How To Become A High-Performance Student
Plus 3 Tips from UCLA graduate — Richard Yu
What does it mean to be a student operating at High-Performance?
It doesn't mean that you can’t go out with friends and drown yourself in studying for exams all the time — Nobody wants that.
To be a High-Performance Student, you just follow a simple set of habits, 3 of which I’ll be sharing in this article. You don’t need to sacrifice your friendship or partying. At the same time, your grades won’t suffer also.
Let me share with you my story on how I started on this journey.
My Story On How This Started
There are a lot of fake courses out there on Personal Development. Nicely made gift-wrapped packages where the information taught could be easily found by reading a book.
A book that contains the exact same processes and cost less than 1/3 of the course.
To be fair, not all Self-Improvement Gurus does this scheme. Some courses really do make a change in your life. It makes the investment to buy the course worthwhile.
But it’s honestly hard to know who is there to help you and who is on the other side of the coin.
That’s why I was hesitant when another YouTube personality sells a training program. Richard Yu is a high-performance coach. He has recently created a High-Performance Training Program — an 8-week intensive Live Coaching Program.
A helpful warning: I didn’t purchase this course, so you can guarantee that I’m not paid to share any of this.
Wait! So how did I review the program if I didn’t buy it? You see, Richard shares his student testimonials on what they have learned for the week on his Instagram Stories.
You might think that there is not much to learn from watching Instagram stories, but it was how I was able to share with you 3 lessons that changed my habits as a high performer. (I’ll share you a Bonus at the end on How to Never Forget an important subject or a skill)
While watching his student’s testimonials, I thought, “Maybe there are a few students who find it interesting. But maybe it’s just not for me?”
And the program continued on without me and the following weeks, Richard invited some of the Successful Entrepreneurs like Joel Marion and Vince Del Monte to talk (not speak) LIVE at the program.
There is a huge difference between talking and speaking. Instead of just giving a speech and motivating the audience, these entrepreneurs really took the time to build a one-on-one connection with other students — and that’s not something I expect in a program.
More than that, Richard willingly shares what he taught on his Instagram. Sharing key points and takeaways of one of his students learned for the week.
1. Eisenhower Box Method
This is pretty much new to me. My curiosity immediately took a hold of me when a bunch of Richard’s students is creating their ‘Eisenhower Box Method’
After researching to find out what this is, this method simply shows how to properly plan out your day into 4 separate tasks.
They are divided into 4 boxes based on importance and urgency. Eisenhower Box Method is dedicated to maximizing efficiency while staying productive — doing tasks in a short time possible while having good quality work
(I won’t bore you and go right to the specifics since I find it disrespectful when writers go on and on with unnecessary details just to make their article long) so I shared an example of how the Eisenhower Box Method can apply to my lifestyle.
Let’s take an example of how it goes in my day:
First is Reduce. You place the most demanding task for the day at the upper left corner of the Eisenhower Box. Your work output here is of low quality since these tasks need to be done immediately. For me, it would be filtering which emails to read or discard for the day.
Second, Schedule. What can be done later on the day but I still need to be the person doing it. In my case, that would be scheduling to write my articles and researching topics that you would love to read
Third is Delegating. The truth is you don’t need to do everything by yourself. You can reach out to someone and give them a task that they are more skilled than you. For me, I’m not a proficient editor, so it would be finding an editor who is skilled in cleaning out words
Lastly on the lower right is Declutter. Remove the task that bothers you for achieving what you want. In my case, what I want to write is an impactful article that readers would appreciate reading and at the same time learn something from it to apply in their lives. On the other hand, the distractions from writing would be logging out of Social Media and Netflix.
Now taking all of this together, my goal, and your goal should be forming a strategy to stay away from Quadrant 3 and 4. Reduce the number of tasks at Quadrant 1 and spend more time working on activities in Quadrant 2.
(If you have further questions on this, comment down below and I’ll respond)
Now going on, we have the second takeaway I have learned.
2. No Stimulants Or Caffeine After 2 pm
I have heard this for quite a while now. The reason for the discouragement of drinking coffee after 2 pm is because caffeine is still in your bloodstream and you won’t be able to have a good night’s rest
Here’s a CNBC article explaining it in detail, but I’ll still explain it shortly below:
Caffeine has a half-life of about 5 hours. Meaning a person who drinks an espresso that has 40 mg of coffee, 20 mg (half of it) is still stuck on your body for an average of 5 hours.
