I’ll never forget the day I made the most important discovery of my life. A discovery that would also prove important for thousands of language learners and students of various topics around the world.

Here’s what happened:

I was on my porch down in Zehlendorf. (It’s really too bad about Zehlendorf …)

I really miss that part of Berlin. I used to walk to the nearby lake and through a wooded area leading to the stores and the M48 bus I often took to Potsdamer Platz where I would watch movies for my work.

Yes, watch movies. I was a Film Studies professor back then. Greatest job in the world – if you can get it.

And If You Can Keep It!

Anyhow, I was on the porch studying German and nearly tearing out my hair with frustration. No matter what I did, the German vocabulary wouldn’t stick in my mind.

Worse, the flashcard software I’d been using bored me to tears. I’ve never found anything more painful than banging foreign language vocabulary repetitively against my eyes in the vain hope that I would somehow magically remember the abstract and mysterious words.

In all fairness, some people can tolerate rote learning. In fact, there’s research suggesting that polyglots get great value from hard repetition. This happens primarily because they’ve trained themselves to be really good at it.

But Let’s Be Real

Most people do not want to be polyglots. Most people would be happy just to get halfway decent in one language, not several.

In fact, most people would be overjoyed just to get a couple of hundred words in their long term memory.

And most people would be ecstatic if they could turn those words into basic conversational fluency. All you need is about 800-1200 for that, plus a touch of understanding the grammar.

So there I was with a fat dictionary pumping words into the spaced-repetition software I loathed like the plague.

I sure loved that dictionary, though. What a glorious thing, all thick and yellow.

Heavy too, almost as heavy as a brick. But that didn’t stop me from carrying it everywhere.

And That’s When It Hit Me!

With a bit of summer wind on my face, I asked myself a fundamental question:

Why on earth wasn’t I using memory techniques to help me learn German?

Seriously. They sometimes say that Ph.D. stands for “piled higher and deeper,” but Mann O Mann (as the Germans say), was I ever mystified.

You see, following a terrible and nearly suicidal depression that almost forced me out of grad school, I discovered memory techniques almost by accident. I was avoiding the looming field exams and dissertation defense by learning magic tricks.

Of course, procrastinating on my studies only made my depression worse …

But it’s at least a good thing that I was doing something constructive. I thought of my magic practice as developing a kind of “emergency paycheck,” because I was certain at that time I was going to wind up on the streets with nothing more to do than entertain people and pass around my hat.

And I suppose that would have been fun for awhile. Studying card magic was certainly better than jumping off a bridge, which the mounting pressure and the teeth of my depression were forcing me to consider.

Worse, if you’ve ever experienced the horrors of manic-depression in full swing, you know the impulses involved. They are sick and sweet and jump out at you from nowhere. It’s terrible too because once the urges pounce, they can keep trouncing on you for days and days on end.

The most sinister part of the situation was that I couldn’t concentrate or read. It always felt like my eyes were slipping off the page. And when I could read for brief periods of time, I always wound up forgetting everything.

And that made me frustrated and even angry. Magic was my only relief.

And it was easy to study too because you can buy a lot of training in card and coin magic on DVD. I didn’t have a whole lot of money at the time, but it sure was worth it.

Especially when I came across the process that would save my life. I’m talking about the “Holy Grail” of all card tricks: The Memorized Deck.

There’s a ton of effects you can create with a memorized deck. The only difference is …

They Aren’t Effects! They’re Based On Real Magic …

… Or at least, the closest thing to real magic that exists. The ability to go through 52 cards, looking at each only once and being able to recall the entire order backward and forward …

This ability is a complete miracle.

So I bought a book on the topic and an audio program that included a section on card memorization. It would be years before I read the book, but my hungry ears gobbled up the audio like peasants on bread during a famine.

And what I heard nearly made my brain explode.

It’s true. I understood the procedures immediately. It’s shocking how simple it is, and yet …

… I was skeptical. How on earth was I going to put these techniques into action when I could barely concentrate on a book?

Not only that, but playing cards are essentially a kind of book, only they are made up of totally abstract and fragmented sentences and chapters. And the pages can be endlessly recombined.

But even so, I gave the technique a try.

What happened totally blew me away.

Why?

Because 15 minutes after learning the technique, I had memorized my first deck of shuffled cards.

I couldn’t believe it.

In fact, to this day I’m still in awe. And the reason I work so hard to promote memory techniques to people around the world is precisely because that awe remains.

And it grows and grows the more I hear from people who have read one of my books or taken one of my video courses.

They All Have One Special Characteristic In Common …

They, like me, learned the methods and took action. They experimented. They memorized vocabulary using the tools of the Magnetic Memory Method and they got results.

And then they repeated what they learned and got even more results. And those results led to even higher payoffs because things just keep getting better and better the more you use mnemonics as part of your learning.

Anyhow, as soon as I realized what I had done with the playing cards, I instantly saw how I could apply these techniques to learning and memorizing the 250+ books I needed to cover for my field exams.

These are mean and nasty affairs where seven professors sit around a table and drill you with questions for nearly two hours. They’re very protective of the university Ivory Tower, so they do everything they can to keep you out.

The hostility makes the process of sitting for those exams frightening an stressful in every possible way.

And frankly, most people never make it. I don’t know what the figures are now, but back then, the graduation rate from Ph.D. programs in Canada was a mere 13%.

In other words, out of every 100 people who enter grad school, 87 walk away without a degree.

But I wasn’t one of those who left the hallowed halls empty-handed. And it’s all because I took action and used the memory techniques I’d learned on that magical day during the depths of my nearly suicidal depression.

Of course, it’s not as if my studies were suddenly free from challenges.

Far From It

The memory techniques boosted my confidence and this gave me increased clarity. But I still struggled to read with the amount of focus needed to even discover and isolate the information I wanted to memorize.

So what I wound up doing was to read the books out loud. Unlike the memory audio program I had no problem following, the philosophy and history books I was reading had no audio editions.

Worse, they were so dense and so obscure … It was often like pulling teeth just to get through them.

But by reading out loud to maintain my concentration and then listening to my narrations, I could finally concentrate.

And then I would write down the key points and facts from the books on index cards.

Next, I would order the index cards in particular ways to aid the memorization of them into the Memory Palaces I’d created.

Following that, I memorized the information on the cards. Kind of like memorizing a deck of playing cards, only in this case you’re not entertaining audiences but rather earning a degree.

But there was another level of difficulty.

The memory techniques and especially the Memory Palaces I was using at the time were far from foolproof.

And I Made A Lot Of Mistakes

You see, the techniques I had learned were actually kind of pedestrian. They weren’t made for higher levels of learning. And they certainly weren’t designed for language study.

So what I did was to develop completely new approaches to the memory techniques. I was still learning and memorizing information very well, but I knew I could do better.

Above all, I knew that my Memory Palaces could be much more precise. So I found better ways to begin the journeys through them. I discovered principles that reduced the errors many people make with mnemonics and massively reduced the cognitive load extensive learning places on the mind.

And the more I worked at it, the more streamlined the techniques became. Before I knew it, I had zoomed through most of the books and was ready to sit for my exams.

I had also finally landed on a feasible dissertation topic. And even though I still felt physically terrible and the mental illness remains to this day …

I Was Sitting On Top Of The World

I marched into those exams brimming with confidence and aced them.

In fact, when my final dissertation defense concluded and I was called “Dr. Metivier” for the very first time, the top examiner who had come up to Canada from the United States told me something I’ll never forget.

“Most people freeze up,” he said. “Some of them even break into tears. But you …

… the only person cooler than you is Miles Davis.”

I guess what he meant is that I was calm, collected and cool in the sense of being unshakable. And trust me, each and every one of the professors surrounding me at that table on the second floor of the Vanier building on the campus of York University in Toronto did all they could to shake me up.

But none of them could, not even the one hellbent on failing me.

Why?

Because I knew my stuff and could remember it.

All Of It

And when they awarded my degree, they even added a special comment on the form that I had presented my knowledge with originality and audacity.

I take that to mean that I did it all with nerves of steel, total confidence and the ability to create new knowledge, not just parrot what I’d memorized.

And that’s what the Magnetic Memory Method is all about: Creating knowledge while also being able to repeat information verbatim. Or in the case of memorizing vocabulary, being able to create unique and meaningful sentences.

But don’t get me wrong.

In some cases, being a parrot isn’t a bad thing.

Not A Bad Thing At All

But let’s flash forward a couple of years.

There I was on the porch. Stupidly I’d sat through six months of a German language course after landing a research and teaching grant at a university there.

Looking back, I still can’t believe it. But in all fairness, I had already used my memory to get my Ph.D. But researching and teaching didn’t require them in quite the same way. I used mnemonics only to memorize the names of my students and the basic architecture of my lectures.

But on that porch, I realized that I could have been using memory techniques all along to memorize German vocabulary. The only question now was …

How?

When I thought back to what I’d done during my graduate years, it all fell into place.

You see, when organizing the knowledge I needed to know in order to memorize the works of philosophers and literary or film theorists great and small, I had created at least one Memory Palace for each, sometimes up to five.

In many cases, the Memory Palaces weren’t so much centered on the career of a philosopher, but on a single book. For example, for Aristotle I concentrated only on memorizing the major details of The Nicomachean Ethics. But as for the rest of his cannon, I’m a sitting duck in water.

Michel Foucault, on the other hand, had five Memory Palaces, four for individual books he’d written and one for facts about his life and how it intersected with important moments in his Zeitgeist.

Regardless of having one Memory Palace or five per philosopher, in each I got some kind of picture in my mind of what that person looks like. In the case of Aristotle, I had only paintings to work with. With Foucault, I could look at oodles of photographs.

Then, using a well-formed Memory Palace that obeys the principles of what would eventually become the Magnetic Memory Method, I followed these philosophers along carefully constructed journeys. At one point, for example, Aristotle fistfights with the notorious serial killer John Wayne Gacy. Foucault, known for his sexual escapades, got into some situations rather X-rated to at present mention.

I would eventually come to call these Magnetic little puppets of mine, “Bridging Figures.”

Why?

Because by following them around in my imagination, they “bridged the gap” between Memory Palace stations and engaged in behaviors that quickly and efficiently reminded me of the key points I needed to know. After that, it was just a matter of rehearsing the show a few times and writing out what I’d learned in summary format to ease the information into long-term memory.

As one commentator on a Magnetic Memory Method YouTube video puts it regarding my approach to memory techniques and mnemonics overall, it’s all …

Easy Peasy Lemon Squeezy

Lemon squeezy, indeed.

Thinking about that practice and its tremendous power, I clearly saw that the same approach readily applied to German vocabulary. Abraham Lincoln helped me connect “ab” words in an “A” Memory Palace.

To give another example, Einstein took over the show in an imaginary reconstruction of my brother’s home.

Even more interesting, real people proved useful too.

For example, my ex-wife’s good friend Vera war sehr verantwortlich when it came to stuffing “ver” words into a very special Memory Palace that happened to be her home in Brooklyn. I had only visited the place once, but due to the mind’s uncanny ability to absorb the details of a building on autopilot, I used its rooms and hallways to great effect before moving to my old girlfriend Vicki’s home and on and on and on.

Nifty, Isn’t It?

You bet it is. And before I knew it, the fruitless hours spent on index cards and writing words out by hand became a thing if the past. I deleted every trace of the spaced-repetition software clogging my laptop and honored instead the unparalleled abilities of a well-trained memory.

Thousands of books and over a dozen video courses and public appearances later, the ancient art of memory finally had an innovation for one of its toughest opponents: language learning.

There had been other attempts. Harry Lorayne and Jerry Lucas devote three pages to memorizing vocabulary in The Memory Book. In Memo, Oddbjorn By talks about organizing a city into three parts to help organize gendered nouns, an idea he may have found in Host Von Romberch, who was a contemporary of the great mnemonist Matteo Ricci.

But none of these approaches had the rigor needed to memorize vocabulary en masse. Harry Lorayne is no fan of Memory Palaces and mnemonists like Dave Farrow use them sparingly.

Nothing Wrong With That

But for so many people like myself, pegs and linking do little or nothing. Without a track upon which to lay the associative-imagery, the choo-choo train of the mind has to grasp after ghostly images popped willy-nilly into the void, connected only by abstract relationships between silly images.

But a Bridging Figure moving along a Memory Palace journey matches two extremely concrete elements that are easy to follow. The Memory Palace serves as the rails, beautifully fixed in place. The Bridging Figure is the train conductor who stops at the stations and lets you decode the associative-imagery.

It’s simple, elegant and fun.

So Much Fun

Of course, it would be years later before I told anyone about this revelation. When I finally did release How to Learn and Memorize German Vocabulary following a mysterious and strange set of tumultuous adventures ranging from divorce to the biggest dental nightmare of my life, many people instantly got it. They went on to collectively memorize thousand of words and experience unheard of boosts in fluency.

But others didn’t get it. They cursed at my book and the books to come, calling the Magnetic Memory Method impractical, impossible and insane. Others called me a scammer and compared me to Kevin Trudeau, a memory trainer who had broken the law by making dietary claims. What his health niche crimes have to do with his memory training, I’ll never know, but one thing will remain eternally clear: haters gonna hate.

The critics and naysayers aside, I focused all of my attention on helping the dozens of people who emailed me their questions. I spent hours clarifying the technique on an individual basis. And to be perfectly honest, I loved each and every minute.

But it soon became impractical to spend the better part of each day sharing clarifications to one person at a time. It’s the Information era after all. So I started gathering email addresses and emailed the answers to every one interested enough to subscribe.

Soon, ever more questions started rolling in. And new subscribers asked me how they could get their hands on all the emails they’d missed.

More than a hundred requests later, I created the Magnetic Memory Method Newsletter. At the end of each month, I gathered the emails I was sending once a day into a Kindle book and put them up on Amazon. Although these never became Bestseller like my other books, they have become the stuff of legend. Not a day passes when someone doesn’t ask to be subscribed to the MMM Newsletter or get the entire collection.

I’ve put ten of them together so far, totaling over 1000 pages of the deepest investigations into the art of memory on the planet. Some people have called me the Simonides of the 21st century. Others think I’m the reincarnation of Giordano Bruno (probably because of my Heavy Metal/Stoner Rock look and sometimes stubborn and insistent ways).

But to quote the late, great master of copywriting Gary Halbert:

“Whatever.”

One day I will have to put together the mounds of other correspondence with readers that I’ve never published. I expect that this eventual set of documents will amount to 3000 or more pages of material, writing that some people will undoubtedly gobble up and put to immediate use in their personal memory practice.

But for now, my focus is on the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast and creating second editions of the existing vocabulary books. After all, I now know so much about why people struggle with the MMM that it behooved me to incorporate it all into the first editions.

And now I’m excited to release the second edition of How to Learn and Memorize German Vocabulary. This new and revised edition includes:

* Illustrations of how to create a well-constructed Memory Palace so that you can see the principles right before your very eyes and model them.

* Drawings of a few pieces of associative-imagery so that you really understand how you can instantly memorize the sound and meaning of a word in just a minute or two.

* A lengthy list of suggested German words you will want to learn so that you aren’t stumbling around blind wondering what you should memorize.

* Notes on memorizing grammar principles and phrases so that you can speak sentences instead of just words. (Though the emphasis is on words because you can’t form sentences without them.)

* An expended discussion of Recall Rehearsal so that you know exactly how to get the words and phrases into long-term memory.

* A mega-conclusion that covers every possible question you may have so that no stone is left unturned, and you know exactly what to do to memorize hundreds of vocabulary words a week.

And make no mistake …

This Stuff Works

I heard a few months back from one person that he learned 1000 words in 6 weeks.

Just imagine what having that ability could do for you.

