and component. But without that grammar you actually can't read the sentence correctly and you'll never get over a certain speed. This is why like programs that have like flashing words at you or single words, they, this is one of the reasons why those don't work because without the grammar you don't actually understand the sentence at all. And in fact, faster readers can take longer sentences and still get the grammar correct. The proof of that is if you can cold read like an actor.  

Kristin:    00:36:03    Hmm, that that reminds me of learning a language too because Totally. Yes. The strategy that my language school used, which is called conversa in Costa Rica, which is one of the best Spanish language schools I think in the continent. Um, we only learned grammar, we only oh's so amazing learned verbs. We didn't learn any vocabulary and it was all probably related to this.  

May Ling:    00:36:29    So cool. Should work. Yeah, very effective. Yeah, so those are the first three that are like kind of just rudimentary English kind of things. Um, and then those actually probably are true of Spanish as well. I mean I'm pretty sure as long as it's a phonetic language, you should be good to go. The other four are a little bit more mechanical and you can continue to increase your pace by working on these four. The first three, your pace kind of caps out at some point because there is a max finite amount that you can learn there. The four are the first one's focused because you know, when you're reading you are actually 100% focused on just taking stuff in with your eyes. People that go with the finger method. That only works if you're, if it's helping you focus back on the page. But once you cross like I wanna say 1500 words per minute, your finger can actually be covering up part of the structure and the grammar so it becomes a distraction, um, given the speed you're going at.  

May Ling:    00:37:25    Uh, so I, I'm a hundred percent sure that you definitely don't need to put your finger down the page to be able to read it very fast and that it could be actually a problem depending on your speed. If you're like at very, very advanced speeds, uh, what you do need to do is either learn to focus the way that you do in meditation 'cause and get into that full flow. And that focus is true of tennis players. Elite athletes will tell you the same thing as far as meditation goes. Um, so focus or what I call refocus, which you know, I, I heard your podcast on meditation and it's just like when you have some thought you have to like acknowledge it, push it out. So that actually helps a lot, believe it or not, with when you try to get the higher speeds in reading.  

May Ling:    00:38:05    So that's the first one. The second one is this thing called thought units and that's just chunking the words correctly, uh, or the sentences correctly surrounding a couple of different things. The third is to put an end to the sub vocalization and really understand when to use it and when not. And the fourth is really advanced pattern recognition. And that's when you take the concept of structure and map it to a bigger concept of how you would do like a full book. Because everybody does in fact write approximately an outline for their book. Even if they take shortcuts around it. There is some structure, it turns out that the more experience you have with different structures, the faster you can actually read as well. This is why to hit your max pace. You can continue to grow that over a lifetime because you will see and experience more and more books.  

May Ling:    00:38:53    It's kind of like the first time that you traveled to a foreign country, you were like, oh my god, how do I even get out of the airport? You know? And now you're like, all airports approximately look like this. I'm gonna go through there, there's gonna be an ATM before I exit. There'll be ATM after I'll get a sim card here. Do you know what I mean? Like it doesn't matter what country you put any like true nomad in, they know exactly what they're doing when they get off the plane versus like someone new. It's just like, uh, <laugh> luggage, <laugh>, you know? Totally. Like books are the same way. They have the same sort of like approximate avenue. I mean different styles of books are gonna be very, very different. Just like an Asian airport will probably be very different from an American airport because they're all newer and they, you know, um, although I know you just, you haven't gone to as much Asia, but Latin American airports have their own deal as well. And you can almost tell that you're in a region of the world just by being in the airport <laugh>. Yeah, yeah. You could totally  

Kristin:    00:39:47    Just put me in a suitcase and unzip it in a given airport and I would be like Caribbean, Eastern Europe, like Yeah,  

May Ling:    00:39:55    Totally. Totally. Totally, totally, totally. So like that exists in books as well and you just have to get more experience with it. That's it.  

Kristin:    00:40:02    You just reminded me of something else that I didn't even realize I knew until you said that because since I've been writing my first book now when I am reading books, I am recognizing the organization of their books. Totally.  

May Ling:    00:40:16    Yep.  

Kristin:    00:40:16    And taking away from that, I'm like, oh, I could do this, I can implement that. And I've done the same thing subconsciously with video. When I learned how to, yes, we could talk about this next, when I learned how to make video, um, I had no idea what I was doing. And then now two years later I can't even watch a commercial or a movie or anything without analyzing the shots. I'm seeing like how fascinating, how long, like how the shot is moving, how long the shot is, what cuts they're using, what transitions they're using. I never noticed that before but it now it's like reading a stop sign. Like I see it  

May Ling:    00:40:57    And I see you can't do it. Cannot do it. Yeah.  

