Unleash Your Primal Brain

Demystifying How We Think and Why We Act

By: Tim Ash

Narrated by: Tim Ash

Length: 5 hrs and 16 mins

Publisher's summary

Understand what makes you human!

This book is about the commonalities all 8,000,000,000 people on Earth share.

"In highly readable style, Tim Ash moves readers from the basics of brain functioning to the evolution of its regularities, quirks, and affordances. In the process, we gain invaluable insights into human decision-making and behavior." (Robert Cialdini, Author of Influence and Pre-Suasion)

“A fascinating and thrilling look into our minds and what matters.”
(Jay Baer, Founder of Convince & Convert, co-author of Talk Triggers)

“Tim has studied the research on behavioral science and evolutionary psychology and written an excellent book that explains much of human behavior. If you want to know why we do what we do, then read this book.” (Susan Weinschenk, PhD, Author of 100 Things Every Designer Needs to Know About People)

“This book would be very helpful for anyone who wants to understand what truly drives attention, emotions and cognitive arousal, from the perspective of psychology! Very addictive read by an author with great experience and academic knowledge. I highly recommend this book!”
(Dr. Hedda Martina Šola — Dir. of the Institute for Neuromarketing, Oxford Business College)

"Managing your brain is the job of your life. This book is a good way to understand the operating system we've inherited." (Loretta Breuning, PhD - Author of Habits of a Happy Brain)

"What a wild ride! Tim's ambitious book takes us from early life on earth, to the bizarre qualities that make us uniquely human. Sleep, memory, herd instinct, motivation, language, culture, cooperation - it's all in there. A must-read book that will literally blow your mind!" (Joel Comm, New York Times best-selling author, keynote speaker, futurist)

Drop a rock. It falls and hits the ground.

Once you understand brain evolution, many of our behaviors will become more predictable. To a scary degree, we are reactive animals ruled by passions, and not the rational geniuses with free will that we like to imagine.

First the bad news: The notion that people make decisions and choices to maximize objective self-interest has been demolished. People are not rational — far from it.

Now the good news: We are finding out exactly how and why we act in these seemingly irrational ways. In other words, there is a method to our seeming madness.

We evolved for a particular environment, but our rapid social advances and mushrooming populations have created a bewildering new world. On the timescale of this dizzying change, evolution has effectively stopped, and we must rely on what has gotten us this far. By retracing the path that our distant ancestors took to get here, we can understand the stunning abilities and glaring weaknesses which we have inherited.

Sometimes our reactions and responses are appropriate and uncannily helpful. In the blink of an eye we can assess complex situations and reach critical life-or-death decisions. At other times, we are seemingly our own worst enemies — repeating the same mistakes, even when we know the results will be counterproductive, or even deadly.

Unlocking the true nature of the human brain is the last frontier. Recent work in fields such as biology, neuroscience, evolutionary psychology, medical imaging, social science, and behavioral economics is combining to show us the inner workings of this evolutionary marvel.

This book is designed for you — the curious and intelligent searcher for truth.

©2020 Tim Ash Enterprises (P)2020 Tim Ash Enterprises

Great Overview of Evolutionary Psych w/ an Application to Daily Life

This book makes a big promise. Something along the lines of:

“Lemme tell you all about the human animal, the mind, the body, the relationships, the ancient primal ‘decision-making’ and all the rest. And lemme do it in a way that practically and pragmatically -ACTUALLY- relates to your modern, everyday, life.”

After finishing the book, I’d say it really delivers on that promise.

If you’re interested in why we do what we do, as people, then I think you’ll get a lot out of this.

I’m already deeply interested in this topic (evolutionary psychology, etc.) and I felt there was a real abundance of intellectual tidbits I hadn’t heard before.

I particularly enjoyed the details around Grandpa’s question of kinship in chapter 13 (or was it 14?), that apparently men born blind find the same hip-to-waist ratio most attractive in women as ppl with sight, and ch. 19’s discussion of the elderly and culture. I also enjoyed the mention of Nature Deficit Disorder.

It’s not overly technical. In a way, it’s a great overview or primer for this field of study. It gives you interesting info on many different areas of human experience and ties them all together in a useful way.

If you’re at all interested in the different variables running our physical and psychological life - I’d give it a hearty listen. In fact, I don’t currently know of a better book to hand someone interested in this line of inquiry. Especially if they’re just starting out, but also if they’ve been around the block a bit.

Excellent Read for Everyone With a Brain

In this great, short, easy to follow book Tim jumps into many reasons for why people do the things they do. The book covers a variety of topics in depth with lots of examples. Tim reads the audiobook himself which adds a layer of both fun and passion. I enjoyed this book quite a bit, and felt it had tremendous value - including some interesting key takeaways I will be applying in my life and work.

Great voice, great listen

Tim does a wonderful job narrating his book. As a marketer I’ve found so much value in his teachings that we hired him to consult us through a pivotal transition!

I loved this book! Tim Ash makes understanding you

The book covers a lot of material in a really accessible writing style and gave me a number of great insights on how to improve my business, relationships, and personal life. There is a particularly interesting part at the end that explains what makes humans unique.
I didn't know that we evolved to spread culture. This advantage allows us to learn from people around us and instead of having to figure out everything by direct experience. But it also resulted in many weird adaptations like giant brains, delayed adolescence, the need to mimic other people, our highly cooperative natures, and compliance with our tribe's behavioral norms.
There is so much more in this book - highly recommended!

LOVED IT! Amazing perspectives and analysis!

The great thing about this book we know how people will react, We know that the human race is continually evolving internally and intuitively. But sometimes we need the facts laid out in plan language in order to understand.

The reinforcement that evolution is never done, wasn’t an AHA moment but an ah moment. It was a concept that I knew and thought about but never expressed in such a simple and easy way.

very interesting

the book is really interesting. the narrating could be better but all in all great