And even if you’re not learning German, the principles apply to any language.

So if this book is something for you, grab it. If you get it during this special promotion, I’d like to send you a special bonus.

That’s right. For people who get the book, either for Kindle or in print, I have a 45-minute exclusive video training I gave for Jonathan Levi’s SuperLearner Masterclass.

In this training, we go into detail about the misconceptions and problems people have with creating Memory Palaces. It’s all in the book, of course. But sometimes having a “student advocate” ask me questions live can make all the difference in the world. Plus, Jonathan is a force unto himself when it comes to learning.

At the present moment, this interview is available only in his SuperLearner Masterclass. It’s an experience that costs several hundred dollars to access. And honestly, if you’re willing to take action, 45 minutes listening to me talk in detail about the MMM is priceless.

I’ll send you a link where you can download this exclusive interview.

It’s just as simple as that. So here’s what to do next:

– Grab the book now.

– Click forward on the email receipt you get from Amazon.

– Enter my email address (anthony/at/magneticmemorymethod/dot/com).

– Click send.

Just make sure you do so before 11:59 p.m. on January 1st, 2016.

Now you may be wondering what’s coming up in 2016 for the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast. That’s a great question and so I can only urge you to stick around and see just what this grizzly old Wizard of Memory has up his sleeve. 2016 is going to be a big place indeed and if you want to learn a language, never forget a name or recite poetry or speeches, or pass even the most complicated math exam, the Magnetic Memory Method is here to help.

But Don’t Delay

Each and every day that you aren’t using the natural abilities of your imagination to integrate with the art of memory, you’re missing out on the massive power of flawless recall. You’re surrendering to the demon of forgetfulness when you could be eliminating its terrorist attacks on your life once and for all.

Grab your copy of How to Learn and Memorize German Vocabulary now and make 2016 the most amazing year of your life.

Your friend in memory,

Anthony Metivier

Additional Resources

The post The Story Of How To Learn And Memorize German Vocabulary appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

If you’re lucky enough, eating is something you do every day. If you’re like most of us lucky ones, it might be something you do too often every day.

But for something you do so often, are you getting the most out of your eating, for both your body and mind?

Doctors, nutritionists, fitness instructors, and your mom are constantly preaching:

“You are what you eat.”

“An apple a day keeps the doctor away.”

“Eat your fruits and veggies.”

Undoubtedly …

… diet is consistently cited as one of the more important aspect to weight loss and overall good health. What you eat can make you healthy, happy, and well-functioning, or throw you into a death-spiral of obesity, disease, and disability.

It should come as no surprise that diet also affects mental health. In fact, there is mounting evidence that specific types and classes of food can have beneficial –  or detrimental – effects on memory.

Recently, for example, coconut oil has come into question.

The question is…

Is it possible to change your diet to maintain, and even achieve new and better levels of memory and information retention?

We are all salivating for a definitive answer, but for the most part, the jury is still out. Much of the research surrounding food and memory are in preliminary stages and tested on animal subjects. Not to dismiss the abilities of a lab rat, but making the connection between a rat and a human is dubious.

However, we aren’t entirely left in the dark. In fact, there is exciting new research pointing to real and impressive associations between food and memory.

This post (don’t forget to listen to the podcast version too) will dive into this salad bowl of findings and scoop out foods to help with memory conservation and retention.

All you’re left with is the easy – and delicious – part of figuring out how to incorporate these foods into your meals.

So, let’s dig in.

The Ugly Nut That Should Get More Attention

They look like brains, are hard to crack, and have a slight bitter flavor. Walnuts taste as unique as they look, and cracking them open has been a strength test for bodybuilders everywhere.

Beyond their use as a party trick, these funny-looking nuts have some evidence pointing to their ability to improve memory.

It’s not due to their pretty appearance. Walnuts contain the highest source of antioxidants among their nut brothers and sisters (Vinson and Cai 134). Perhaps due to their impressive antioxidant profile, walnuts have garnered research specifically on their abilities to improve memory.

A recently published, cross-sectional American study was conducted analyzing the association of walnuts to several forms of cognitive function (Arab and Ang 284). The study included participants from a variety of ethnicities, age groups, and genders. It surveyed over 20,000 people about their dietary habits and had them take various cognitive tests. These tests included reaction time, numerical processing, and recall.

This is perhaps the largest walnut to cognitive function study ever done on the US population, and boasts impressive results.

The study showed strong associations between higher walnut consumption and progressively better scores on each cognitive test, including the memory recall test (Arab and Ang 284).

In other words, the more walnuts they ate per day, the better their memory became. These results applied to all of the age groups studied, ranging between the ages of 25-59.

The study concludes with an (albeit serious and scientific) ode to walnuts.

“These significant, positive associations between walnut consumption and cognitive functions among all adults [. . .] suggest that daily walnut intake may be a simple beneficial dietary behavior.”(Arab and Ang 284)

This study does not stand alone.

Another study focusing on elderly subjects found positive effects of walnut consumption on memory recall (Valls-Pedret et al. 773).

What all these studies are really trying to say is, “Walnuts. Get on that”. Raw or roasted, add them to salads, to your oatmeal or even to the your green smoothies in the morning. If the statistics are correct, you should be getting smarter and remembering more details than ever.

How Green Tea Can Super-Charge Your Memory

Green tea is a favourite around the world. It’s found in a variety of drinks outside of its standard tea form, including lattes, soft drinks, and even ice cream. Green tea has been in the limelight for a while for its purported ability to aid in treating nearly any ailment.

Every other week there seem to be stories about green tea’s heroism in fighting cancer and diabetes. Hype aside, can green tea help your memory and mind as well?

In a study conducted on Japanese residents over age 60, higher green tea consumption was associated with lower incidence of dementia (Noguchi-Shinohara et al). Dementia is a common cognitive and memory decline associated with growing older.

The study suggests that green tea consumption could be beneficial for reducing our risk of memory decline.

But what about improving our memory here and now?

A very interesting, albeit small, study on college students, sought an answer to this question (Schimdt et al 3888). The study examined the effects of green tea extracts on brain activity in the prefrontal cortex of the brain. 12 healthy volunteers were given green tea infused drinks and asked to perform a working memory task while in an MRI.

During the task, the prefrontal cortex showed increased activity and the volunteers performance was heightened (Schimdt et al 3888).

A larger study looked at the effects of tea consumption on the cognitive abilities of middle-aged adults in community living in Singapore. This study didn’t test green tea exclusively, but it found protective and enhancing affects of green tea on cognition, including memory (Feng et al 438).

The evidence suggests that drinking green tea daily will protect from future memory decline and may even provide a memory boost.

The Small Berry That Packs A Punch You’ll Remember

Blueberries aren’t just for toddlers and vanilla ice cream anymore. Blueberries are showing some promise in the protection of your memory.

In a study of nine older adults with memory decline, consuming blueberry juice over 12 weeks resulted in improved memory function. Each day this group of five men and four women drank blueberry juice. After 12 weeks of drinking blueberry juice, these nine test subjects showed improvements in recall and general cognitive functioning (Krikorian et al 4000).

Although small and preliminary, the research offers an interesting benefit to an already very health food. If you aren’t already eating blueberries, these findings should be the kick you needed to start adding them to your smoothies.

Nothing Fishy About This Brain Food

If you’ve been on the internet at any point in the last ten years, you’ve probably heard about “Omega-3s”.

You may not know exactly what they do or what they are, but you know you need more of them.

The purported benefits of Omega-3s is the reason fatty fish have been promoted as a necessary addition to your weekly meals. Fatty fish, such as salmon, contain some of the highest levels of Omega-3s.

Similarly to green tea, Omega-3s have been touted as having a wide variety of health benefits. These include things like reducing pain associated with rheumatoid arthritis, ensuring the healthy development of babies, and aiding against dementia.

Setting the former two claims aside, it does seem that Omega-3s, as consumed through fish, have a protective effect against memory deterioration.

A large study followed 889 older adult men and women over nine years. It was hoping to understand whether differences in fatty fish intake impacted the prevalence of dementia by the ninth year (Schaefer et al 1545).

Researchers found that subjects with the highest intake of Omega-3 fatty acids had a lower risk of developing dementia and Alzheimer’s. Their subjects consumed a mean of three servings of fatty fish per week and the risk reduction was impressive. Subjects that consumed the most fish saw their risk of memory impairment decline by 47% (Schaefer et al 1545).

Another study followed a group of 281 people aged 65 to investigate the correlation between fish intake and brain deterioration. This study found that higher levels of Omega-3 fatty acids in the blood, predicted reduced deterioration for its test subjects (Samieri et al 642).

In another very large study of over 1,200 people, Omega-3 fatty acid, along with various other micronutrient levels, were analyzed. The results were compared to the prevalence of an important biomarker for dementia, a compound in the blood that predicts Alzheimer’s. Sure enough, those with high levels of Omega-3 fatty acids had a lower amount of the threatening biomarker (Gu et al 1832).

What’s really interesting is that these results were not replicated through supplementation.

In a huge study, supplementation Omega-3 fatty acids were given to 4,203 subjects to determine whether memory function improved. The study followed subjects for five years, during which they tested various cognitive functions, including memory. The results showed that supplementation did not have a significant effect on cognitive function (Chew et al 791).

Moral of the story? There seems to be real memory benefits and protective effects to eating foods high in Omega-3 acids, such as in fish. Moreover, supplements have not proven effective. You’re much better off saving your money for a nice salmon filet once a week.

The Simple Diet That Brings It All Together

It might get tiring eating walnuts, berries, green tea, and fish all the time. But you’re in luck! As it turns out, there is an entire diet which has been shown to be protective against memory degeneration. The diet, called the MIND diet, reduces the risk of cognitive decline and memory by 35%. And that’s just for people who followed the diet moderately well (Morris et al 1022).

For those who stuck to the diet closely, the study measured an impressive reduction of 53%.

This diet has not, as of yet, been shown to enhance memory for healthy adults. There are no super-memory foods in the MIND diet.

Nonetheless, the MIND diet and study has shown impressive results in its potential to protect you from memory deterioration.

The MIND diet is a combination of two very well-studied diets: Mediterranean and DASH. Unlike these two diet, it places a special emphasis on the consumption of berries, strawberries, and blueberries in particular (remember them?).

The diet involves the following:

• At least three servings of whole grains a day
• A salad and one other vegetable a day
• A glass of wine a day
• A serving of nuts a day
• Beans every other day
• Poultry and berries at least twice a week
• Fish at least once a week

The MIND diet also calls for limiting or eliminating unhealthy foods, especially butter, cheese, and fast or fried food.

In a time when many countries are facing ageing populations and increasing rates of Alzheimer’s, the MIND diet offers hope. As of yet, there is no effective cure for Alzheimer’s. Every step to a more definitive prevention of Alzheimer’s is a step in the right direction.

Don’t Be Tricked By Ginkgo

Apart from being a lovely decorative tree across North America, Ginkgo Biloba is an ancient species of trees. In fact, they are known to be the oldest tree species in the world, remaining unchanged for over 200 million years. That’s right, this tree has been around since the dinosaurs. Unlike the dinosaurs, they did not go extinct.

Not just a pretty tree, Ginkgo Biloba has also been used in east asian culinary. For example, Ginkgo seeds are added to a traditional vegetarian dish called “Buddha’s Delight”.

Otherwise, Ginkgo Biloba has earned a shining memory-boosting reputation in both alternative medicine circles and the mainstream population. According to the New York Times, it is widely marketed as a preventative treatment to Alzheimer’s disease. What’s more, it is America’s best-selling herbal cognitive enhancement.

But is there substance behind these claims?

Unlike many food claims, definitive answers are possible because Ginkgo is one of the most commonly studied herbs in the world.

Ginkgo has not shown evidence for preventing memory-loss diseases in later life, including dementia. In 2015, a study reviewing many previous studies available on Ginkgo showed no effect on memory loss prevention (Charemboon and Jaisin 508).

But can it help enhance memory for healthy adults?

Again, the evidence is lacking. A similarly large review conducted in 2012 found nothing to prove that Ginkgo Biloba enhances memory, despite the marketing (Laws et al.).

All that glitters is not gold, especially when it comes to claims made by herbal supplement manufacturers. Save your money on Ginkgo supplements and move on to other, better evidenced memory-supporting foods.

Start On Your Memory-Boosting Journey
(Without Supplements)

It’s difficult to isolate specific components in foods that make them effective. It’s been found that blueberries, walnuts, and green tea have amongst the highest levels of antioxidant among their respective food groups.

Antioxidants are thought to protect against cell damage from free radicals, which occur naturally in the body due to normal metabolism.

However, many studies analyzing the effects of antioxidant supplements have failed to show significant effects. It seems that you must take the food with the antioxidant.

Although there may be a time and place for supplementation, uprooting food in their place is a poor strategy.

In any case, the variety and availability of these delicious foods leaves no reason not to incorporate them into your diet. Memory-boosting foods and diets are surprisingly commonplace.

Above and beyond improving memory, eating a healthy diet will leave you feeling energetic and, most importantly, disease-free. It’s a fair statement to say that living a long and healthy life is a prerequisite to excellent memory. After all, you need to be living a long life to have something to remember.

No research needed to back that up.

Further Resources And Works Cited

Dave Farrow Talks About Focus, Fatigue And Memory Expertise

Stop Smoking And Boost Memory With These Step-By-Step Addiction Breakers

How to Stop Information Pollution From Poisoning Your Memory

Arab, L., and A. Ang. “A Cross Sectional Study of the Association between Walnut Consumption and Cognitive Function among Adult Us Populations Represented in NHANES.” J Nutr Health Aging The Journal of Nutrition, Health & Aging (2014): 284-90. Pubmed. Web. 22 Dec. 2015.

Chew, Emily Y., Traci E. Clemons, Elvira Agrón, Lenore J. Launer, Francine Grodstein, and Paul S. Bernstein. “Effect of Omega-3 Fatty Acids, Lutein/Zeaxanthin, or Other Nutrient Supplementation on Cognitive Function.” JAMA (2015): 791. UpToDate. Web. 22 Dec. 2015.

Feng, Lei, X. Gwee, E. -H. Kua, and T. -P. Ng. “Cognitive Function and Tea Consumption in Community Dwelling Older Chinese in Singapore.” J Nutr Health Aging The Journal of Nutrition, Health & Aging (2010): 433-38. Pubmed. Web. 22 Dec. 2015. <pubmed.com>.

Gu, Y., N. Schupf, S. A. Cosentino, J. A. Luchsinger, and N. Scarmeas. “Nutrient Intake and Plasma  -amyloid.” Neurology (2012): 1832-840. UpToDate. Web. 22 Dec. 2015.

Krikorian, Robert, Marcelle D. Shidler, Tiffany A. Nash, Wilhelmina Kalt, Melinda R. Vinqvist-Tymchuk, Barbara Shukitt-Hale, and James A. Joseph. “Blueberry Supplementation Improves Memory in Older Adults †.” J. Agric. Food Chem. Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry (2010): 3996-4000. Pubmed. Web. 22 Dec. 2015. <pubmed.com>.

Laws, Keith R., Hilary Sweetnam, and Tejinder K. Kondel. “Is Ginkgo Biloba a Cognitive Enhancer in Healthy Individuals? A Meta-analysis.” Human Psychopharmacology: Clinical and Experimental Hum. Psychopharmacol Clin Exp (2012): 527-33. Print.

Morris, Martha Clare, Christy C. Tangney, Yamin Wang, Frank M. Sacks, Lisa L. Barnes, David A. Bennett, and Neelum T. Aggarwal. “MIND Diet Slows Cognitive Decline with Aging.” Alzheimer’s & Dementia (2015): 1015-022. Elsevier. Web. 22 Dec. 2015.