Kristin:    00:40:58    I'm like, this is the shot they're doing. Even if it's a drone, I'm like, I know that drone shot like what you have to do with the controller to get that shot. And it's like, it's really bizarre. But I think this attention to detail can really help people because we live in a society that's bombarded with information. It's like information overload and if you can cut through the noise and get to what matters, then it's just gonna make your life better, a better quality of life and it's effective in your business or your job.  

May Ling:    00:41:29    Yeah, I mean with reading in particular, you will get like if even if somebody had told you all the stuff that you now know about video shooting, right? The first time you went to shoot the video, you wouldn't have done what you do now. So you with reading, um, you just gotta take that off of yourself. You'd be like, I'm gonna read this, I'm gonna get what I'm gonna get and what I don't get. I'll go to the next book, I'll get it from a different book. It's all good, right? Yeah. Um, but I think that there's too much stress around reading whereas it's really just like every other skill. Like if you suddenly did a totally different format in video, you know, the first one's gonna suck and then subsequent to that, by the end it'll just like be rockstar. Perfect. That's um, essentially every time you read a new subject area, same experience and, but over time you will find that because you've just recorded so many videos, your first new attempt at a new type of video is gonna be like way better <laugh> than like your first attempt at a video.  

May Ling:    00:42:25    And that's, that's the same thing with reading strangely enough  

Kristin:    00:42:27    Because you're building on that foundation of what you had before. 'cause you don't know what you don't know until you know, and then you know where to go from there. And I think that's kind of the key to unlocking life. And ironically I knew nothing about audio equipment. So with the video stuff, obviously I'm still super new to it. Like if I go to a movie set, you know, a film set and saw people using these giant cameras, I wouldn't even know how to turn it on. You know, like I have no idea what they're doing.

May Ling:    00:42:57     It's like, it's nice, I'm wanna stand over here <laugh> 

Kristin:    00:42:59    But you will eventually get to a place where you can recognize that. And case in point somebody said if you're interested in making videos, I'm in this, this group called the Travel Video Academy. Oh cool. Which is run by it's um, a YouTuber called, his name is Thomas Alex Norman. And that group has really helped me a lot. We'll like analyze different videos and we'll post our own videos for feedback and stuff. And one of the guys commented on my video recently, he's like, oh, how did you get such good sound quality? And I just burst out laughing <laugh> because I didn't even own a microphone for like the first year. I was like, there's a microphone built into the camera. Like why would I need another microphone <laugh>? And you, you're welcome everyone listening to the podcast 'cause I'm using a real microphone today. But I would record entire interviews with like three people and no microphone and you don't know what you don't know and so  

May Ling:    00:44:01    You don't know what you don't know. And also now.  

Kristin:    00:44:03    It's super obvious also.  

May Ling:    00:44:05    Yeah, <laugh>, but you know, don't, you can't like I have no regret for just trying it, you know what I mean? Because you have to kind of see what you did to like think about how you do it differently. Yeah. And if you never try it, it's 'cause you'll get like, you know, everybody's so big on this 80 20 rule stuff, right? But I'm like, I kind of want the 20 that I'm missing <laugh>. Do you know what I mean? So I think of like this whole exercise, whether it's speed reading and the logging or whatever it might be. I get to see my 80 20 and where it sits and now we get to cover the 20 Right. <laugh>. Yeah. And the 20 actually is the difference that makes you that much faster. So I mean I think a lot of people with reading haven't even tried to cover the 80.  

May Ling:    00:44:50    Like they're, they're like doing it, they're like cruising way lower than their potential. And reading unfortunately is actually one of those skills that helps all of their skills. So it is somewhat worthwhile to maybe get that even a little bit faster or at least take out way all the angst around it. 'cause it shouldn't be this like super negative thing for people. Yeah. Um, but if you wanna like cross to the extreme speeds, that's a totally different thing like that. That definitely is even I think my, the course that I built with, um, with Katya, um, you know, that'll get you that that is going to be accurate and great up to 1500. But there are really crazy things that happen over 1500 in speed reading that are beyond what's in that course.  

Kristin:    00:45:31    Okay, well we'll start with the marginal gains because  

May Ling:    00:45:34    That's like, yeah,  

Kristin:    00:45:36    Reading at over 1500 words a minute is not even within my realm of reality right now.  

May Ling:    00:45:41    Totally. I mean that's one of the bigger reasons why I did this is because, you know, no one tells you how fast reading speeds are and even when they do, they don't explain it like, like it's almost impossible for people to see what it actually is. Um, so that's why when I post the videos, I post how long it's taking me to read it, um, so that people could get a sense for what it could be on the extreme end. The way that, like I once watched this documentary on, on marathons, um, and marathon racing and there was a time when they thought women like physically could not run even a half marathon because they, they had all these like excuses for what would happen to our physiology and our ability to have children <laugh>. It's like these crazy things. This is like, and this is like, I wanna say the late seventies, early eighties and then this guy in New York, I forget his name, but he's so famous and I think he's like part of, he is the person that started the New York Marathon was like, no we need women in the marathon because first of all, I'm a guy and I want women to run with <laugh>, you know, and so he actually goes to the Playboy club and gets a bunch of those girls to run what's called the mini marathon, which is a 10 k.  