So, if I went to Starbucks and grab a cup of have coffee in the afternoon. By the time dinner rolls around, you are still wide awake. It gets worst when you are the type of person who sleeps early since you will be tossing and turning all night long until caffeine is deposited out of your body.
It all comes down to this, a piece of simple advice that you can start today to boost your productivity: Don’t Drink Coffee after 2 pm.
3. Why Teaching Others Is Not Selfish
Ever wondered why teachers allow group projects in class instead of having it done individually?
It’s because when you are teaching your friends during group works, the subject that you are trying to teach is now locked in your long-term memory. You won’t be having trouble remembering the answer to the exam questions since you are constantly recalling what you have first learned.
I’ll be honest with you. For me, This is the hardest to implement.
Imagine if you just paid for a program and you teach it to someone for free. In my mind, that is like scamming myself. Why do I need to share it with another person? I mean I could’ve just learned it from someone and not waste my money on the program, right?
Even if you are sharing it with your most trusted friend (and I have no qualms since I gladly help a friend) Your friend doesn’t see the amount of money you spent on that program. And I doubt that they would pay even half the price if you plan to resell the program to them
But here’s the thing, since you placed money on something, you’ll definitely spend more time on it and take action
Reading this right now, I’m guessing you didn’t just take your Medium membership for granted. You don’t stop and get satisfied reading only 1 article from Medium knowing you spent $5/month on this.
You are here because you desire reading a written work that is of high quality. Works that are both personal and professional.
Moreover, if you decide to share what you know right now. You will be the person who actually benefits the most.
The reasoning on this is when you decide to share something and teach others. You compress all that you have learned into a simple form. You customize it, and most important of all you take everything that you have been taught and share it in an easily understandable way to others.
The process of compiling everything you have learned and putting it on a single page gives you a more organized thought. You know right now what to do and what not to do.
In my case, when writing this article — I did a ton of research on the 1st two bullets above. I don’t want to mislead you so I made sure that 2 pm is really the recommended time before intake with the proper health website backing up the claim. I also rewrote the Eisenhower Box Method, again and again, to make sure it is short but concise.
If you still remember the promise I made to you at the start of this article — How to Never Forget an important subject or a skill. I will share how teaching others can help you retain that information long-term. There is one caveat on this — you need to teach it to others over and over again.
Take this from a person who reviews Self-help books every month. In my case, I was reviewing The Personal MBA by Josh Kaufman (it’s a book that teaches everything that you need to know about business from A-to-Z)
My Secret: I don’t actually read the whole book again every month
Instead, I only study the notes that I gathered from reading the book. This 100 page notes that I compiled contains all the essential learnings that I have gathered in the book (so that I don’t need to waste time reading 446 pages all over again.)
And it is the same notes that I use when teaching others what I have learned. If you want a copy of my notes, message me at my profile and I’ll send it to you.
And here’s the reminder on the caveat — I spent every single Friday of the 1st month reviewing The Personal MBA notes. And each new month, I said to myself that I have learned all there is to know in this book but every time I review, I realize that I’m just getting started.
This is why when you teach others consistently, that knowledge becomes a part of you. You can easily recite it on the back of your mind, unlike the 1st day where I struggled, fumbling reading through all my notes to make sure it is right
Lastly, you don’t need to teach it to a big group. Simply having a one-to-one talk with a friend about what you have learned is already considered teaching.
Executing on this 3 Lessons
If you took any of these 3 lessons and used them today, I can almost promise you that you are on track to become a High-Performance Student.
And this is just the tip of the iceberg. There are even more ways to strengthen and develop your habits
Whether you are a student or currently working, and you want to deepen your journey in becoming the best version of your life. I recommend you to follow Richard Yu, even just watching his free YouTube videos can already help you as you go on day by day for Personal Development
Now, as I said, all of this I just learned for free when watching Richard’s Instagram Stories.
Richard has a paid program where students from all over the world learn from him and have a one-on-one mentorship.
However, for a limited time, Richard is offering a Free LIVE Masterclass — showing 5 hacks on how you can start doubling your productivity while working only less than 3 hours per week.
Check out for free a Live Masterclass with Richard Yu!
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-Jed Silverlake
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Note: This is not a paid-for or sponsored post. I am not affiliated with Richard Yu.
About the Author:
Jed Silverlake is a brand journalist & storyteller who has written articles of Fortune 1000 companies & private clients. He specialized in writing brand stories of E-commerce Business, Influencers, Consultants & Coaches. For more content similar to his, you can follow his Medium profile.
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