Noguchi-Shinohara, Moeko, Sohshi Yuki, Chiaki Dohmoto, Yoshihisa Ikeda, Miharu Samuraki, Kazuo Iwasa, Masami Yokogawa, Kimiko Asai, Kiyonobu Komai, Hiroyuki Nakamura, and Masahito Yamada. “Consumption of Green Tea, but Not Black Tea or Coffee, Is Associated with Reduced Risk of Cognitive Decline.” PLoS ONE (2014). NCBI. PLOS ONE. Web. 22 Dec. 2015.

Samieri, Cécilia, Pauline Maillard, Fabrice Crivello, Evelyne Peuchant, Catherine Helmer, Michèle Allard, Jean-Francois Dartigues, Stephen Cunnane, Bernard Mazoyer, and Pascale Barberger-Gateau. “Plasma Long-chain Omega-3 Fatty Acids and Medial Temporal Lobe Atrophy: A Longitudinal MRI Study.” Alzheimer’s & Dementia (2012). UpToDate. Web. 22 Dec. 2015.

Schaefer, Ernst J., Vanina Bongard, Alexa S. Beiser, Stefania Lamon-Fava, Sander J. Robins, Rhoda Au, Katherine L. Tucker, David J. Kyle, Peter W. F. Wilson, and Philip A. Wolf. “Plasma Phosphatidylcholine Docosahexaenoic Acid Content and Risk of Dementia and Alzheimer Disease.” Arch Neurol Archives of Neurology (2006): 1545. UpToDate. Web. 22 Dec. 2015.

Schmidt, André, Felix Hammann, Bettina Wölnerhanssen, Anne Christin Meyer-Gerspach, Jürgen Drewe, Christoph Beglinger, and Stefan Borgwardt. “Green Tea Extract Enhances Parieto-frontal Connectivity during Working Memory Processing.” Psychopharmacology (2014): 3879-888. Pubmed. Web. 22 Dec. 2015. <http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24643507>.

Valls-Pedret, Cinta, Rosa Maria Lamuela-Ravent’os, Alexander Medina-Rem’on, Melibea Quintana, Dolores Corella, Xavier Pinto, Miguel Angel Martınez-Gonzalez, Ramon Estruch, and Emilio Ros. “Polyphenol-Rich Foods in the Mediterranean Diet Are Associated with Better Cognitive Function in Elderly Subjects at High Cardiovascular Risk.” Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease 29 (2012): 773-82. IOS Press. IOS Press. Web. 22 Dec. 2015.

Vinson, Joe A., and Yuxing Cai. “Nuts, Especially Walnuts, Have Both Antioxidant Quantity and Efficacy and Exhibit Significant Potential Health Benefits.” Food Funct. (2011): 134-40. Royal Society of Chemistry. Web. 22 Dec. 2015.

Weinmann, Stefan, Stephanie Roll, Christoph Schwarzbach, Christoph Vauth, and Stefan N Willich. “Effects of Ginkgo Biloba in Dementia: Systematic Review and Meta-analysis.” BMC Geriatr BMC Geriatrics (2015): 14. Print.

The post Foods That Improve Memory You CAN Pig Out On appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

In this episode of the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast, Guinness World Record Holder Dave Farrow talks about developing focus, overcoming study fatigue and how advanced memory abilities can make you an expert in anything.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

* Why the Ancient Greeks are not the only source of powerful memory techniques.

* An amazing focus method for people with A.D.D. that’ll also work for anyone!

* How to beat any world memory record and maintain the information over long periods of time.

* The important of accuracy in memory and how to develop it fast.

* How Dave memorized 59 decks of cards, totally 3068 cards.

* The important difference between a memory championship and memory competition.

* The nearly magical power of pegs as a powerful alternative to using a Memory Palace.

* The secrets of bring longevity to memory without having to cram or spend tons of time reviewing.

* A stunning and colorful alternative to the Major Method, especially for people with dementia using an arrangement like this (you can create your own version):

1 = red
2 = orange
3 = yellow
4 = green
5 = blue
6 = purple
7 = brown
8 = silver
9 = gold
0 = black

* Exactly how to memorize the Major Method (sometimes called the Major System) using “mnemonics for mnemonics.”

* How to use memory techniques to “fill in the gaps” of anything you missed from a lecture.

* How to deal with being accused of cheating when you use memory techniques to ace every test.

* How to rebalance your brain after intense periods of learning so that you can maximize every minute you invest in your studies.

* How to study with zero fatigue, no matter what field you’re in (medical, legal, etc.)

* The relationship between the focus created by athleticism and what you need to maximize your scholastic studies.

* Why having a short attention span has little to do with the Internet Age and everything to do with our primal ancestors.

* The best places to study so that you have the space and the freedom of mind to get the most out of your memory.

* How to combine focus bursts and mnemonics to blaze through learning a language – even supposedly difficult languages like Chinese.

* Why you need to avoid memory techniques taught by people unqualified to explain them.

* How to find out your primary way of making imaginative connections so that mnemonics work for you at the highest possible level.

* The power of irony, oddity and personification as alternatives to action and imagery in your approach to memorizing information.

* How Dave used memory techniques to become expert in everything needed to build the animatronic FarrowBOT with fully articulated hands. It truly is the robot that memory built.

* The secret keys to developing motivation and passion so that you can make maximum gains with your memory over the long haul.

* … and much, much more!

Photos From Dave Farrow’s 2015 Canadian Memory Seminar And Tournament

The 2015 Seminar and Memory Tournament took place on October 17th in Toronto, Canada at the Ontario Science Center.

Please feel free to read the full Tournament Rules. You can also grab the World Memory Tournament Manual Dave put together with Chester Santos for more information about being a memory competitor or putting together your own competition.

At the competition, anyone can take turns being either a competitor or a judge. It’s amazing how quickly complete beginners pick up the mnemonics and get stunning results just minutes after receiving instructions in how to memorize vocabulary, numbers and playing cards. Even the most skeptical utterly surprised themselves!

As you can see, I was having the time of my life overseeing some of the matches. It was actually a challenging experience because judges have to make some tough close calls. If one competitor makes a mistake, the other competitor can claim the point and then go on to rack up even more until they’ve exhausted the amount of vocabulary, numbers or playing cards they were able to memorize.

These competitors are memorizing lists of vocabulary that they are seeing for the first time. A camera captures everything and detailed records of the results are recorded by the judge.

At the end, everyone walks away as a winner just for taking up the challenge of exercising their imagination and memory abilities and it is a thrill to get a photo with the “Farrow” of Memory himself, Dave Farrow.

Further Resources And Information Mentioned During The Interview

Dave’s TEDTalk On Why Forgetting May Save Humanity:

Excellent article about a Dave Farrow event by Tatiana Sanchez

Dave Farrow article on Wikipedia

Pushbutton Memory

Canada’s  Best Memory

Eric Dinnerstein’s World Memory Statistics

Make A Wish Foundation

Ben Pridmore

PAO notes on the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast

Harry Loryane

The post Dave Farrow Talks About Focus, Fatigue And Memory Expertise appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

Let me ask you something:

If you had the cure for cancer, to what lengths would you go to get it into the hands of the people?

I’m guessing you would not rest until you could see the world freed from the disease in all its manifestations.

Matteo Ricci did not have the cure for cancer, but as we learn in The Memory Palace of Matteo Ricci by Jonathan D. Spence he did have the next best thing: A simple recipe for eliminating forgetfulness.

Not only that, but Ricci’s recipe helps with memorizing entire books and large volumes of vocabulary. Most impressively, Ricci developed a means for memorizing how to write in Chinese.

Yes, you really can memorize how to understand and sound those crazy characters, and even memorize the stroke order.

The Freakish Willpower Of A Memory Wizard

As an Italian Jesuit priest and missionary, Ricci’s memory techniques were so powerful that some of the people in China who heard him recite their books forward and backward thought he was a wizard. In some cases, people saw him as a religious threat because Ricci also believed he had the ultimate salve for the human condition: Christianity.

Indeed, as Jonathan D. Spence suggests in The Memory Palace of Matteo Ricci, “by impressing the Chinese with his memory skills, Ricci hoped to interest them in his culture; through interesting them in his culture he hoped to draw them to an interest in God.”

Talk About Ambition!

Although Ricci’s proselytization had only middling results in China, he was a friend of memory techniques, and we can learn a lot from him about how to use mnemonics at a much higher level.

He wrote about his approach to memory and quoted the scholars from whom he learned the Memory Palace technique in a book called Xiguo Jifa. It took me forever and a day to find a copy of it, but finally I did and made sure to pack it up and take it with me during a recent move:

Speaking of books, Ricci was said to have the ability to memorize them cover to cover – and recite them forward and backwards.

But is this a useful skill? You be the judge.

But memorizing entire books aside, as with all interesting lives, Ricci’s was filled with drama. Along with his many thrills, chills and spills, this “wizard” of the dark mnemonic arts we can learn …

The Many Dangers Of Using Memory Techniques

The first danger with using memory techniques is that as your memory grows stronger, so do your powers. You may even find that special new powers grow, abilities that you did not anticipate.

And, as all fans of Spider-Man know …

With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility

This is certainly true, but those of us living today can probably ignore the idea that using mnemonics fuses your brain with the cosmos. But it was a common concern in the sixteenth century, the flames of which Giordano Bruno had no problem fanning.

But for Ricci’s contemporaries, the threat was real. Being accused of magical powers regularly led to imprisonment, disfiguring torture and public execution. Often all three.

We can also probably dismiss the idea that rosemary helps with memory improvement, something promised by Ophelia in Shakespeare’s Hamlet: “There’s rosemary, that’s for remembrance, pray you, love, remember.”

Other than that, the rest is golden. Drawing on Spence’s book about Ricci, we can now turn to …

Matteo Ricci’s 5 Memory Palace Tips For Total Memory Mastery

1. Cultivate eloquence by using familiar buildings.

Ricci grew up during a time when fortresses were taking on more prestige than cathedrals in European cities. This historical circumstance meant that Ricci could use the best of both worlds.

And you can too by visiting the most modern architecture where you live and the oldest remaining buildings. You can transform these buildings into well-formed Memory Palaces simply by following a few simple principles. This free Memory Improvement Kit teaches you each of these, so grab it now.

The great thing about many civic buildings is that they’re well-planned. You can also usually find a floor plan on one of the walls. If not, a guard or other official will probably know where it is and let you take a photograph for later reference.

Get Freakishly Insane Results With This DIY Memory Palace Strategy

Or, for very good practice, you can sketch out a floor plan of the building yourself. This activity translates your immediate impressions through your muscles and other representation systems directly into your memory, and if you can start memorizing information before you leave the site, all the better.

For more ideas about the kinds of buildings that make great Memory Palaces, check out the How To Find Memory Palaces episode of the Magnetic Memory Method podcast.

The most important point Ricci draws out is that familiarity breeds eloquence when it comes to creating top-notch Memory Palaces. As he noted in his letters, even the biggest and most chaotic cities he visited during his travels became small and manageable in his mind through familiarity.

For us, this means spending more time visiting the homes of our friends and maximizing the value of all the Real Estate surrounding us. Even the most sprawling metropolis can provide you a tightly organized system of Memory Palaces if you take it just one corner cafe at a time.

This “Best Friend” Secret May Be The Best Way To Get Ahead With Memory Techniques Ever

2. You Don’t Have To Use Memory Palaces On Your Own

Memory improvement takes places in your mind and your mind alone …

Or does it?

Not for Ricci.

As Spence unearths, Ricci and his friend Lelio Passionei created Memory Palace systems together while studying in Rome. Twenty years later, Ricci still reflected on these Memory Palaces. No doubt they were even more memorable to him than others because he did not create them alone.

If you’re creating Memory Palaces all alone, you could be limiting your success. Check out this post on how to play memory games using your childhood with a friend to maximize the potential of your memory and the Memory Palaces you want to use.

3. Flexibility is king

All memory techniques involve encoding information, storing it, consolidating it and then decoding it when you want access to it later.

But many people think that using a Memory Palace and visual memory techniques requires creating perfect images. They sweat and labor and fight with their minds to come up with 100% accuracy.

The Best Way To Prevent Failure Is To Stab
Perfection In The Heart And Leave It For Dead

Not only is 100% accuracy not necessary. It also rarely works. There is rarely a one-to-one correspondence between what you want to memorize and the images you use to memorize that info.

What you need instead of verisimilitude is flexibility and trust. Don’t let yourself get caught up in the rabbit hole of perfectionism.

Ricci, as Spence tells us in The Memory Palace of Matteo Ricci, often made adjustments, getting things just right enough to trigger the right memories at the right time.

It’s almost like getting a car engine running just well enough to get it on the road until it can either repair itself or coast based on that initial momentum. When it comes to mnemonics, that’s usually all you need.

Do The Right Work

Ricci did this not only in his mind but in his religious teachings as well. Indeed, to communicate the larger ideas of Christianity, Ricci often adjusted the Gospels so that the visual pictures he had fashioned could do, as Spence puts it, “the right work.”

Our takeaway as memory enthusiasts is that it really all comes down to flexibility and letting your mind fill in the blanks once you’ve got mnemonic imagery that is good enough to do the right work.

4. Information Can Be Broken And Put Together Again

Ricci had the mind of a strategist. Instead of trying to memorize Chinese ideographs as a whole, he would allow them to be as complex as he found them, but cut them into pieces so he could better create images for them.

By doing this, he had an easier time compounding multiple meanings onto the same ideograph.

Spence gives the example of “yao,” which may mean to want, to need, shall and fundamental. To fit all of these possible meanings into the single mnemonic image he placed in his Memory Palace, Ricci saw a Muslim tribeswoman from the Xixia territories. She has fundamental beliefs that oblige her to do certain things. In other words, her fundamental beliefs require that she wants, that she needs and that she shall.

Once created, Ricci places this image of the woman in his Memory Palace so “she will stay there, in the quiet light that suffuses the Memory Palace, calm and unmoving, for as long as he chooses to leave her.”

How Do You Stack Up When It Comes 
To Breaking Things Down?

The point being that most, if not all pieces of information can be broken down into multiple components. Even the smallest words, in a language like Chinese Mandarin, can be separated to learn better and memorize tone structures.

The Magnetic Memory Method for language learning takes this approach a step further by using Bridging Figures that we can apply to numerous similar word pieces and the various combinations they make with other sounds to form complete words.

Using the MMM, you can also trigger both the sound and the meaning of the word using the actions and interactions of the Bridging Figure in your Memory Palace.

Cool Stuff Or What?

5. Study As Many Memory Masters As You Can

It was common during Ricci’s time to quote from a number of different sources. We still do this in many books today, but in the world of memory, you’d be hard-pressed to find too many references to books written by other memory trainers. Many want you to think that they’ve got the best “system” and no one else exists.

That’s fine and dandy for branding and marketing purposes (though it’s ultimately destructive in the age of the Internet). Luckily, Ricci had no such concerns, nor did Spence. Here are just a few of the many names who come up:

Hear Be The Root Of All Eloquence

Cypriano Soarez. De Arte Rhetorica.

Spence thinks Ricci first learned about Memory Palaces in this book. Cypriano connects the structured placement of images to help recall information to the eloquence of the thesaurus (thesaurus eloquentae), which he calls the “root of all eloquence.”

Pliny’s Natural History.

In this book, Pliny apparently cites a number of memory experts, passages that Ricci translated and placed in his own book.

Frances Panigarola. Ars Reminiscendi.

War. What Is It Good For? Absolutely …
Mnemonics?

Ricci may have met Panigarola personally, a man said to have used one hundred thousand stations in a very large number of Memory Palaces. He apparently used a lot of puns to make his images memorable. These images tended to reference current political disputes and wars between nations.