May Ling:    00:46:49    Ultimately there's this woman from Norway, Greta Vols Vice I think is her name. She's like this crazy fast runner. Um, she ends up like doing a sub three hour marathon, almost like two and a half I think. And she's got crazy fast speeds and then they're like, yep, women can run the marathon <laugh>, you know, after that point. Um, but no, no one knows that you can do something until someone just is like, yep, here's how it would look. I'm more than sure that, um, that there are people that are run faster. Like notice I said I'm probably like a seven, seven and a half minute pacer on marathon, but we know that there are actually marathon runners that are going a lot faster than that Olympic style. I mean that shouldn't barely even qualify me. Like I wouldn't be, I'm, I'm saying I'm not qualifying for the Olympics of, of reading. Um, but I am pretty fast. Like I'm a solid amateur speed reader.  

Kristin:    00:47:37    And you bring up another good point is that you don't have to be an expert to do something well to enjoy it or to teach other people how to do it. You have just have to know 1% more about that topic to be able to help somebody else and boom, there's probably everybody who's listening has skills and abilities that they take for granted that other people don't know how to do or have never heard of and you can help those people with it. So. Oh that's such good information. Yeah. So I wanna get to your questions about video, but first let's take the opportunity to ask, since you have a hundred books on your list and you've clearly read more than that over the course of your life, um, are there any books that stand out in this first 60 days that you really loved that you wanna share the titles with people and why?  

May Ling:    00:48:31    Yeah, I did an episode where I at at 50 where I shared a couple that I really liked and I did one replacement book because I read a bunch of books for that day and I hated all of them. So I was like, I'm just gonna pull one that I actually really like. It was on Super Bowl day so I was like I'll just pull the one that I like the best on Super Bowl Day. It's Gridiron Genius, it's by Mike Lombardi and he is like this amazing football coach that everybody but me knows 'cause I know nothing about football. It's so dumb. I mean it comes to it with the actual sport, but I will say that was a great book. He is like such a good teacher of leadership skills and like how do you think about becoming great type skills? I also think Wynton Marsalis's book, um, was amazing.  

May Ling:    00:49:17    I think it's called Letter, oh no, it's called two, A young jazz musician. He, aside from just being a great musician, the way he thinks about his craft, you know, he studies it all the time, but he is like, no, there's this other thing after you studied that's actually doing and like becoming part of your soul and that's what you have to express when you do jazz. But it's so beautifully written and it's so easy to carry it into any other parts of your life. There's a couple that I had that I actually haven't posted yet, so I can't really speak to those, but I thought were really cool. Well, sorry I've named enough. I'll just name those two. I call it a day.  

Kristin:    00:49:53    Everybody follow mailing on Instagram so you can see all the books that she read and you can get the like short review of each book and  

May Ling:    00:50:04    Yeah, I'm long-winded in person, but I keep it to sub four minutes, right around four minutes or less.  

Kristin:    00:50:09    <laugh> uh, you actually reminded me of last night, um, I was eating dinner and I had some YouTube on and it just autoplayed this video by, I think it was CNN, it's called Make It, have you heard of this channel?  

May Ling:    00:50:24    I haven't.  

Kristin:    00:50:24    Super interesting. So it's about the cost of living in different cities. And this girl came on and I think she was living on 50 or $60,000 a year in Manhattan and she was explaining how she spent her money and how she supported herself and where her income came from. It's like a five minute video. I'll link to that in the show notes too. Yay. We'll link to everything, all the books and stuff. And she said something that really hit me. She said that she could make more money if she waited tables full time, but she moved totally to New York because she wanted to be a dancer. And she said she makes less money per month when she dances because her hourly rate is lower and she has to go to a lot of auditions to get jobs and then she doesn't get paid for that. But that she felt like she was slowly dying inside when she wasn't dancing. And so it's kind of reminds me of that with the music, like if she wasn't dancing, she wasn't living her life. And so it doesn't matter if her income goes down on the months that she takes a job for one week and goes to dance, that is what gives her life and that's what makes her happy. And I was like, yeah, I'm like sitting there eating my dinner like you go girl, that's totally,  

May Ling:    00:51:40    She  

Kristin:    00:51:41    Just hit the nail on her head.  

May Ling:    00:51:42    I mean I hate, I hate that there are so that people, you know, something like dancing, playing music, like people work so many years, the amount of education they have relative to investment banker, their education is like a trillion times more. Their dedication to the craft is a trillion times more. I think it's really unfortunate how incomes go the way that they go. Most artists in New York have to figure out a side hustle to really support their craft and their art. And I think it's unfortunate.  

