Powerful ideas from top nonfiction
Try Blinkist to get the key ideas from 7,000+ bestselling nonfiction titles and podcasts. Listen or read in just 15 minutes.
Start your free trial
Blink 3 of 8 - The 5 AM Club
by Robin Sharma
Listen to the Intro
The Art of Impossible summary
Steven Kotler
A Peak Performance Primer
25 mins
Brief summary
"The Art of Impossible" by Steven Kotler is a guide to unlocking the full potential of the human brain and achieving peak performance. Through neuroscience, psychology, and his own experiences, Kotler offers concrete techniques and practices to help readers push past their limitations and achieve their goals.
Table of Contents
The Art of Impossible
Summary of 8 key ideas
Audio & text in the Blinkist app
Key idea 1 of 8
Intrinsic motivators drive us toward the impossible.
There are no two ways about it: your journey to impossible is going to be long and arduous. As with any long journey, you’ll need fuel to keep you going. That includes food and sleep, but you also need psychological fuel – in other words, drive.
Drive, or motivation, nudges us toward action. But what creates drive in the first place? From an evolutionary perspective, it’s all about surviving in a world where resources are scarce. Drive is evolution’s way of getting us to either fight each other to obtain the resources we need or to use creativity to make more resources.
But drive doesn’t consist of just one thing. There are various drivers, like fear, curiosity, and passion. All of these provide psychological fuel – and you can harness them to achieve the impossible.
The key message here is: Intrinsic motivators drive us toward the impossible.
All psychological drivers are divided into one of two categories: extrinsic or intrinsic. Extrinsic drivers are things like money, fame, food, and sex. They’re external to ourselves, and we chase them to win the evolutionary survival game. Intrinsic drivers, on the other hand, are within us. They’re psychological and emotional concepts like curiosity, passion, meaning, and purpose.
Psychological research tells us that extrinsic drivers only motivate us to a certain extent. They get weaker once we have enough money to pay for food, clothing, and shelter. After we’ve met these basic needs, it’s the intrinsic motivators that take over. It’s those intrinsic drivers we’ll be focusing on in these blinks.
The five most powerful intrinsic motivators are curiosity, passion, purpose, autonomy, and mastery. You can stack them together so they feed off one another – and so you can achieve the impossible.
Let’s start with curiosity, the first element in the intrinsic motivator stack. You can start building it by making a list. Write down – by hand – 25 things you’re curious about. What might you read a book about or attend a lecture on? Be as specific as possible. For instance, don’t just write down football or food. Instead, write down: the specific mechanics and maneuvers necessary to play the left tackle position or the potential for grasshoppers to become a primary human food source.
Now that you have a list of things you’re curious about, it’s time to start hunting for overlap between the items on it. This will help you identify your passions, your next intrinsic motivator.
Want to see all full key ideas from The Art of Impossible?
Key ideas in The Art of Impossible
More knowledge in less time
Read or listen
Get the key ideas from nonfiction bestsellers in minutes, not hours.
Find your next read
Get book lists curated by experts and personalized recommendations.
Shortcasts New
We’ve teamed up with podcast creators to bring you key insights from podcasts.
What is The Art of Impossible about?
The Art of Impossible (2021) is a science-driven guide to reaching your maximum potential. By developing four key skills – motivation, learning, creativity, and flow – you’ll gain the power to smash whatever goals you set. With enough time, you may even achieve the impossible.
Who should read The Art of Impossible?
- Aspiring movers and shakers
- Go-getters driven to achieve their maximum potential
- Anyone who wants to boost their performance and be at their peak
Categories with The Art of Impossible
Book summaries like The Art of Impossible
People ❤️ Blinkist
Sven O.
It's highly addictive to get core insights on personally relevant topics without repetition or triviality. Added to that the apps ability to suggest kindred interests opens up a foundation of knowledge.
Thi Viet Quynh N.
Great app. Good selection of book summaries you can read or listen to while commuting. Instead of scrolling through your social media news feed, this is a much better way to spend your spare time in my opinion.
Jonathan A.
Life changing. The concept of being able to grasp a book's main point in such a short time truly opens multiple opportunities to grow every area of your life at a faster rate.
Renee D.
Great app. Addicting. Perfect for wait times, morning coffee, evening before bed. Extremely well written, thorough, easy to use.
People also liked these summaries
4.7 Stars
Average ratings on iOS and Google Play
29 Million
Downloads on all platforms
10+ years
Experience igniting personal growth