Tip: Since wars involve a lot of historical figures and over-the-top activities, the history of war is a ripe source for exaggerated imagery and intensely memorable personalities.

We can also see that many of the mnemonists of Ricci’s era tended to use mnemonic imagery appropriate to their times. We, on the other hand, can use the Internet to examine swaths of history and come up with images as old as cave drawings and as new as Banksy. We’re in the finest moment of all times to be fully and completely visual. We are rich.

Guglielmo Gratarolo (sometimes spelled Gratoroli). De Memoria Reparanda.

The Weirdest Way To Use Emotions To Make Information Memorable

Gratarolo’s key tip is that the images we create should be so powerful that they “move one to laughter, compassion or admiration.” We could add to this disgust, fear and even anger. As people who need to remember, we need all the help from our emotions we can get.

Gratarolo also appears to have been the first to use something akin to what we now call the Person Action Object technique (PAO).

“After designing a memory location on conventional lines, he then positioned in each an object – a chamber pot, a box of salve, a bowl of plaster were his first three examples – and then had separate figures, each based on individuals he knew well and each carefully named, jolt the scene into mnemonic action. Thus in rapid sequence Grataroli presented his friend Peter as picking up the chamber pot full of urine and pouring it over James, Martin putting his finger in the ointment box and wiping it over Henry’s anus, and Andrew taking some plaster from the bowl and smearing it over Francis’s face. If one could link these vignettes by pun, analogy, or association of ideas to given concepts, one could be guaranteed never to forget them.”

That Truly Is Disgustingly Unforgettable!

Ignatius Loyola. Spiritual Exercises.

Loyala stressed that Jesuits be mentally present at Christ’s death. “No violent detail is to be avoided,” he wrote, quoting Ludolfus of Saxony.

By focusing on the extremities, the priests would not only better remember the Gospels. They would strengthen their overall abilities with memory techniques.

Host von Romberch. Longestorium Artificiose Memorie.

Romberch described entire memory cities to be divided by categories such as shops, libraries, slaughter yards and schools. How specifically this kind of division should work is not clear.

Nor is his suggestion to use “memory alphabets.” These were to be based on the logical combination of humans, plants, animals and objects.

Of all Ricci’s contemporaries, Romberch seems to have been most closely aligned with the Magnetic Memory Method. The ability to use general methods to create specific systems for specific memory purposes is perhaps the most profound approach we have.

Hater’s Gonna Hate …

Not everyone in Ricci’s time held memory techniques and mnemonics in high esteem.

In Of the Vanitie and Uncertainties of Arts and Sciences, Cornelius Agrippe said that the “monstrous images” required by mnemonics dulled the mind. He even went so far as to suggest that mnemonics “caused madness and frenzy instead of profound and sure memory.”

Erasmus and Melancthon agreed and Rabelais went out of his way to mock memory techniques. In Gargantua, the title character learns to memorize bizarre books of grammar and the commentaries written on them by Bangbreeze, Scallywag and Claptrap.

The Worst Thing You’ll Smell All Day

Although Gargantua can recite these books backward and forwards, Rabelais does not present the skill in a virtuous light. Instead, Gargantua “became as wise as any man baked in an oven” and when speaking to him about his memorized knowledge, “it was no more possible to draw a word from him than a fart from a dead donkey.”

Those who mocked memory techniques and the ability to use a Memory Palace really missed out.

But Their Loss Is Our Gain …

… and their mockery contributed to the preservation of these extraordinary techniques for learning, memorizing and recalling anything.

The Enduring Tragedy Of
The Memory Palace Of Matteo Ricci

Sadly, Ricci spent so much time in China, but apparently wasn’t aware of the countless Chinese mnemonists capable of memory feats that made his abilities pale in comparison. So although we get a wealth of information in his writing about the Western mnemonic tradition, Ricci could not expose us to the untold treasures of the Chinese memory wizards as part of his extraordinary career.

For this reason, I’ve been inspired to start learning Mandarin Chinese. Two weeks deep into the language, my results using several Memory Palaces to memorize Pimsleur dialogs has been even more successful than anticipated.

I’ll be talking more about exactly what I’m doing, so stay tuned and be sure that you’ve got my free Magnetic Memory Method Memory Improvement Kit so that you’re subscribed for notifications and can learn the techniques to use along with me.

And like Ricci …

Use Knowledge To Change The Entire World For The Better

Until next time, keep busy learning and practicing the art of memory. And as always, keep yourself Magnetic!

Further Resources

Mandarin Chinese Mnemonics And Morning Memory Secrets

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This Insanely Smart Guy Teaches You How To Learn Anything At Record Speed – Including Learning How To Engineer Your Own Body. Tap The Mental And Physical Wellness Secrets Of SuperLearner Jonathan Levi.

In this episode of the Magnetic Memory Method podcast, the host of the Becoming Superhuman podcast and the bestselling Become a SuperLearner video course and book shares a ton of actionable knowledge with you about learning quickly, efficiently and in ways that honor your memory instead of taxing it.

In this incredible hour, you’ll learn:

* The importance of developing your visual memory.

* How the process of using a Memory Palace can change over time – and become even more powerful when you have the best practices under your belt.

* How to create a powerful Memory Palace – even if it’s just minutes before giving a major presentation.

* How to use the most shocking locations in your personal history to memorize anything (graphic content).

* Why it’s never acceptable – and also never necessary – to have crappy grades in school.

* How Jonathan deals with ADD, both with and without medication.

* How to cope with listening to boring lectures.

* Why traditional education needs to change and what the future of education will look like.

* How to speed up the slow pace of learning as an independent learner on the road to autodidacticism.

* How to use stories in order to memorize and make what you have to say memorable.

* The magical power of tension and distress when learning, memorizing and recalling information.

* How to deal with feeling uneasy about things you don’t want to do and why this kind of action creates such powerful results.

* Why people don’t use memory techniques, even if they’ve mastered them.

* The connection between slouching and bad memory habits.

* How to build confidence in your memory for better conversations and social performance in practical situations.

* How to shape the muscle of your mind in order to increase raw memory ability.

* How to make using mnemonics second-nature.

* How to safely do N=1 experiments on yourself (and why self-experimentation may be the most important activity you ever engage in).

* The danger of doing exercises that aren’t optimized for endocrine.

* The rampant evils of estrogen in everything from your food to your cologne.

* Why there is no such thing as being in the “normal range” and why you need to go much deeper when exploring your own health.

* How to be more attractive to the opposite sex – even if you’re a weird and introverted memory enthusiast.

* Why you have a moral obligation to share what you know with the world.

* Jonathan’s core values and why you shouldn’t waste your memory on appointments and other small details.

* How to create deep knowledge in ways that create dense connections between the neurons in your brain.

* How to harness the power of dual-coding in your use of memory techniques.

* How to share your knowledge ethically as you navigate the changing educational landscape in the 21st century.

* … and much, much more!

Further Resources, People And Items Mentioned In the Podcast

Jonathan Levi Talks About Becoming A SuperLearner on the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast

USA Memory Champion Nelson Dellis On Memory, Tenacity, & Conquering Anything

Extreme Memory Improvement: How Nelson Dellis Pushes The Limits Of Recall For The Good Of Humanity

Ben Greenfield Fitness

Rob Wolf of Eat Real Food

Loren Cordaine of The Paleo Diet

Kombucha

N=1

Branding You: How to Make $1000 A Day Selling YOUR Knowledge

The post Jonathan Levi On ADD, Education And His TEDTalk Memory Palace appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

Let’s face it – you’re burned out.

Work is killing you. Your Kindle app is bursting with unread books. Your credit card is melting from the heat of buying stuff you want but do not need. And that circles back to the job or entrepreneurial pursuits you need to keep the devil’s circle spinning.

Here’s the good news:

There are specific habits that can get you off of that wheel. They are easy and mostly inexpensive to do. They give you insight into your situation and can spring you from the prison of burnout faster than you can imagine.

The best part is that these seven techniques are also minimalistic. There’s almost nothing to them. And the “zen of almost nothing” is a great way to get started dealing with overwhelm.

1. The Shocking Truth About Meditation

Daily meditation feels good and creates many benefits ranging from stress relief to increased creativity and improved critical thinking.

The only catch is that taking time for this simple practice can be difficult to remember. And that’s somewhat strange, given how good it can make you feel, even after only five minutes of practice.

One way to make meditation a regular practice you won’t forget is to place a mat beside your bed. When you wake up, sit for even just a moment to connect with your surroundings.

You don’t have a spend a penny on your mat either. Just fold up a blanket, and for extra comfort, place a pillow on top of that. In this way, you can keep your ankles off of the hard floor and give some balance to your spine.

Many people think meditation is difficult. But it’s easy to do and gets even easier when you approach it without a lofty goal, like enlightenment. As Alan Watts said, the best way to approach meditation is “sitting just to sit.”

If you can make this simple approach to meditation a regular practice, even with thunder and lightning jolting through your soul, you have a chance at developing better balance in your life within a week or less.

2. How Taking A Simple Walk Can Protect Your From Harm

Many hold walking as a form of meditation. But walking also releases regulatory chemicals in the brain, such as dopamine and norepinephrine. These chemicals not only create pleasure, but can also help reduce any physical pain you might be suffering.

And you can make walking even more soothing for yourself. Take some MP3s of calming music that you resonate with and focus on immersing yourself in the sound and rhythm as you walk.

Match your movements to the music and pay attention to the feeling of the world around you. It’s only important that the music you choose reduces overwhelm – not increase it.

And if you are interested in meditation, take a break and sit on a bench in a park. Just to sit.

3. How To Practice Vegging Out (In A Positive Way)

Well, not exactly “vegging out” in the traditional sense.

Practicing Shavasana has a funny catch to it. You will always lose the game. No matter how good you get at the stillness, your body will eventually force you to move.

But in this game, losing is a good thing. As you experience the relaxing feelings of stillness, you’re also studying your impulses and your need to react to the same thoughts and desires that lead to overwhelm in other areas of your life.

As you practice Shavasana over the coming weeks and months, try extending the periods of stillness longer each time. You’ll find that by extending your reactions in Shavasana, you’ll also be able to slow how you react to overwhelming elements of life too.

4. Do This With A Pen And Paper Every Day

When life hands you a car crash, we tend to react to the overwhelm by piling on worry, concern and more stress.

The way around this is to buttress yourself in good thoughts before tough things happen. That way, you’ll have a reference guide to which you can refer.

To complete this simple exercise, get a notebook and focus on writing down things you genuinely appreciate. Be specific. If you’re grateful to have a computer, list it. If you enjoyed the smile of a stranger on your walk, make a note of it.

And commit to doing this every single day for at least three months. Add these 5 Brain Exercises for bonus points, if you like.

Please don’t think this daily writing habit is silly or will itself contribute to your overwhelm. In 59 Seconds, a book by Richard Wiseman, the author gives scientific studies that demonstrate the validity of journaling gratitude.

But you don’t take the word of science for it. Give it a try and you’ll find out on your own. Within as short a period as one or two days, you may find that you’re already feeling happier about your life and this new recognition of how things are for you will buttress you against future troubles that really can be overwhelming without a daily defense practice in place.

5. Have Two-Tiered Positive Goals You Can Achieve Now And Later

You’ve probably heard of SMART goals. They are goals that are:

* Specific
* Measurable
* Achievable
* Realistic
* Time-related

These are all great guidelines to keep in mind when making your goals, and they are designed to reduce overwhelm.

As a bonus to the SMART concept, my friend Daniel Welsch down in Madrid adds on two other components that work well. He notes two kinds of things he wants to achieve:

* Goals that cost nothing (like spending more time with a loved one)
* Goals that cost $1000

The former can be scheduled immediately. The latter can be worked towards and earned. It doesn’t have to be $1000, but the benefits of having a monetary goal in mind are huge.

After all, you’re going to work one way or another and saving up for a specific goal that costs money not only engages you in your work in a more meaningful way. It also lets you give yourself a gift for all that you do.

The trick is to make sure that your goals in and of themselves reduce overwhelm while leading to even greater states of calm and freedom in the future.

6. How To Make Your Favorite Poison A Cure

It was often said in Ancient Greece that the cure is always a poison, and the poison is always a cure. In fact, the word “pharmacy” partially descends from this concept (Pharmakia).

Computers are like that too. At the same time you can use them to achieve miracles, you can also let them run you into the ground.

Set specific limits. For example, no matter what, hit the off-switch at 10 p.m. and stick to it. Then go for a walk and sit on that bench.

Of course, everybody knows that setting limits is tough, but the benefits of doing so reduce overwhelm and open you up to receiving so many good things in life that cannot be achieved when you and your brain are chained to a machine designed to bombard all your senses.

7. How To Reduce Overwhelm While Chilling Out With Friends

Social media has many positive aspects. But it’s not a substitute for real life contact. It doesn’t cause your brain to create any of the healthy and helpful chemicals that social interactions bring. And in fact, keeping up with all those posts and liking all those likable links can bake your brain.

You also don’t get the challenges your brain needs while using social media. These include being asked questions and asking questions in return, complete with the body language and innuendo that only real life contact can offer. That said, like meditation, social contact needn’t have a lofty self-improvement goal. It can be valuable in and of itself just as something to do.

But if you do want something specific to do with your friends, tell them about your minimalist plans to bring more balance into your life. After all, they’re helpful for everyone else too.

And teaching something helps you organize information in your brain, leading to streamlined thoughts and crystal clarity that also help reduce overwhelm in your mind.

So what do you say? Are you ready to get out of the soul-crushing loop that you’re in and bring in some new habits that will help you reduce overwhelm and boost your success? I hope so, because the truth is that you can free yourself from the suffering of burnout, one small positive habit at a time.

The post 7 Minimalist Ways To Boost Success In The Face Of Soul-Crushing Overwhelm appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

Check out this guest post by Camilla Hallstrom of 99 Smart Ideas. She teaches you how to use powerful psychological tools to make finally crossing that language off your bucket list simple and fun. Take it away, Camilla!

Have you ever started learning a language only to find yourself still no better than a beginner years later?

If so, you’re certainly not alone.

Learning a language is often considered extremely daunting and takes a long time.

After all, you’ll have to cram all this information into your brain. For example, you’ll have to memorize new vocabulary, including regional variations, slang, cultural concepts, grammar rules, and numbers. If you’re not some sort of a memory prodigy, you’re in it for the long term – and who has time and energy for that?

But here’s the thing:

The conventional wisdom that learning a language is a long and arduous path is…

Just Plain Silly

As a native speaker of two languages, Swedish and Finnish, and fluent speaker of three more languages, English, French, and German, I can communicate in two other languages, Norwegian and Danish, and I’m a beginner in an eighth language, Italian.

Am I a language prodigy? No way.

Do I have superhuman memory skills? Not really.

Is it in my genes? Nope. No one in my family speaks as many languages with the same fluency.

The key to every language that I’ve learned is that I have learned how to motivate myself to keep on learning and memorizing.

Being motivated to learn a language might sound intuitive, but still, this is one of the most basic things language learners struggle with.

Motivation also applies to learning in general and learning memorization methods that can be applied to other things.

For example, you know from Anthony’s Magnetic Memory Method that there are structured frameworks that can be applied to language memorization.

And if you’ve used the Magnetic Memory Method, you know it works.

Yet, it’s easy to fall back on the same old excuses – you don’t have time to create those Memory Palaces right now, you don’t have time to learn the techniques, etcetera.

So how do you continue to motivate yourself to keep on learning? How do you master those Memory Palaces and learn a new language?

Read on to learn exactly how you do this – once you’ve mastered motivation, there are no limitations to your learning.