Kristin:    00:52:10    Yeah. And if you would be happy if you were just born naturally gifted at a skill and you had it, you wouldn't value it the same way as if you worked for it in the same way that people that are born into a trust fund don't value money in the same way that somebody who went from being homeless to becoming a millionaire later, like they know what it feels like on both sides. And so if it was just about someone handing you a skill or handing you a material object, then like everybody who never had to work a day in their life would be super happy. You know? Or everyone who's retired would be super happy 'cause they didn't have to work. And it's just not that way. And so that struggle and that 20% or whatever, that's part of the, the journey. And I'm on my third time taking this Udemy course on how to DJ and on the third time,   

May Ling:    00:53:07    Oh wow

Kristin:    00:53:07   It's clicking like.

May Ling:    00:53:09     That's  awesome. 

Kristin:    00:53:10    The beat  patching and the, that's grid and the structure of the music. And I'm like, ah, the first time I watched this <laugh> I must have retained like 1% and the second time right, like maybe 5%. And now it's like, like all of a sudden I'm retaining half of what he's saying. That's really cool. And like, like I already get it 'cause I already did it twice.  

May Ling:    00:53:30    That's awesome.  

Kristin:    00:53:31    So yeah.  

May Ling:    00:53:32    But you were a badass surfer if I recall.  

Kristin:    00:53:34    Um, I don't know. <laugh>, I mean I used to surf competitively. Um, but that's, yeah, that's another thing that's a very humbling sport to learn. My brother who's a surf photographer, he's, oh, I didn't realize that. Super talented. His name's Jimmy, Jimmy Wilson and you can follow him. Jimmy McCain like hurricane, but with Jimmy at the front.  

May Ling:    00:53:55    Oh, that's fun. Yeah. Um,  

Kristin:    00:53:56    'cause he's such a tornado on Instagram, but um, he has this motto that everyone sucks at surfing and so he's kind of Right. 'cause it's such a difficult sport and so there's nothing more humbling than learning how to surf and you're just getting pummeled by the waves and the wind and the surfboards hitting you on the head. Yeah. And then you're falling over and yeah. So once you can overcome that, you feel like you can overcome anything.  

May Ling:    00:54:23    Yeah. I mean I think that's why it's so great to have an activity that you suck at. 'cause then you can always remember <laugh> like humility is like, 'cause you know, if you just, when you're not humble, that's when you're gonna do something really stupid. You're gonna face planet <laugh>, right? Yeah. So it's always good to like be reminded of the fact that you act that everyone sucks at something. <laugh>  

Kristin:    00:54:46    Reality life has a really reality  

May Ling:    00:54:47    And you're good at, Yeah. 

Kristin:    00:54:50    Reality checking you right? When you totally think you're cool <laugh>.  

May Ling:    00:54:53    Totally, totally, totally. Every day of the week. Yes, I agree <laugh>.  

Kristin:    00:54:58    So, um, ask me your question. So you went from, I know you've been talking about wanting to learn video for a while 'cause we've known each other for almost three years now. And here you are making videos and they look really good. Your lighting looks good, your sound is good. 

May Ling:    00:55:14    Your articulation better  

Kristin:    00:55:15    To the camera is good because you're practicing, you've probably That's right. More than a hundred videos now. So do you have any questions about starting out or where you are now and how to get to the next level? And then maybe anyone who's listening, uh, you guys can take something away from this too, if you're interested in learning how to use video in your personal life or your business.  

May Ling:    00:55:37    Well, I would love it if you did like, you know, there's a lot of self-help ones out there on YouTube. Instagram TV I think is still growing. And so that's why I chose that medium. But I think that these are probably better for YouTube, uh, because then if you didn't, if you wanted to find a book later, I think Instagram doesn't make it easy for you to find the book that you were looking for so easily. But YouTube seems like it's constantly changing and it's got its own deal just to like set up the channel correctly. <laugh> Oh yeah. What, what do you know now about just setting up the channel correctly that you would like? 'cause I still have to do that. I have to, and I don't know that I, I don't think I want it to be my personal account channel. Like I've heard there's a thing that you can do that's like, like how did you end up getting, I remember it was you had an announcement on your channel name when that finally came to pass and all that stuff.  

Kristin:    00:56:26    Yep. So I started a second channel because I realized that if you have too many different types of videos on one channel, you can actually shoot yourself in the foot and like cannibalize your own channel because people subscribe to you because they liked a video that they watched. And if they don't see any more of those kinds of videos that they liked, then they're gonna be like, why am I even subscribed here? And they're not gonna watch any of your videos and if none of your subscribers watch your videos, then YouTube algorithms like, what is going on here? And so I think my best easy tip for setting up a YouTube channel is to take advantage of all the customization that you can do on the channel. So there's different categories. Like you can have, um, a news and politics or people in blogs or places and events.  

