Does speed reading really work? No, it does not work! You work it. Now before you stop reading thinking, "that last statement is obvious," I'll ask you to stop and think for a moment and consider the following ideas.

If you cannot comprehend at high reading speeds, it is not reading! There is a mistaken notion "out there" that if you speed read, you will not fully comprehend. That is a myth! There is a little understood secret though.

Speed reading requires training the brain, not just the eyes. Getting the eyes unstuck from looking, and sometimes staring, at individual words is essential, but that is merely one aspect of learning a set of complex behaviors and skills. Training the eyes is the mechanical part of learning the skills. That's easy part. The more difficult aspect is training the brain/mind to comprehend.

Whether you have just started to look into speed reading, or whether you are a frustrated learner who has tried and not mastered the skills yet, there are 6 essential concepts you must understand if you hope to master the skills as a lifelong habit, or skill set.

Recently someone asked me directly, "is it possible to read 2000 words per minute?" Yes, it is possible. Faster is also possible.

Since the popularization of the approach in the 1960s, there has been such a flood of approaches to the term "speed reading," and so many who have tried to cash in on the promise it offers by unskilled practitioners and program developers, that there is no standard definition. With that being said, then how would you answer the question, "how fast is it, really, to speed read?"

Do you remember Aesop's fable of the Tortoise and the Hare? As you read this article about speed reading you probably think I'm going to talk about the fast hare. On the contrary, I am going to sing the praises of the lowly tortoise.

When people watch me read they will often say something like, "Oh, you're a speed reader. Does that really work?" I will usually respond, "No!" I know that sounds flippant, but truthfully, it does not work. You work it. Speed reading is a systematic approach you apply to learning and absobing printed material.

When you are starting to learn speed reading one of the common mistakes the learner makes is trying to read faster by speeding up what they already do. This approach may bring some gain, but they will be short lived. Here's how to overcome this mistake.

Speed reading is a set of skills that is necessary for nearly everyone's survival in this age of information overload. Here are 8 fatal mistakes you need to avoid when learning this set of powerful learning tools and how you can overcome them.