(Note: I’ve put together an eBook at the end of this post that will give you 19 actionable ways get motivated and achieve your goal.)

What Does Motivation Do to Your Memory?

Years ago, back in high school, I wasn’t very diligent. German was one of my least favorite subjects. Yet, I had to undertake a rigorous and important exam at the end of my senior year. Everything that I had ever learned in my German classes throughout school was going to be tested.

I didn’t have very much time to revise. Also, I had to take three other exams at the same time. I pretty much gave up at the starting line.

Instead of trying to frenetically revise grammar books and dictionaries a month before my test, I decided to do something unconventional.

Quite simply, I watched my favorite movies, read my favorite books, and watched the news – all in German. I did this for a month and I enjoyed doing it.

At the end of that month, the result for my exam took me by surprise – I scored nationally in the top 20% and was one of the best in my class.

This success happened despite the fact that I had been one of the poorest performing students just a few months earlier. How come?

Don’t Overlook This Little Known Secret:
It Supports All Successful Language Learning

The fact that I enjoyed the way in which I was revising for my test meant that I was motivated to do the tasks I did.

And as it turns out, motivation can affect cognition. In fact, many of those who achieve success in learning a language are highly motivated.

Of course other things play in as well.

When learning a language, your success is – beside motivation – determined by your aptitude skills:

Working memory. Your working memory is what enables you to both temporarily store and process information. Working memory is crucial for our language learning because it enables us to understand and communicate in our target language.

Associative memory. Your associative memory helps you remember associations between unrelated items, such as the name of someone you just met and it helps you connect old and new information. For example, when learning a language, your associative memory can help you build links between words in your native language and your target language.

How strong your mechanisms are for implicit learning. Implicit learning is what you learn without realizing that you’re learning. For language learning, implicit learning means that you unintentionally learn complex and subtle regularities in a language. Implicit learning is common for children, but for adults it can be more challenging.

However, you’d think that my classmates were also motivated. Some of them had been much more successful language learners throughout school – why, then, did I perform better?

What was it that set me apart from other students – those who were diligently reading the textbooks set out in our curriculum?

To answer this, we need first to understand how motivation works.

Here’s Exactly What Motivation Is And How It Works

There are different forms of motivation, intrinsic and extrinsic motivation.

Intrinsic motivation is our internal motivation. For example, hobbies are often driven by intrinsic motivation.

Intrinsic motivation builds on:

• The natural motivation to direct our lives.
• Being able to continuously improve something.
• Being part of something that is bigger than us.

Beside these motivational factors, intrinsic motivation can build on different factors, such as having a clear goal.

Clear goals should be defined goals that:

Have personal meaning to you. Intrinsic motivation builds on our internal motivation. Subsequently, your goal should build on something that’s important to you and not caused by external motivators.

Are attainable. Self-esteem is tightly linked with motivation. If you don’t believe that you have the capacity to do something, it’s hard to muster the motivation for it. Subsequently, if you don’t gain momentum, you lose self-esteem for that particular task or goal and as a result, you lose interest in your goal. You need to find the sweet-spot between attainable goals and too easy or unachievable goals.

Extrinsic motivation, on the other hand, is external. It refers to incentives that come from outside of the individual. Such incentives could be a good grade or monetary compensation.

What Motivates You To Learn A Language?

Intrinsic motivation is key both to mnemonic processes and specifically, language learning. Consequently, intrinsic motivation has a huge impact on how you use the Magnetic Memory Method or any set of memory techniques. Extrinsic motivation, again, has shown not to be as effective as intrinsic motivation when it comes to learning a language.

Some people are naturally intrinsically motivated to learn a language. For example, intrinsic motivators for learning a language are:

• Learning a language for a trip to a country.
• Learning a language to communicate with friends and family.
• Learning a language to be able to read a certain book in its original language, watch a certain movie, and so forth.
• Learning a language when moving to a country.
• Learning a language as a hobby.
• Learning a language to better understand a culture.
• Learning a language because it appeals to you, e.g., because it sounds beautiful.

Now that we know what motivation is, we can return to why I performed better than my classmates in my exam despite not having performed as well in the past.

I was intrinsically motivated to watch movies and read books as these things are things that I would have done even if I hadn’t had to prepare for my exam. I was preparing for the exam because of an extrinsic reason, but I was able to turn it into something that I liked doing. This gave me intrinsic motivation.

My classmates, on the other hand, were – at least for the most part – extrinsically motivated. They took the tests to get good grades. This, again, isn’t as effective as intrinsic motivation.

What Can You Do When Your Motivation Fizzles?

It’s worth noticing that motivation is not static.

It changes according to circumstances, like your mood and your goals.

For example, if you have a particular task – like I had in my example – you might experience a sudden burst of motivation. The risk is that you lose that motivation once you’ve completed your task.

This, again, can lead to a serious problem – procrastination.

What Is Procrastination Anyway And …

What Makes It So Bad?

Motivation fluctuates. As we’ve discussed, intrinsic motivation has a big impact on your mnemonic processes. The risk is that once you become unmotivated, you don’t take the actions you should.

However, while there are times when you’re not motivated to do something, there are ways in which you can ensure that you continue to work towards your goal. In this case, it’s learning a language and therefore, continuing to create Memory Palaces.

So how do you keep up working on memorizing your target language even when you don’t feel like doing so?

First, it’s key to understand why you procrastinate when you lose your motivation.

You procrastinate because your decisions are processed in two different parts of your brain.

Take the limbic system. It’s a primitive part of the brain. It assesses the instant rewards of any decision. It’s also the part of your brain that makes you procrastinate.

For example, you might decide not to build a Memory Palace, which has long-term rewards, and instead log in on Facebook, which has instant, but useless rewards. By swapping Facebook for memory methods, you immediately do what you want to and not what you should for long-term gain, which is learning a language.

The prefrontal cortex, on the other hand, evaluates long-term gain and processes decisions accordingly. To keep from procrastinating, you should always consider what consequences your action holds for you in the long run.

Of course, isolating these consequences is much easier said than done. However, there are ways in which you can optimize that you’ll make a decision based on these consequences.

Never Settle For Multitasking

For example, you should focus on few goals at the same time, and never settle for multitasking. This way, it’s easier to keep your goal on the top of your mind at all times and consequently, make decisions based on it.

You should also make a plan for how you will achieve your goal. This way, you always keep up with what your next step is. Also, when you’re tired or hungry, your decisions are processed in your limbic system. Sleeping enough hours and eating regularly helps you identify what consequences your actions have in the long run.

Now that you know why you lose motivation and procrastinate, we’ll look at what remedies there are for this in relation to language learning and memorization.

How Habits Help You Achieve Your Goals …

Even When You Lack Motivation

#1. Seinfeld’s productivity secret as a habit-building method

First, by establishing habits, you ensure that you continue to build your memory palaces and learn your target language.

Habits are behavior patterns that are constantly repeated and ultimately become almost inevitable.

For example, you brush your teeth and shower almost by automation.

Even if you feel like not brushing your teeth, you do it – it’s more difficult not to do it than to do it. In this case, you don’t even make a decision, and therefore, you don’t need to worry about the limbic part of your brain interfering with your action. Consequently, you don’t have to determine the long-term reward of your action, which means that it’s hard to procrastinate on your task.

Habits can naturally be applied to your memory goals.

By building Memory Palaces and using them as part of your language learning activities every day and making the process a habit, you keep up the practice.

To hold yourself accountable and make the habit-keeping process easier, I suggest that you make use of Seinfeld’s productivity secret.

Seinfeld’s productivity secret is a habit-building system.

It’s quite simple: get a wall calendar and a red marker. Now, decide the habit you want to build – right now, that habit is building and using Memory Palaces. For each day that you complete the task (more like a game, really), mark that day with a big, red X.

Soon, you’ll have a chain that grows longer and longer. Your task is not to break the chain. That’s the only task – keep the chain growing.

After a while, you have a habit that sticks.

#2. Tiny habits as a habit-building method

Another habit-building technique is building tiny habits. According to Mark Channon, tiny habits are easy, digestible habits that take you closer to your goal – small steps you take to approach your goal.

For example, if brushing your teeth isn’t already a habit, the smallest step you could take is to place your toothbrush so that it’s right in front of you when you wake up. The next step would be to brush one tooth, then another, and so forth.

In this case, you want to learn a language. (And if you’re reading this, but for some reason don’t, here are 15 Reasons Why Learning A Foreign Language Is Good For Your Brain.)

Take the smallest step you can and program your mind to repeat it at a set time. Let’s say you want learn vocabulary in your target language every day. Your tiny habit might be to put paper and a pen on the table.

By making the habit small and specific, you significantly lower the threshold to getting started and in the end, your habit becomes automatic.

If you memorize just one word a day using just one Memory Palace and make this a habit you can build upon, your language learning will skyrocket. And once you’ve done just one, it will be hard for you not to do another.

To Skyrocket Your Language Learning – Find Your Intrinsic Motivation

As already discussed, I used movies and books to learn a language, because I like doing these activities.

Even if I was learning German for an extrinsic reason (getting a good grade in my exam), I was intrinsically motivated to read books and watch movies. Subsequently, I used methods for my language learning that I was intrinsically motivated to do.

In the same sense, when you feel unmotivated to use memory methods and learn a language, you can do activities that you’re intrinsically motivated to do, and that help you reach your goal.

The action itself is already an immediate reward and therefore, you don’t procrastinate on it.

And how do you decide whether the activity in question is worth acting on?

In her celebrated TEDx talk, relationship and career expert Mel Robbins gives a good rule of thumb for these situations.

If you come to think of something and don’t act on it within five seconds – kill the idea.

To take action on an idea or activity, you could make a note of the first step you should take, Google if you can find a certain book, check if the movie you’re looking for is available on Netflix, or check if you can find a language partner online.

As to specific activities you can undertake to learn a language, you could watch a relevant travel program in your target language, read a book on fishing if you’re interested in fishing, keep a journal in your target language if you like writing or play a memory game in that language.

However, to properly use this method, there are a few things to note.

First, you don’t want to overwhelm yourself with a difficult movie that’s impossible to follow in the language you try to learn. This kind of choice will only lead to procrastination.

Instead, you should choose movies and books that:

• Are easy to understand.
• A movie or book you’ve already seen or read in your native language (or any other language you fully comprehend).
• Don’t have subtitles in your native language.
• In best case scenario, you’ll read a book in your target language and then watch a movie based on it to fully understand the plot.

Second, optimize your activity for memorization and language learning.

Actively apply the Magnetic Memory Method and the use of mnemonics to get the most out of your language learning.

For example, you can pick one of the locations in the movie (or book) – the location that is most appealing to you – and reconstruct it in your brain. Now, build a Memory Palace using words from the movie. Maybe there are characters and other details that help you construct your Memory Palace?

I’ll give a specific example to help you out.

In the movie The Intouchables (Les Intouchables), one of the main characters (a street kid), gets to live in a fancy room in a mansion. I could reconstruct that room in my Memory Palace (or use it as a Memory Palace itself) and then name its different objects in French.

I could add other associations, both from the movie and outside of it. In the room, there’s a painting of a man – now, I’ll remember that “painting” is masculine in French (“un tableau”). And voilà – I’d have a new Memory Palace full of French words.

How To Pump Up Your Motivation And Learn a Language

Now you know exactly how motivation affects your memory and language learning and what you can do to prevent procrastination.

You also know what to do when you lack motivation. The key is to either be intrinsically motivated to learn a language and if not, then build lasting habits or do activities you’re intrinsically motivated to do.

There’s just one thing left…

Implementation.

This is what I want you to do. Go ahead. Get something to write with. I promise, it will help you.

• List the language you are trying to learn and why you’re trying to learn it. Are you already intrinsically motivated to learn that language? Are there parts of the learning process that you’re not so motivated to complete?
• If you need to find intrinsic motivation to learn your target language, you should list 5 things you love doing in your spare time. These should be things that you could do anytime and that are effortless to you.
• Now, determine how you can use these five things to help you get your memory exercises done and consequently, move towards learning your target language.

Let’s say you love watching Keeping Up With The Kardashians (Don’t worry, I’m not judging you!)

This TV-series is probably dubbed at least in the most commonly spoken languages. You can use that TV-series to your advantage and build memory palaces out of it with your target language (I can also imagine that you could have great fun doing so).

Remember, this method works even if you’re not naturally intrinsically motivated to learn the language, as long as you’re intrinsically motivated to do the specific activity in question.

So that’s it – that’s the secret to how I’ve successfully learned so many languages.

And I know you can do it, too.

Want 19 more tips on how you can achieve any goal through motivation? I’ve put together a free eBook that helps you with just that.

Sound good?

Then grab the eBook here.

The post How Motivation Affects Your Memory When Learning A Language appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

Have you ever thought about getting into marketing?

Or perhaps you’ve just wondered … what on earth makes the people who write all those ads tick?

If so, then today’s your lucky day, because on this episode of the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast, the remarkable comic turned copywriter, Kevin Rogers of Copy Chief, holds the truth about …

How To Be Memorable On The Stage And On The Page

So go ahead click on the play button above, download the transcript for this interview or read Kevin’s many words of wisdom right here below.

Anthony: Kevin, I’m really excited to have you on the podcast today. There are a number of reasons why I wanted to speak with you in particular. Maybe you could tell everybody listening to this a little bit about who you are and what you do.

Kevin: Sure, thanks Anthony for having me. I’m really glad to be here. An interesting, I guess, resume, I am now a freelance direct response copywriter, which means I write the ads that force people to make a decision. Essentially, direct response compared to more sort or traditional advertising means that there’s always a call to action at the end of it. An extreme version would be an infomercial – buy now, buy now and you’ll get an extra set of knives and all that good stuff. We certainly have much more subtle ways to do all that, but that would be the one big distinction between what we do and other types of marketing.

My story is that I was a stand-up comedian. I actually left high school a little early because I was restless and after doing some labor jobs that I didn’t feel were a perfect fit, I was dared by friends to do an open mic night at local comedy club. It turned out that was a better fit for me. I was fortunate to excel pretty quickly at that and actually won a contest to take over as the house MC at this club here in Clearwater, Florida. It was a really great opportunity because it meant that I was doing eight shows a week and stage time is everything to a comic.

For instance, in New York City, there are so many comics there, and they will club hop. They might be taking cabs from club to club from 5:00 in the afternoon to 2:00 in the morning just trying to get on everywhere. It was a big deal to get that much stage time at a popular club here in town. Then I went on the road at about 19 and stayed on the road for almost 7 years as a comic. That was an incredible adventure.

How To Turn Your Hair Into A Calling Card

I knew at some point that I didn’t have any control over whether I succeeded or not in that business. Show business is one of those things where it takes a little bit of luck and some knowing the right people. For me, I had no business sense whatsoever. I do know a few comics who had marketing backgrounds and certainly used that to their advantage, Carrot Top being one really good example. Carrot Top was having stickers made of his image when he was still just a road comic. He really understood that his shock of orange hair was his calling card. I had none of that. I had no business sense.

I just kind of knew that at some point I would need to make a decision that if I wasn’t getting signs from the business that this was going to pay off for me, somewhere around the age of 30 maybe, I did not want to risk becoming some of the older very bitter comics that I worked with. Because they were amazingly funny and talented, and, they were also really tortured. It was clear to me, and to them, that they had no alternatives. When you spend most of your life as an entertainer and that does not manifest into a big win, then what do you do? It’s a really sad state of affairs for a lot of people I have a lot of respect for.

Anthony: We know the image of the tortured comic, or many of us do anyway because we see it again and again. What do you think it is that tortures them? Is it something that links to memories that they’re trying to deal with? What would it be maybe from your own experience?