Kristin:    00:57:18    You can have like a different type of channel and then a certain type of video on that channel. So the catch 22 is that when you're first starting, you don't exactly know what you wanna make your channel about. Or maybe you have an idea, but maybe that idea evolves over time. And so you could start off doing a personal finance channel and then realize that your number one video is about how to grow on YouTube or how to grow on Instagram. And then all of a sudden you're making videos about Instagram and that can happen. And so maybe out of the first 50 videos you make, 49 of them are about personal finance for millennials and you're getting like 500 views per video. And then one day you do a video about Instagram and it gets a million views. And like clearly people wanna know that type of information so you can kind of go in that direction.  

Kristin:    00:58:13    And so I realized that the format of doing interviews and live streams on my Traveling with Kristin channel was conflicting with the city guides and the travel guides and the cost of living guides. And so I wanna do focus on doing more of those and keeping it travel centric. And then take the business stuff and the entrepreneurship and the, um, tactical advice onto a different channel. And that would be, you'll, you'll see some really big YouTube people opening up like 2, 3, 4 channels because once they learn how to do it, they can open a new channel and a new niche. So they might have one channel that's just for v logging and they might have one that's how to videos and tutorials, you know. So if you wanna do one on books in your research to starting that channel, you should look at using keyword search tools.  

Kristin:    00:59:11    So there are some for YouTube like VidIQ that I can link to in the show notes. And then you can also use some um, SEO tools or searching on Google Trends or Google keywords or Ubersuggest, which is Neil Patel's content. Okay. Search tool. And then you can see how many people are searching for the content that you wanna make because the more people that are looking for it, the faster your channel will grow. So I'm looking at your Instagram. There is a book, let's say you have, let's say you read a bestselling book. Um, yeah. Okay. Let's say you read the four hour work week and yeah. That it gets a lot of search volume. Um, you, if you make a video about the four hour work week, you could tag that video with all the different variations of tags that people are looking for for that book. Okay. And let's say you were gonna review this book.  

May Ling:    01:00:09    So it's all about the tags is what it sounds like to me in a lot of ways. Well, it's, but that's a huge component. It's about, aside from the content, all that stuff, but like,  

Kristin:    01:00:16    Yeah, I mean the content has to be good. Like if people watch it for 10 seconds and they're like, this sucks, then they click off. It's not gonna make much of a difference. So of course you wanna have a good thumbnail and have people click on it, but it's also about what they're looking for. So let's say, um, a new book is coming out. Let's say Barack Obama's book is coming out.  

May Ling:    01:00:34    Yeah.  

Kristin:    01:00:35    And you can get your hands on that book and read it in 20 minutes.  

May Ling:    01:00:40    Like immediately. <laugh>. Yeah. <laugh>. I know. That's the crazy thing. Like I could literally easily be the first review <laugh>

Kristin:    01:00:46    You could  be the first person with like a book review of Barack Obama's book on YouTube. And so when that book comes out, a lot of people are gonna start searching for it and you're gonna get organic search traffic to your video. Um, so those are the types of things that okay, you wanna think about when you're making a YouTube channel. And then if you start to notice that a different type of video is, is working, then you can kind of go all in on that video. And then if, if,  

May Ling:    01:01:14    What was the custom URL thing that you were talking about at one point? Oh, I remember that was really exciting. Yeah.  

Kristin:    01:01:20    So I got youtube.com/digitalnomad, which I couldn't believe was available, but it was, and you have to have a hundred subscribers to get what's called a vanity url. And, and so I was trying to get a hundred subscribers to snag that URL and YouTube will give you options for what your vanity URL can be and it's based on what your Google name is registered as.  

May Ling:    01:01:47    Ah,  okay.

Kristin:    01:01:48     So I had registered my name as Digital Nomad tv, but that one was already taken. And so I was like, maybe I can do digital nomad underscore TV or something like that. And then I realized I couldn't change it 'cause it was grayed out 'cause that's what my name was registered as. So I was like, what if I changed it to first name digital, last name Nomad? And then it popped up as youtube.com/digitalnomad  

May Ling:    01:02:15    And I was like, a lot  

Kristin:    01:02:17    Save, save url, save it. And so I got, ah,  

May Ling:    01:02:21    So when you're setting up the channel itself, you kind of wanna think about like, what is the name of your channel, because that's gonna dictate interesting. Okay.  

Kristin:    01:02:28    You get that URL. So that's also a good tip. Um, and then my other tip would be output and consistency at first until you know what you're doing. <laugh>. So that could take six months. That could take three years. Just keep Yeah. Putting it out there and the faster you'll get through the super awkward part, <laugh>, shitty part. Everything sounds  

May Ling:    01:02:52    <inaudible>. So you don't, you don't get better until you see what you did. And you have to be brave enough to just be like, yeah, yeah, that sucked. We're gonna make it better <laugh> next time. Like, oh, well sometimes I suck. That is how it works. I'm human. Here we go.  

Kristin:    01:03:04    <laugh>. That's part of it. And that is how it works. It's the only way. There's no other way to get around it. So we might as well just accept it. And it's actually more fun when you see how bad you are and then later how much better you get. Um, my first episode of Digital Nomad News took eight hours for me to film. Ouch. <laugh>. I had the idea at lunch, I was like reading a book, had the idea, had like a slow day where I had nothing planned for the afternoon. And I think I worked on it from like 1:00 PM until 8:00 PM or something. And if you look, I will link to the first episode for you guys. And it's still my most popular episode, by the way. That's awesome. From like the top three. That's great. I literally thumb hacked a sheet to the ceiling because I had no green screen.  

Kristin:    01:03:54    I had no newsroom backdrop. I was like, I don't know what to do. So I took a wrinkled gray sheet that I thought wouldn't look wrinkled in the video and I took a ladder and I tacked it to the <laugh>, I tacked it to the ceiling and it really looks very unprofessional and very ugly. And I set up a desk in front of it and then I was like writing the script and I had obviously no teleprompter or anything, so I'm trying to talk to the camera like a news anchor and like, remember what I'm saying? And my mom was just cracking up 'cause I was home that month. It was, it was, I had just gotten back from France or something. She was just laughing so hard. And, uh, <laugh>  

May Ling:    01:04:34    Your mom's awesome for just being like, 

Kristin:    01:04:36    She took the thumbnail photo too, too. So she good for her because I lost my remote control to my camera. So she was like, and she couldn't see the screen because she's like, I don't have my glasses. So yeah, basically. And then now people say like, oh wow. The, the production quality is so good on that show. And I just, when I die laughing laugh because I think of myself in front of the sheet, the wrinkly sheet and um, it's funny's so funny. So keep going and then ask me whenever you need help.  

May Ling:    01:05:10    That's cool. Thank you. I appreciate it. I mean you just never know until you're like in the middle of it what you wanna change and what you're doing.  

Kristin:    01:05:17    Yeah. There's no way to know until you get, until you get there. So let's do a quick lightning round. Uh Okay. Before we go.  

May Ling:    01:05:25    I'm done with that. I'm totally done with that feeling  

Kristin:    01:05:28    <laugh>. All right. Lightning round. Okay. 

May Ling:    01:05:31    Here we go.

Kristin:    01:05:32     What is your, what is your morning beverage being a very healthy--

May Ling:    01:05:37    Coffee. That's all I drink. I drink coffee all the time. It's full of antioxidants. I have read actually this whole series of books on sleep, so I know exactly what, why it's bad for you <laugh>, but I'm very clear now. But I just love coffee. I mean, for a while I was going down to Costa Rica mostly from the coffee  

Kristin:    01:05:53    <laugh>. That's where I got addicted Costa Rica.  

May Ling:    01:05:55    It's so good. It's so good.  

Kristin:    01:05:58    So do you drink it black or what do you put in it? Half  

May Ling:    01:06:00    And half. But I, I can definitely drink it black in a pinch, you know, I'll even drink the, the disgusting ne cafe 'cause that's how addicted  

Kristin:    01:06:09    I'll drink it.  

May Ling:    01:06:10    Yeah, yeah. Totally.  

Kristin:    01:06:12    Do you make coffee at home or do you splurge on  

May Ling:    01:06:16    Starbucks? I do. Okay. No, I'm a French press woman and I get beans, like I show you <laugh>. I get, I get beans, um, like whole beans, grind them up.  

Kristin:    01:06:26    I love that. Yeah. I have a um, it's one of those coffee things. It's like the metal one that you put on the stove. Yeah. So I have a gass-- 

May Ling:    01:06:35    Ooh, espresso. Yeah, yeah, espresso. Those are  

Kristin:    01:06:37    Great. I think I'm really overdosing on coffee right now 'cause I'm drinking like a whole pot of that, so.  

May Ling:    01:06:42    That's awesome.  

Kristin:    01:06:43    Um, next question. What is your favorite city to live in as a digital nomad?  

May Ling:    01:06:49    Oh man, that's so tough. I love New York because I love New York and I can't get away from it. And um, but there's a couple that I thought were awesome. I think Qual Lumpur is really easy. They have such great infrastructure. It's dirt cheap and then you don't give up anything at all. Um, very multicultural. I mean, only if you feel strongly you have to be in a bathing, a bathing suit or a bikini all the time. That would be the one thing. 'cause it is Muslim, but even then they don't care. They're very chilled out. Um, yeah.  