Kevin: Yeah, it’s absolutely that. I think there is an incredibly thin line between pleasure and pain when it comes to how we express ourselves. You know funny comes from pain, period. We laugh as a healing device. Comics – I can’t tell you about a stable person I’ve ever met who is like gut-busting funny. It just doesn’t equate. Not everybody grew up in some terrible condition, although that’s often the case.

A very true statement is comedy is therapy for the comic. Very often, these people would be in dire straits mentally without that outlet. It’s funny because hanging out with them or being around them offstage is very often not what you would expect. People just assume a comedian is funny all the time and loving life and it’s nothing but laughter. There are parts of that which are true. For the most part, it’s a bit of – I don’t want to call it miserable – but….

How To Hold The Most Depressing Dinner Party In The World

I’ll never forget a story a screenwriting teacher told about his wife wanting to liven up a dinner party so she invited comedy writers. It turned out to be the most morose dinner party she had ever thrown. It made perfect sense to me.

Anthony: I’m curious, how do you remember sets and when you’re doing eight sets like that back to back, are you doing the same thing? Are you embedding it into memory as you go along? What is the artistry there in terms of your own delivery and the role of how you prepared and how you performed?

Kevin: That’s a great question. I think what I did, and what I saw, is very typical among comics. There wasn’t a lot of strategy to it other than you always wanted to be coming up with new material.

We would start with what we call a premise. A comic would say to another comic, “Do me a favor and watch my set because I’m trying out a new premise.” They wouldn’t really say I’m trying out a joke. Sometimes jokes come to you just done out of the aether. The first thing you do when that happens is you call four other comics, and you go have you heard this before? Because you are afraid that your memory is playing tricks on you and telling you it’s got something new when it’s actually something you heard somewhere else. The worst think you can encounter as a comic is being labeled a thief. We are all very careful that we’re not accidentally repeating someone else’s bit.

You bring up the premise, you have some idea of what the punchline will be and you work it into a place in your set where it feels safe because you’ve got momentum and then you know that you’ve got some great jokes after that. You slide it into sort of a safe place in your set and you just work it out.

I think most comics prefer to have the magic happen live. It’s almost more about how you introduce the premise than how you execute the punchline when you’re developing a joke. Because at its best, the process is letting the audience sort of dictate live which way the joke should go. Very often things happen in the moment that you couldn’t sit with a pad and pencil and create.

Notebooks … The 51st Shade Of Grey?

As far as memory, people would say all the time, “How do you memorize all that?” I guess it just starts with five minutes. You memorize it enough to –

The first time I went on stage that was my biggest challenge. I got on stage. And it felt nothing like I could have imagined. I was very nervous. I couldn’t see. I didn’t expect that. I’ve got these lights in my face. I was just trying to remember the jokes and listen for something that sounded like good news coming back from the crowd. Then you just remember that and then you add on bit after bit, and guys could have hours of material.

George Carlin famously would do a new HBO special every year. He would build up new material for that year, and then he would throw it away after the special was recorded. That was done. That was part of the magic of George Carlin. He was dedicated to the craft and to developing and evolving new material. He would take about the best 10 percent of the previous special, use that as the foundation, sort of the safety net to give audiences their money’s worth.

Other than that, he’d bring up a notebook and basically just be working out new material in front of a crowd of hundreds or thousands sometimes.

Anthony: I was going to ask you about that. Because there are some comics that have trademarks like Carrot Head. There are very few comics that have actually made a bit of a trademark of actually having lines written on a notepad or whatever that they bring up. I wonder if you ever did that too, or had any sort of visible triggers, notes written on your hand or anything like that to prompt yourself?

Kevin: It’s a good question. There was like a phase – a thing in the 1990s all of a sudden called alternative comedy. It was the early days of Patton Oswalt and Marc Maron and these San Francisco comics. Janeane Garofalo was a big alternative comic.

They would all bring their notebooks up. That was their thing. It was like we are so cool we are not pretending to perform. We don’t care. There is no formality here. Honestly, it was a bit like torture a lot of times. It was just very self-indulgent. It’s not that there should be some hard rule that you can’t bring up a notebook and refer to it if you’re working out new stuff. No problem with that, but it almost became a cliche. You know, like this is all so fresh that I have to look at my notebook to even remember it. With some people, it was BS. They knew the bits. They were just using the notebook as a prop.

For me personally, I did later start recording my sets. To be honest, I don’t know how often I actually listened back to them. If I was trying to work out a new joke, I would record and at least listen to that part. Then I might go I forgot the funniest line I had or whatever. It would have benefited me to formalize that a little bit more. For the most part, again like I said, for me and a lot of comics it was about creating a moment.

Believe me, when you do create a moment with a new premise and it hits, you will not forget what made it work. It just becomes a part of you because that’s your lifeblood. It wasn’t too formal.

How To Build An Empire Without Wearing Any Pants

Anthony: As a way of seguing from comedy into copywriting and Copy Chief, there is a real funny and compelling marketing video that you put out at one point recently for the Copy Chief community. You were apparently wearing no pants. Maybe by way of saying a little bit about how you went from comedy into marketing you could also talk about, “What is it about comedy that helps persuade people to buy?” and, “Have you ever really left comedy?”

Kevin: Great question. So I’ll try to really give the condensed version of this. I did leave comedy and that was a painful exit for a couple of reasons. One, I was really done with touring clubs. That part wasn’t hard. My heart I knew would always be in it and there would be potential jealousy to see friends make it when I had kind of thrown in the towel. I had convictions about it, and I knew it was the thing to do.

The other part that was difficult was logistically trying to go get work. That same problem I talked about wanting to avoid. The good news was I was only about 30 so I had plenty of energy and some time.

I knew I liked to write and so I would take classes at the local university, University of South Florida here in St. Pete after moved to Florida from Chicago, my wife and I. I would just take all the writing courses I could before I had to actually choose a major and go to real college.

Writing was always there for me, and I just had no idea there was this thing called copywriting. I always said I wanted to be a writer. I had no idea outside of comedy writing, which I had decided probably wasn’t for me just because of what I had seen of it in Hollywood and how it worked. It really turned me off. I was doing like these no resume jobs. I bellman, I was a bartender and then I just got really lucky and got into a situation where I met a guy who was a direct response marketing junkie and he introduced me to copywriting. He knew I liked to write and he said I think you’d be a good copywriter. You should check it out.

Here’s Why Comedians Might One Day Rule The World

I slowly became indoctrinated and learned and was able to make a career of it. What is interesting is in trying to sort of transition and “go legit” from an entertainer to a guy who you should hire to push people’s luggage around at your hotel, I realized that bringing up comedy was bad news. People don’t want to hire somebody who wants to talk about how great it was to be a comic. They assume that’s still what you want to do.

I was finding other things to put on my resume and really kind of burying that story. When I got into copywriting, I still had that mindset. It just wasn’t on my radar anymore at that point. It was my friend and mentor John Carlton, the legendary copywriter, who, when we began in the early moments of our friendship, said to me – that was sort of what bonded us. He was really fascinated by the idea of standup comedy and that I had actually made a career of this. He had a lot of questions about it.

Then he said to me at one point, “Why aren’t you talking about this?” He said right now you are just another copywriter but if you were the standup comic turned copywriter, that’s a much more interesting conversation. He said, “Do you realize how few people in the world have had the experience you’ve had and how many would love to?” I didn’t. I just knew most of the people I knew were comics. It was normal to me. That was a huge revelation to me. It still took years.

Then what I began doing was teaching copywriting through the lens of comedy. Then I wrote the book The 60 Second Sales Hook where I took a joke formula and I showed people how to just change the last part of it and it becomes a perfect condensed marketing story. That was very popular.

To Be Memorable, You Gotta Make A Commitment 

It wasn’t until recently, Anthony, where I realized it was kind of my duty to strive to be funny again with marketing. Part of it was me just getting comfortable enough in the market to feel like it wouldn’t hurt me to do that. Then it became about, “Well how do I do it? What approach do I take?” I started to just post up videos on Facebook and sometimes they would just be tactical giving copy tips and other times it would just be me doing something stupid like lip sinking to Sympathy For The Devil in my car. It’s funny because I never stop. I commit to the entire song, right. I realize that it’s not funny if I show 20 seconds of it, but the fact that I did the entire song and never broke character for a second. That resonated with people.

I slowly started learning what’s funny. How do I merge into now this new technology, this new ability to reach people? That’s when I started having fun with video. It’s interesting that you bring up the no pants video, because that is the result of me spending two days in this very office that I’m talking to you from right now with a camera set up, the lights just right and trying to do a straight pitch for my copywriting course. I was feeling incredibly frustrated and it just not feeling right. I finally got just annoyed enough to go, “You know what dude, just like relax. Go sit at the desk and just look into the camera even if it is babble for a minute.”

You know what it was? It was like just going right back to that idea of just take the premise and go with it and see what happens. I literally sat down, turned on the camera, and for whatever reason, I guess because I was sitting at a desk, that’s the line that came out of my mouth. I said, “Hi, I’m Kevin Rogers, the founder of Copy Chief, and I may or may not be wearing pants right now.” Then I kind of ran through some stuff.

I literally wrote that video which is about four minutes long in a minute. I jotted down. I came up with the premise of I want to teach something. To me that is the most important thing we can do to brand ourselves is to deliver value. Always be teaching is my motto.

I thought, “What can I teach?” Well, I will teach the difference between good copy and bad copy. I just wrote down real quick good copy means this and bad copy means that. I went into these characters. Then I realized at some point well I have to at least tape the part where I don’t have pants. The punch line has to be here that I’m actually not wearing pants.
So I sat there pantless in my office making this video and then of course the joke was that I cut away for a second and then I stand up and I’m not wearing pants. I actually didn’t know which part I would actually show. It just seemed obvious to me that it’s not nearly as funny if I don’t end up pantless.

So that’s kind of how that evolved. It is interested you ask that because I did leave comedy. It wasn’t until smarter people than me made it painfully obvious that I needed to be using that and then putting in action and effort. If that’s my brand, if I’m the former standup comic turned copywriter, I’ve got to deliver some funny once in a while.

Anthony: I mean it stuck in my mind in such a way that I came back to it and it was an interesting moment for me as someone who is interested in copywriting and in marketing as such because I had first encountered as a voice only on the Gary Halbert All-Stars Audio.

Kevin: Oh, interesting.

Anthony: I had always noted a sense of irony in your voice. I’ve listened to that thing probably four times, the Part 1 and Part 2. There is always this kind of flavor of irony especially because of a particular part that you narrate. Getting to actually then see you and know you through video made it, I guess, exceptionally interesting, but what I really am wondering is, is there something about the comedy that you find that persuades people to ultimately buy?

Kevin: That’s a good question. I don’t know. I don’t know about buy, but I do know about that “know, like and trust” are major factors in why we buy from one person over another. I do know that if you can get a laugh from somebody, and, in particular a couple of laughs in one sitting – two or three laughs – that is a real bond. People did share that video quite a bit.

I had one woman tell me she loved it so much and thought so much of it that when she shared it outside of the marketing community on her personal Facebook wall and nobody liked it, she was angry. She felt like you people don’t get it. That was really interesting to me.

I don’t know if that makes somebody a “buyer.” It’s interesting because I’m in direct response. Like I said, our job is to get a reaction whether it is sign up, give us your email and let us give you more value and let’s have a conversation and ultimately of course you would like that to lead to that person being a customer or it is buy right now.

“Look Like You’re Having A Good Time Being Yourself”

It may not be an immediate thing but yeah, if you can show some personality and really look like you’re having a good time being yourself people find value in that. They go I want more of that. I’d love to be that comfortable in my skin. I’d love to wake up happy to be me, and be able to turn on my iPhone and make people laugh or share these bizarre thoughts I have.

I think it does make people buy, but not immediately and certainly not in every market. When you’re talking about healthcare or health supplements or things like that, outside of male enhancement products that have been able to use humor occasionally, there’s not a lot of funny going on in those subjects. If you’re marketing and you’re teaching people how to do what is ultimately at least a 50 percent creative endeavor, which is like write better sales copy, guys like me, Frank Kern and others have a pretty good license to let loose and have some fun.

Anthony: I’m really glad you made this distinction between buying and knowing and liking and trusting and then deepening a relationship towards having a financial transaction because this to me has a lot to do with making yourself memorable with many touches over the long haul and in a way that hopefully to basically quote Frank Kern that’s “always cool,” but still moving towards the sale.

You know, so many people complain about sleazy marketers and all the sales tactics that assault us thousands of times a day. There certainly are those kinds of people in that world. How do we make that many touches that are sometimes necessary to move towards the financial traction of the “know, like and trust?” Knowing that we cannot 100 percent not insult some people or offend some people or annoy some people, but what is the fine line there so that we’re remembered but not rejected so that when that moment comes when the person is readily to buy that they think of you.

Do You Know What You Stand For?

Kevin: Another great question. I think part of it is what you just said in that we can’t please everybody. Some people are going to reject us. I would take that further and say decide up front who you would want to be rejected by. Because if you are, as the great Gary Bencivenga said, (I don’t know if it was his quote but he emphasized the quote), “If you are not against something, what are you for?” I am actually totally screwing that up. I don’t remember how he said it. Basically, you have to have a rally cry.

You have to let people know this is the enemy. This is who this is not for. You look at a copywriting colleague of mine, Colin Theriot, who has a thing called the Cult of Copy, 14,000 members in a closed group. Now not all loyal followers but 14,000 people requesting to join a group about copywriting. Pretty amazing feat, right?

Anthony: Right.

Kevin: Colin is constantly reminding people who that group is not for. It’s not for the timid. There’s going to be a lot of language and there’s going to be things that make people uncomfortable, and if it’s not for you, no problem but never, never tell me not to do these things, because you just don’t get it. So he’s against are the people who don’t get it or feel so righteous and indignant that they need to scold him or recommend to him that he should tone it down or these things. Those are the opportunities he sees to attack. It only strengthens his bond with his followers.

That’s probably an extreme case of a guy who like honestly not only doesn’t care if you are not interested but goes after people who raise their hand that explain why they’re not. That doesn’t work in every market, but if you just allow yourself the freedom to be yourself and not hold back, and that doesn’t mean you have to swear.

Why Are Some Words Offensive?

I don’t swear much. I don’t know why, Anthony, I as I mature, because I’ll be honest with you, around the house I swear a lot. I’m sure I’m looser with language with my children than most other parents would be, but to me, I take sort of the George Carlin approach because we talk about why are some words dirty. Why are some words offensive? We don’t get it. At the same time, something in me, there is a filter like in my podcasts, one of guests on podcasts my default is to not swear for whatever reason. I don’t know why, but I point that out to say that it doesn’t mean that you have to swear or go out of your way to be edgy or annoying.

Take a minute, I would say to anybody with a product, anybody who wants to build a following, take a minute and open up a notebook and say who am I for and who am I for not. Who does not qualify to be in this group, this tribe I’m building and go out of your way to point those people out? Not in a judgmental way, but in a way that the people who do belong will feel strengthened to identify that with you.

Anthony: It’s a good life principal for sure in in many areas. I wonder, you know, speaking about I think what is sometimes called repulsion marketing so that you’re attracting the people that you want, I want to mention your podcast, The Truth About Marketing so people can look it up and it seems like a good example. There is an episode that you recorded with Ben Settle who sort of has that kind of down pat, you know, defining who is with him and who isn’t with him.

Kevin: Yes, a big part of his marketing. Almost every email has some shade of that. It’s very strong to him.

Anthony: So I just mention that to people listening that your podcast is called the Truth About Marketing and that would be a great example of that to listen to and remember some principals from.

Speaking of podcasts, you’re also involved with in Psych Insights with John Carlton who you already mentioned. There is one particular episode on that podcast called How to be a Damned Good Road Dog & Sneak Into “Insider” Status  and it connects to something that you’ve talked about on The Truth About Marketing when you were discussing how to impress Michael Jordan.

What I like about all these episodes combined, and that really switches certain things on in my mind, is that you’re teaching through examples about getting it wrong when you’re trying to connect with influencers and that is the opposite of repulsion marketing.

That’s where you’re repulsing people with, you know, not being consciously aware of mistakes that you are making, or just being kind of awkward. I know I’m often an awkward person. I wonder, first, what do you think if you could define them or list them some of the wrong ways that rookies try to get the attention of a influencer and wind up making themselves forgettable by that person or disregarded and maybe not forgotten but put on the “black list.”

How To Be Socially Awkward And An Epic Failure … Guaranteed!

Kevin: Wow, I’m loving these questions man. I have a great example of this. What is interesting is this is sitting on my desk now for months because I’ve been waiting to teach this. One classic way of doing a poor job of getting the attention of an influencer is to kick the door in. I always coach people to be confident and sort of take the reigns of their business and all that and not wait for permission to go forth and be an expert, because there is always somebody who needs to learn what they know.

Being cocky – John Carlton has told this story a few times on our podcast. It is a great example. When Gary Halbert was his mentor and they were very close friends and when they would do live events they would have a lot of fun with each other and they would bust each other’s balls and do a lot of that from the stage.

He said, “Once an event there would be that guy who thought the way to come bond with them would be to walk up to them and the bust Gary’s balls.” It was an epic fail every time. That’s a sure sign of showing that you just don’t get the joke. You don’t recognize and appreciate that that’s a bond that only happens after a certain comfort level between two people has been achieved. That’s a classic.

Then I received a letter from somebody in three different ways: it was emailed to me, it was hard mailed to my house, and it was hard mailed to my office. This is somebody who clearly believes that they’ve figured it out, they’ve really nailed it, and all they need to do is get this in front of me. I’ve never responded to this person because of the first line of the letter.

It says, “Dear Kevin, I need our help. Now I know that sounds selfish so I’m going to offer to help you.” Now that’s probably supposed to be what Frank Kern would call a pattern interrupt because maybe he would think most people who would write to me would start by gloating or trying to flatter me or something.

It doesn’t work for a few reasons. Of course, it did get me to read it. If somebody sends you a letter, you know, that is usually enough to get you to read it. He was just so cocksure in how he was offering to help me, and he made so many different assumptions about whether that would actually be valuable to me or not without ever asking, “Hey, would this be valuable to you?” It made me instantly discount him as somebody I would ever want to invest time in or reply to. I think the worst thing you can do is (a) ever make assumptions, or (b) try to open with the joke that can only exist after you’ve been friends for a while.

I’ll tell you another great story based on this. Do you know who Mark Ford is? He’s one of the great copywriters. He doesn’t get credit for it. He’s also known as Michael Masterson and he wrote a course called the Accelerated Guide to Six-Figure Copywriting and when I started it was the only course out there really on copywriting. The guy is amazingly brilliant. He runs a thing now called the Palm Beach Letter and he was a big player in Agora Publishing.

Anyway, the first time I met Mark Ford it was outside of a conference and every time the guy would stop and talk to one person a group would quickly form around him because he’s a very magnetic person. In such a group, a guy came up to him and he said, “Mr. Ford, I have a question if you don’t mind.”

He said, “Sure, what’s up?”

The guy said, “You know, I’ve always heard that the best way to connect with an influencer is to offer to help them, but I’ve been walking up to some of the influencers and saying hi, I’m Larry, how can I help you, and they just look at me funny and it doesn’t go anywhere. It feels awkward.”

Mark said, “Well, what is it you do and how could you help somebody like Clayton Makepeace that you’ve just had this encounter with?”

He goes, “Yeah, that’s the thing. I’m not really sure. I’m just starting out in the business. In fact, that’s what he asked me and I didn’t have a good answer for him.”

Mark said, “Well that’s the problem. You don’t even know what you do yet.”

The point of going up and offering to help somebody is to know that (a) you really can help them and (b) first make sure that it’s something they need or have interest in. I always remember that story and I thought it was really funny that people just take the really core meaning of the device and then go out and try to implement it and are shocked when it doesn’t work.

How To Really Get The Attention Of An Influencer

I will give you just as an alternative what I think is a great way to get in front of an influencer and what I teach the freelancers that I coach. I say, “Look, if you have somebody who is an active marketer, just do a case study on a piece of their advertising and teach other people what you see going on in the piece. Show what you know. Showcase your own expertise through the lens of what you admire about their copy and make sure that gets in front of them.”

When they see that, it’s kind of like hearing your name – you can’t not listen. If somebody says, “Hey, you know, this copywriter did a breakdown of one of your ads.” Of course, they are going to go look at it and if they’re impressed, they’re going to call you. I promise you because they are always looking for copywriters.

That’s a really great way to get results in advance and display only your value and sort of generously give to somebody. Even though they never asked, but you also never asked them for anything. You don’t send it to them and go, “Hey I did this breakdown of one your ads. Hopefully you’ll learn something from it! You idiot. You were missing these four key factors that I call dah, dah, dah.”

Just teach generously to other people using their stuff and they’ll think wow this person is cool man. All they want to do is teach and I happen to agree with what they’re teaching so why I don’t I get on the phone with this person. Suddenly you’re equals instead of some guy hanging out by their doorstep.

Anthony: With this alternative example that you gave, what is an example whether you either have personally or through the mechanisms of the Internet created results in advance for people as part of making yourself memorable and moving forward towards goals that you have for yourself?

Kevin: Probably the best example would be the book, The 60 Second Sales Hook. Because the whole point of the book, like I mentioned earlier, is I took a joke formula which is relevant to my story. Then I show people in a very short (it’s only a 50-page book that sort of gets right to the point and talks about story) and I give them the device to write their story and use this formula to make it really effective.

That was a big turning point in my career because anyone who read that book and did the exercise was instantly compelled to share it with me sort of as a thank you and because it really did create a special moment for them. A lot of times, it was the first time anybody ever wrote anything that actually looked like copy and worked like copy. People who just thought they couldn’t write their own copy. They would of course naturally also want my feed back and see if – or maybe they would be stuck and say here’s what I’ve got but I feel like it’s missing something. I was giving them results in advance but I was also opening the door for them to want more from me.

I found that was a great opportunity because with that opportunity I could kind of do whatever I wanted. I did everything from offer 20-minute what I would call sales hook perfection sessions for like $350.00. I realized that was unscalable and then that evolved into what is now Copy Chief because it was the simple premise of I’m teaching the same things over and over to people one-on-one, what if I could just let a bunch of other people watch that lesson and learn from it and implement it in their own stuff. It would very often solve their problem for a lot less money and deliver similar value. That is how Copy Chief was born and that’s sort of the premise of any effective membership community I think.

Anthony: Would you think it’s fair to say that an effectively memorable marketing campaign essentially creates a kind of ecosystem?

Always Be Teaching

Kevin: Yeah, that’s a good way to put it. I guess so, yeah. I’d say that’s a fair thing to say, if the campaign is teaching along the way. This is why I say, “always be teaching.” Teaching is everything. If one of your top priorities for your marketing campaign is to deliver actionable value to anybody who comes into the funnel, the campaign, then you absolutely are creating an ecosystem because especially on Facebook and anywhere if you have a site dedicated to it, people are naturally going to share something cool that they’re value from.

Anthony: Well, one thing that I wanted to talk to you a little about is the actual use of words. We’ve already been touching upon it with comedy and it’s come up a few times the idea of having structures and formulas and sort of setting something up so that it almost falls into place later when you come to the punch line. People listening to this may not be familiar with copywriting but we know that there are some particular structures like AIDA and related acronyms. How could you describe those kind of structures even if it is just one or two of them and how a person absorbs them into their memory so they can sort of use it on autopilot or using a crib sheet or something like that but still have an authentic ability to write according to structure?

Kevin: I sure you can educate me a lot more on this in regards to how memory works, but I think the best way to do it is not to just recognize a formula but to immerse yourself in the formula. Sort of like what I mentioned about the book being so effective for people because it gives them a very simple formula and then they’re inclined to do it, to use it. It’s sort of fun to use and everybody has a story so they are instantly qualified to use this. They don’t need to go do research or anything like that first. Then they immerse in it.

The Insider’s Guide To Sales Hooks

Part of why that took off for me was that people began to take ownership of the formula. It’s the ISDR (identity, struggle, discovery, result). People would call it that ISDR or the KLT formula (know, like, and trust formula). Because they immersed in it, they knew it and they took ownership of it.

What else was cool, what I never would have expected, was people started to recognize it out in the wild. They would be watching a TV commercial and they would go that was The 60 Second Sales Hook. They would send me a clip of the TV commercial or they would take a photo of an ad in a magazine and they go look at this. It’s The 60 Second Sales Hook. It was super cool. I think if it had not been for the fact that it was so easy to immerse yourself in that formula that never would have happened because like most things people would have nodded at it and said that makes sense and then just moved on to the next shiny object.

Anthony: I mean it is such a fascinating world and there is so much depth to it all. You mentioned Gary Halbert before, and speaking of depth, he had this idea of neurological imprinting which is something you could perhaps explain better in terms of actually writing out either headlines again and again or entire sales letters. Is that something that you’ve ever done or what do you think is the logic behind that.

Kevin: Yeah, it is something I did early on. It was one of the exercises in that course I mentioned, the Michael Masterson course. I found it useful but I also personally kind of got bored with it quick. Other people I know it’s actually become a bit of a cottage industry. There’s a service that does only that. I don’t know if there’s a fee for it or not. But essentially they send out a letter, a sales letter every day and then your job is to write it out by hand. They have kind of built a community around it. It’s a very popular thing to do. Occasionally, I question if that becomes for people, you know, they feel like okay I did my copywriting today but all they’re really doing is copying other people’s copy and I think there is value in that but it also could be a trap.

What I recommend to people and it was recommended to me as rote learning. As I understand it, it sort goes back to like a Greek philosophy of how to learn just by doing something over and over and over and does sort of imprint it on your brain and become an instinct. Famously other writers have done this. Hunter S. Thompson handwrote Hemingway he said just because he didn’t want to write like Hemingway. He just wanted to feel viscerally what it was it like to write on that level. I think there’s definitely value in that.

Again, I mention Gary Bencivenga, who is pretty commonly regarded as the best ever direct response copywriter. He gives a great piece of advice about a similar thing. His advice is to read a great ad every day, and not just read it, but as you are reading it, ask yourself, “Okay, what’s one thing I would change about this ad that I think would make it convert even better than it did?” To me that’s the real power. So I recommend to people if you’re going to hand copy great sales letters, headlines, stuff and bullets, add that to it. Every time you write a headline, go, “Is there a word I could change here? Is there a line I could add to this that I think would actually make it better?” You’ll begin to recognize that some things are super perfect the way they are.

The #1 Question You Need To Ask Your DNA

John Carlton famously wrote long headlines but you could not replace a single word in them. That’s something to study.
I think it is very effective. I don’t know the exact science as to why it works. I guess, again, immersing in something that is quality, it forces you to recognize what is good about it. I think the real power is in asking yourself, “How can I, personally, me with my unique DNA, what would I change about this that I think might make it even better.”

Anthony: I think that’s a great way of approaching it. Maybe if I can offer something to you to take back to Copy Chief. There’s a real interesting guy named Kenneth Goldsmith and he runs something called “Uncreativity Courses.” There’s actually a YouTube video, I can send you a link later and maybe you can share it around where he talks about how he gets his students to pick something to rewrite, to retype essentially. He says the surprise assignment behind the assignment is for them to write an essay about why they chose that particular thing to torture themselves to type through. That’s where the insight is. It is in the reflection of the repetitive action. That’s kind of the connection to Greek philosophy that you were mentioning. How do we derive insight from what it is that we chose to repeat? The same thing with Zen archery and so forth, it’s not so much the repetition as such, but the reflection on the repetition.

Kevin: Wow, love that. That’s great. What’s the name?

Anthony: Kenneth Goldsmith. He gave a speech in the White House. It is the most hilarious thing in the world when you hear him saying to Ms. Obama that I think students should be retyping famous pieces of literature and in fact that’s what they do and the look on their faces is completely, like all these old biddies that are in the White House for poetry day. I will send you a link.

Kevin: I’ll definitely share that. I love it. That’s great. Thank you.

Anthony: It’s awesome. This has been really great. I wondered if I could pick your brain with a question for the people listening to this who aren’t going to become copywriters, but they aspire to get great jobs and have amazing careers and they need to write compelling resumes. As someone who relies to a large extent on the written word, what advice would you give to someone sending out applications for jobs that strictly require their details in print. How can they not kick down the door but get remembered and ideally called in for an interview so that door is opened?

Kevin: I’ve got to be one of the least qualified person ever to talk about how to write a resume. I’m like proudly unhireable. I will say, and I’ve heard that it’s basically computers scanning resumes for certain keywords and that’s how you ever make the pile. The only place I could offer advice is on a cover letter perhaps. The advice I would give for that is speak to the reader like the human being they are.

Cover letters that I’ve seen are either desperately boring because they are just trying so hard to sound professional. It’s like mission statements. Companies’ mission statements are typically – you are literally asleep by the fourth word.

Compare that to something like Dollar Shave Club. That famous video, eight million views on an ad. Why? Because the guy just kept it real and made it funny and told you everything you needed to know in a very transparent and entertaining way.

Humor doesn’t belong everywhere. I wouldn’t try to be funny, but if you could be real. You have got to figure these people are just scanning these cover letters over and over and over, and if you can be the one that makes them slow down their reading and go, “Huh, oh, that’s interesting,” and sound like somebody they can relate to or a niece or a nephew or a friend or someone they care about.

The Human Elements You Should Never Forget 

There’s a reason C-level executives go to lunch with the people they go to lunch with by choice on Friday or whatever. It’s not always business. People are drawn to other people. We’re all human. I think that’s one of the biggest mistakes we make saying like B2B copywriting, which essentially this is kind of what this would be. We are so bent on sounding professional, intelligent and qualified that we forget to be human. I would say that would be your one shining example. Take a chance and be human.
If you can make a connection that way, I bet you’ll get an interview and if you do get an interview, it’s going to be the one they look forward to that day because you’ve already raised their eyebrow with how you connected with them.

Anthony: I like that. That’s powerful.

What is coming up next for you and how can people get in touch if they want to learn more about you, learn about Copy Chief and what you teach in terms of enabling people to write better and essentially make a career for themselves as a writer if they wanted to go down that route. How do people find you?

Kevin: Yeah, Copy Chief is pretty much where you’ll find everything. A copy chief in our business is the person who oversees the ad campaign, the copywriting and my premise for the community is that we all need chiefs. We all chief each other and help each other write better and more effectively. There is a membership community with a monthly fee but there’s also tons of great helpful stuff you can get for free at Copy Chief. You’ll see the blog. You’ll see The Truth About Marketing Podcast and lots of fun little formulas.

You can also download The 60 Second Sales Hook book. I would love for anybody – I think anybody no matter what their goal is would find a lot of value in that book if nothing else. I would certainly love to have anybody take advantage of that.

Anthony: Well to end on the note of “the truth about marketing,” if – heaven forbid – some nuclear disaster were to wipe away your entire memory, what would be the one truth about marketing that you would want to hold in your mind and never forget?

Kevin: Wow, that’s a big question. The one thing? That when all else fails, just be honest. When every other framework feels insufficient, try bold honesty. If there’s a flaw, point it out. If there ares people who something is not for, point them out. Help them identify themselves. Again, by doing so you’ll strengthen the bond with people who it is for. I guess that would be the big one. Know who you’re talking to and speak to them like you would a friend.