Kristin:    01:07:16    Um, are there any like memorable meals or restaurants or places that you've encountered in your, in your journey that you can recommend? Like a really good type of food or a dish that you had somewhere that you think people should try?  

May Ling:    01:07:34    Oh my gosh, there's like two ways to go because at first I thought you were going one direction. Um, the, uh, like Kuala Lumpur is a big time foodie city I think. And there are those that would argue that Panang is more foodie. But I, I don't know who those people are. I don't talk to those people <laugh>, I'm just kidding. Um, <laugh>. But Ku Lumpur, like the food is just so ridiculously good. Um, in, in that place I'm hopefully, I'm excited 'cause I'll be in India next week or week after next. So I'm intrigued to see what that's gonna be like. 'cause I am a huge fan of like very flavorable food. Um, but every city has its one dish that like tells you that you know, that's what the Chinese believe that you're supposed to smell the sights. You're supposed to hear something, you're supposed to taste something.  

May Ling:    01:08:16    There's no touching involved. So it's four out five, right. Like <laugh> Chinese people are not touchers like, you know, it's very good because you know, we don't wanna be touching in 2020 <laugh>. No. Everything else you wanna see, hear, taste. Yeah, exactly. It's fun. Um, every city has it but kale's a great foodie city. Um, the other thing I was gonna, I thought you were going is I was, I remembered I was in a Chinese restaurant 'cause I can't help myself always going to Shire country just to see what did my people do here to represent  

Kristin:    01:08:45    <laugh>. They always represent too, you can always count on them to represent anywhere in the world.  

May Ling:    01:08:52    I think I was in Columbia and I was um, I just ended up having dinner there, but then there was like expats at the other table and we ended up just combining together to like have dinner. That's cool. That happens a lot in Chinese restaurants for me when I travel abroad. Um, that also strangely enough happened in, in keto. So I think it's just, you know, for whatever reason people go to Chinese restaurants and become very social <laugh> Kennedy.  

Kristin:    01:09:16    It's like a hot pot kind of, right? Yeah. You just share everyone's like sharing the food.  

May Ling:    01:09:23    Yeah. Oh yeah. That might be why. That's a good point. It's becausecause it's so shareable as a food. Yeah.  

Kristin:    01:09:28    This last question is, I guess it's not really a lightning round question, but everybody mailing travels with just a carry on. Oh yeah. I don't know how she does it. Can you give us a couple of your Packing Tips? And by us I mean me because I over back <laugh>? No, all of us,  

May Ling:    01:09:43    But you are like a permanent traveler. So you, I mean I'm going at most like three and a half to four, four weeks would be on the high end, which is easy for me to do and I carry on. But you're like way over that sometimes. But that's really you do you think it might  

Kristin:    01:09:57    All you need, it's like if you're packing for two or three weeks, that's fair. It's kind of what you can wear the whole year. You'll just be a little bit bored. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But yeah. What are a couple of your um, packing tips for that?  

May Ling:    01:10:10    I think that in this, these are things you already know. I think slowly but surely your wardrobe goes towards things that are light but efficient. You know what I mean? So like dual use things that fold down very neatly and nicely. I have skirts that actually can, I, I have dresses that can be skirts, long skirts, <laugh>. So I do all that sort of stuff. Um, my shoes, if they're, I, I have no structured shoes when I, when I travel. So even if it's a heel, it, it compresses down to just the sole portions that you can pack it easily. And then I, I know exactly how much I use for toiletries per week. Like over, so if you're like if you've got a small toothpaste versus like a full three fluid ounce toothpaste, like you gotta know how long that thing lasts you. If you're gonna do like monthly travel, that's why for you it might be a little different that because you would be buying a lot of those things. I think you sometimes stay in a place for a month, so you would just buy the toiletries there. It makes more sense. Yeah.  

Kristin:    01:11:06    Do you do the Marino wool? Are you of the Marino wool fans so you don't have to watchit? 

May Ling:    01:11:12     I do have some Merino wool but I actually use, um, there's this, these detergent sheets so they're totally not liquid and I have no problem washing when in fact I prefer washing <laugh>. Even if the Merino wool gets all the anti bacteria out. If you're going to be traveling for the winter, you Yeah, Merino wool, it's like your deal. But if you're going to Southeast Asia where it's like a, you know, a fraction of a cent per kilogram <laugh> of really what you need is like very uh, breathable clothing, that's not gonna be gross. And that actually some of the um, some of the stuff that doesn't stain and stuff, stuff that's anti-wrinkle is a big deal because that will also not smell it turns out. Okay.  

Kristin:    01:11:57    Oh okay.  

May Ling:    01:11:57    I didn't know that. So wet like dry, dry fit or will it, it takes, you have to try a lot harder to get it to smell, you know?  

Kristin:    01:12:04    Do you have a preferred luggage brand that you use?  

May Ling:    01:12:08    I am a to me person. Um, and it's funny because I think they've gotten a little bit more intense in, in Europe on like luggage sizes. So I actually went from my newer to me to my older to me for this trip coming up. 'cause I do not wanna be, have any issues with whether or not I can take my luggage onto the carry on. Have you experienced that recently? Oh, you're not as carry on isn't as vital to you as  

Kristin:    01:12:30    Me. I'm always checking a bag because my carry on is my camera stuff, so  

May Ling:    01:12:36    Yeah. Yeah. But um, that's  

Kristin:    01:12:39    Good. You know, with the smart luggage and everything, people need to sometimes take another look at the rules.  

May Ling:    01:12:44    Yeah. But even if you fulfill the rules, like I actually pulled out the page onto me that showed the dimensions relative to what they were telling me I had to put and they were like, no. In fact I think they were slightly offended as Germans <laugh>, I called them out to be honest. So, so yeah, I'm I'm just saying, I'm just saying that's how it happens. Right. Um, so now I, the older to me didn't have the wheels in the front quite the same way. So it crunches down even more aggressively than the newer soft shell toes in the future. I don't know what I'm gonna do, but I think the key thing is like, I honestly don't need to fill the whole carry on at all. Like I'll be gone on this trip about two weeks and I'll have plenty of extra room in this 'cause I'm definitely buying stuff while I'm in India <laugh> to come, you know, to come back for, um, yeah.  

Kristin:    01:13:30    Do you use Packing Cubes?  

May Ling:    01:13:32    I do. I use compression Packing Cubes. Perfect. So I don't use the compression bags so much. I found that, um, yeah, there's just something that's not quite doing it. I mean if you're gonna use the compression bags, use them for laundry because they do actually keep the smell out. You know, I, I do. So I use compression cubes. Um, there's a couple different companies. Eagle Creek makes a great brand, but I, I use another brand than that but I wish I'd used the Eagle Creek ones honestly. Um, and then I use um, like vinyl Ziploc bags that are reusable. Um, there's a few different companies that make it, 'cause I like everything to be seen. Like it helps you as a travel tip. There was one time I was going through Frankfurt and for whatever reason I had to come out and come back in through security. It was like 5:00 AM and they had one guy that was able to get everyone through security and I was able to bypass that guy 'cause all of my bags were see-through.  

Kristin:    01:14:28    Oh, interesting.  

May Ling:    01:14:28    So I was just like, yeah. 'cause I, they were like, we have to wait for the guy. I am like, I'm pretty sure it's this thing. And I pulled up the bag and showed and pointed towards the thing in the bag, the little com you know, 'cause it was, you know, and because like when you do use um, compression cubes, everything's so organized. You literally can like pull it up and be like, here's what it is. So  

Kristin:    01:14:47    Yeah. Approach a good tip.  

May Ling:    01:14:49    Well thank you. It's one of those.  

Kristin:    01:14:51    Thank you so much Ling for coming  

May Ling:    01:14:53    On. I feel like we got, we got kind of to catch up too 'cause I haven't seen you in a while. Yeah.  

Kristin:    01:14:56    We need to catch up again. Uh, we will make it happen maybe this year.  

May Ling:    01:15:01    Nice. Yeah.   

Kristin:    01:15:03    And Um, everybody, we will link to all the resources in the description, the Udemy course, a discount code so you can all be expert speed readers and I, yeah, really look forward to seeing what everybody does with that skill. 'cause that's so  

May Ling:    01:15:19    Useful. Totally.  

Kristin:    01:15:20    And thanks so much. We'll have you on again, another time to talk more about travel and business guy. But guys, if you wanna hear more about mailing's personal story, you can check out her episode of Instagram. Yeah, The Maverick Show. There's two episodes.  

May Ling:    01:15:33    Oh yeah, that's two.  

Kristin:    01:15:34    Yeah. So I'll link to those two. So thank you and see you all next time on Badass Digital Nomads.  

Kristin:    01:15:46    Today's shout out goes to Sean Parent, one of my badass digital nomads patrons. Thank you Sean. He says, highly recommended. I love listening to the podcast. Kristin provides so much information about traveling and becoming a digital nomad. She does an excellent job interviewing her guests and providing great advice. Can't get enough. Well done. Thanks again, Sean. And thanks to everyone who's left reviews in the Apple Podcast store. If you're not an Apple person, feel free to leave a review wherever you get your podcast. Whether it's Stitcher, castbox, tune in or anywhere. I appreciate so much your comments, feedback, and review and bonus. You can now leave me a voice message or a voice review on my website at TravelingwithKristin.com/podcast.  

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