Further Resources

How to Memorize Classic Copywriting Headlines

The Darkside and the Brightside of How Marketers Manipulate Your Memory Every Single Day

The post Kevin Rogers And The Truth About Comedy, Memory And Marketing appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

Have you ever wondered if mnemonics and memory techniques are for everyone?

Or maybe they just didn’t feel right for you?

Here’s the thing:

They might not be.

That’s just one of the unexpected answers you’ll hear in this podcast and read below. Let’s get started with a wonderful letter I received from a student in the Netherlands:

Let me introduce myself. I am Timo, a Dutch high school student. Nowadays I am preparing for my finals, but besides that I am also working on a final paper about the human memory. To be honest, last year I failed to pass my exams, so I decided to learn differently this year. During my summer vacation, I came across your website. While listening to your podcasts, I realized that this would be the best way to learn for me. That I eventually picked out this subject for my paper was a coincidence.

Back to the story. The last months I have read many books and scientific articles about the method of loci (or the Magnetic Memory Method). There are not many articles about this matter. These articles suggest that the method of loci is an effective way, but they are written by psychologists. Most of them are sceptic to use this in classrooms. You are, on the other hand, the expert for teaching this method to students. I assume that you use this method almost every week.

My practical part of my paper is an experiment with high school students. (This is required in The Netherlands.) Last week I finished teaching them the basics and how to apply the method to a list of random facts and vocabulary words. Now they are preparing to make a test, which I prepared. A university researcher helps me to process the data from these test results. However, I met some resistance with some of the students. They think that this is too time consuming. The teachers are, however, enthusiastic about my research. They want to know more about this subject.

Therefore I am considering writing a much shorter paper for all the teachers to explain my findings. Assuming that you are the only one, who gives these kind of courses, could I ask you humble opinion. Most of the books and articles do not give a clear answer, whether or not this method is effective on large classes and is better for the knowledge of the student (long-term memory). So here are my questions:

Is the Magnetic Memory Method a skill that everyone can develop?

No. The Magnetic Memory Method, any mnemonics or set of memory techniques are exclusive to a particular kind of person.

First, the person must be open to experimentation and implementation.

These personal characteristics appear not to be present in everyone. They require learning a set of tools that must be used in order to truly understand them.

Think of a computer keyboard, for example. Anyone can look at the keyboard and understand a description of what it is supposed to do. But without putting their fingers on the keys and learning to press the keys to produce words, words will never form.

And the exciting thing about typing is that, once you’ve started learning it, you can learn to write very fast. Not only that, but you’ve become so familiar with the keyboard that you can type entire books without even looking down at the keys or your fingers.

Memory techniques are like that, especially if you’re using Memory Palaces. The Memory Palace is a kind of keyboard you build yourself based on a manual like the Magnetic Memory Method. The information you want to memorize forms the keys and the associative-imagery are the sentences you write on the paper of your imagination.

And of course, no one types an entire book without making mistakes. But editing is a minor feat and quickly accomplished simply by scanning the record and compounding your associative-imagery or making the necessary changes.

The keyboard metaphor is not perfect, but it gives a sense of how mnemonic approaches like the Magnetic Memory Method work. Other metaphors have been given, such as the wax tablet and bird cage metaphors given by Aristotle.

In sum, not everyone can develop memory techniques because not everyone will take action.

Seriously. Some people prefer crossword puzzles.

But even with games and puzzles, a large percentage of those who do get started with memory exercise and other forms of mental training will, unfortunately, abandon the task at the first sign of mental effort. This premature departure is unfortunate because incredible successes are usually just around the corner.

Again, memory techniques are best learned by doing. The real job of an instructor in the art of memory is, therefore, inspiring people to take action by learning the techniques and then continuing to take action as a kind of scientist.

As a scientist, you create the basis for an experiment based on a clearly defined outcome and track your results. When the results don’t match the desired outcome, you analyze the mnemonic procedures you used and the Memory Palace itself and make the necessary changes, try again and once again track the results.

Like many things in life, they who test win.

Is the Magnetic Memory Method worth learning?

Yes, but ultimately that is not up for me to decide. Learning is just one part of the process. You must implement the memory techniques, not just learn them. Knowing what they are and how they work without using them is like holding your fingers over the keyboard but never typing anything.

The same holds true of any other memory training you might pursue. I personally believe that everyone should read as many books on memory techniques as possible, but only if they’re willing to try things out.

To this day, I continue reading every book on mnemonics I can find. Almost every single one of them has a new angle on an old technique or something entirely new. I always give these new approaches a try and sometimes they become part of what I do in my personal memory practice.

How much time does it take to master the Magnetic Memory Method for tests (and eventually final exams)?

Mastery is not the issue. It’s results that matter and these often arrive fast and hard when people learn the techniques, follow the instructions and implement based around topics they’re passionate about and that will make an immediate difference in their lives.

When I say “instructions,” I’m not talking dogma. The Magnetic Memory Method is called a method precisely because you need to come with a spirit of experimentation. It’s not a system and it breaks my heart every time I hear someone talk about their “memory system.”

There are no universal systems and you cannot truly use the approach of someone else. Rather, people need a method that helps them create their own, highly personalized system , remembering that flexibility is a requirement as they experiment with making the Magnetic Memory Method their own.

You need to understand that the map is not the territory and results only happen when you’re with the rest of us mnemonists down in the trenches and doing the spadework.

All that said, people typically learn and prepare themselves for the Magnetic Memory Method

Are there any requirements to make the Magnetic Memory Method easier to learn?

The only requirements are a willingness to learn and experiment with the techniques. It helps a great deal if you also come with a topic you’re passionate about, but that’s not strictly necessary. Even the most boring information from the driest topic in the world can be made thoroughly exciting using a Memory Palace and the other tools mnemonics offer.

How can someone test, whether or not the student has learned the Magnetic Memory Method?

Testing is simple. The student either correctly produces the memorized information or not.

That said, unless you’re competing, 100% accuracy is not always necessary. You can create a huge advantage for yourself simply by covering 50%, 35%, 25% or even less of the material on a test.

The important point is that you direct the memory techniques where they are needed. Some people pick up lots of information without the need of any technique.

Others, for various reasons, are desperate for something – anything – that will get more information into long-term memory.

Whether one uses memory techniques or not, testing offers the only means of discovering how much and how deep into long term memory information has gone.

The best part is that we know that as memories age, they move into different parts of the brain. (Gary small link). These memories may even be segmented into different pieces that are stored in different places. In this way, the remembered material becomes connected to other pieces of information, leading to what can be considered the formation of knowledge.

So it is not uncommon that a person using mnemonics will seek a single piece of information and wind up uncorking a powerful flow of related information. This effect takes place often when the remembered information involves philosophy, history and material from subject-based textbooks. Here’s a quick training on how to memorize a textbook.

Testing is a tremendously exciting part of the Magnetic Memory Method because it not only demonstrates that the techniques are working. Merely by testing recall, you strengthen your memory. You also discover more about the techniques and create deeper familiarity with them, ingraining them deeper in your being.

In principle, without testing, which amounts to recall, you aren’t really using memory techniques. This is why I talked in this video on card memorization about how memorization really only takes place during recall, and we must take the time spent during memorization and recall together to form a proper assessment of the time investment.

Is your method age restricted? Is it easier for younger students?

I do not believe that memory techniques are any easier or harder for younger students than any other age. The one advantage young people have is a lack of inhibition and a fresh connection to play.

However, adults, when they can get their egos out of the way, have the advantage of discipline and focus. They can, by and large, sit still at will and channel their energies towards the imagination. They can also practice meditation and analyze the kinds of imagination they have at their disposal with greater insight.

Could information that someone learns, interfere with other information? For instance, would Latin vocabulary interfere with biology terminology?

One kind of information can interfere with other kinds. This possibility is called either “ghosting” or “The Ugly Sister Effect.” These tend to arise when people use the same Memory Palace more than once without cleaning it first.

If the information is too similar – such as when memorizing French and Spanish vocabulary – the interference can be severe. However, Spanish and Russian vocabulary are sufficiently different, something that reduces, if not eliminates jarring effects and confusion.

In either case, with a bit of practice, neither need be interruptive. Once you understand the Ugly Sister Effect, you can bend it to your will and make it advantageous.

Do you think that this method is an essential skill in our digitalising world? People are nowadays more depending on their mobile phones than their memory.

Is it really true that people are relegating more and more information to their memory? Or is it possible that they are freeing it up so they have more space and time to learn and memorize more important things?

Long before computer technology, people suffered from unexercised minds. We sometimes have a false vision of the past in which all kinds of people were running around with superior memory abilities. Many scholars, yes. But the average Joe? Hardly. More everyday people use memory techniques around the world than ever before.

No, it is a lame and technologically deterministic view that blames technology for human laziness. It is the same technological determinism that blamed cars for more sex amongst teenagers and now blames cell phones for sexting. Believe me, young people had lots of sex with each other before cars appeared and many lewd notes were passed from student to student in the absence of cell phones.

What is interesting about technology is that it is at the precise moment that it became so central to our lives that a mnemonics Renaissance took on full force. I believe there is no mistake that the World Memory Championships, mind-mapping and a global interest in memory techniques surged as computers grew in popularity.

But I do not believe this occurred because human memory was being replaced and weakened. I believe the mnemonics Renaissance began because technology has freed the human mind to remember much more valuable things.

For this reason, I often berate those who teach the memorization of shopping lists. What a waste of human imagination and mental energy!

No, if you want to truly learn mnemonics and feel their awesome power from the first moment, memorize something that will immediately improve your life, or at least please you. Memorize something in line with your passions, something you cannot relegate to pen and paper or a computer. It’s for remembering these daily concerns that technology exists. Save your memory for the information that matters.

Do you think that the Magnetic Memory Method is a necessity for all students around the world?

No. Some students do perfectly well without mnemonics. I believe they would do even better with them, but what matters is the results they want and the results they get.

Should education institutes implement the Magnetic Memory Method in the classroom? How could teachers successfully teach this skill?

Yes.

However, I do not think the MMM or any form of mnemonics should be crammed into the classroom with other subjects.

Mnemonics is a subject on its own. It has history, and like math, has different forms. If math has addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division, mnemonics has linking, association, rhyming, keywords, abbreviations and the mothership that bears them all, the location-based Memory Palace.

If schools were to create a semester-long, or even a year-long course in mnemonics, our world would be a much different – and better place – almost overnight. We would be faced with an information revolution far more powerful and interesting than the computer revolution because more people than ever before would be using the software in the hardware of their heads at the highest level ever in the history of humanity.

How often do you use the Magnetic Memory Method, and what for?

I use memory techniques nearly every day of my life. When I meet people, I memorize their names. When I study a language, I memorize vocabulary and phrases. When I read books, I remember dates and facts. When I study music, I memorize scales and lyrics. When I sit in lectures, I memorize the messages in real time. When I warm up for memory projects, I memorize short runs of playing cards.

Above all, I spend the first minutes of nearly every day practicing dream recall. Even if I can’t remember a single dream, I make a note of it to help stimulate recall the next night.

And nearly every day, I spend a small amount of time writing in my gratitude journal. It is a powerful means of never forgetting just what a wonderful life I’ve got.

No matter where we live or who we may be, our existences are tied deeply to memory. And where memory is absent, the mindless void of forgetfulness and repetitive fantasy and negative messages persists. Only by focusing on strengthening our memory can we remember to be present with higher and higher levels of clarity. In this way, using memory techniques are a powerful form of meditation and perhaps the ultimate path to enlightenment.

Further Resources

If you’re interested in developing your memory by using Memory Palaces so that you can create genuine knowledge and achieve your most precious goals, you’ll love the Magnetic Memory Method Masterclass that you can try completely risk-free. I’d be honored to be the one who helps further your education in mnemonics and get you the results you seek.

The post 11 Unexpected Answers To Your Questions About Mnemonics appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

In this episode of the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast, USA Memory Champ Nelson Dellis teaches you how to win the USA Memory Championship.

Take it away, Nelson!

So you’ve read a bunch of books on memory skills. You may have even listened to all the podcasts on this site.

But although many of them have helped your memory tremendously, there might be some of you out there who want to use your techniques to compete in (and possibly win) the USA Memory Championship.

As a 4x USA memory champ (and before you think I’m cocky, also a 3x USA Memory Championship loser), I know the ins and out to winning this competition.

Surprisingly, becoming a memory champion is not necessarily all about memory. There are a lot of other subtle things that go into making it to the end and winning the USA Memory Championship.

And I’m going to explain to you exactly how.

Here we go.

Step 1 – Sign Up


This first point is dumb and obvious, but I’ve met a lot of people who talk about the competition as if it’s this Holy Grail that awaits them …

… once they are truly prepared.

To them I say, f*ck it.

Just sign up and compete. There is nothing better than getting the experience of a full competition under your belt than actually competing.

I hate to say this but, no one (well except for the very first winner, Tatiana Cooley) has won this thing on the first try. You could argue that Joshua Foer won on his first go, but technically he was there the year before as a journalist.

Sure, he didn’t compete that first time, but he dug himself deep into the competition for his article. Scott Hagwood, Ram Kolli, Ron White, Chester Santos and myself, we all lost before we won.

Even this year when I took first place, I honestly believe I won based on competition experience. There were some competitors with better-trained memories than me, but less competition knowledge and experience.

So, bottom line, it’s about getting competitive experience. If you want that edge, just sign up and compete. It’s worth gold. Go for it!

Step 2 – Make It To The Second Round

The USAMC is split into two parts. The morning events:

* Names & Faces
* Speed Numbers
* Speed Cards
* Poetry

The afternoon playoff events:

* Spoken Words
* Tea Party
* Double Deck O’ Cards.

Making it to this afternoon second round has a lot of parts, because you need to score well in each event to make it into the advancing top 8. Not as well as you might think, but decent enough.

The scoring works like this: With each discipline you get a score based on how much you memorize correctly according to the rules.

Then, that score is turned into a championship score, which is a weighted score based on a curve. The best score is 100 pts and then everyone scores comparatively.

Statistically over the years, you need about 200-250 out of 400 pts to make the cut. But standards change over time and it is harder to get a score that high than ever before.

But the nice thing is that even if there are a couple people hitting some awesome scores, there are a lot of people with mediocre scores. Until everyone in the USA is amazing at memorizing (which they’re not … yet), this fact will be your savior.

The mediocre scores are there because it often ends up that there are one or two, at most three front runners who are in another league compared to everyone else in the top 8. The rest are good, and still better than the remainder, but not that impressive comparatively to the top.

So the bottom line is that you need to score consistently mediocre (or better) across the board to make the top 8. You used to be able to pass to the second round by being amazing at just 2 of the events. But agian, that’s getting harder to do. And if you are great at only one event but none of the others, you’re chances are nearly zilch.

In other words, sorry to say, but there is no real shortcut here. You gotta be “good” at all four disciplines: names, numbers, cards, and poetry. But the good news is, you don’t have to be that good.

Step 3 – Play Strategically Through The Playoff Rounds

Okay, you’ve made into the top-8. Maybe not top ranked, but you’re in there. The nice thing about the afternoon playoffs is that it is all strategy. The chances for anyone to win at this point are all pretty much even. You could be the worst of the 8 (i.e. Ram Kolli in 2013) and still end up beating 1st place (me) and become the champ.

SPOKEN WORDS

They take you backstage to memorize 200 words (or as many as you can of those 200) in 15 minutes. Then, recall takes place back on stage, in order of the list, alternating between competitors.

One slip-up and …

… you’re out.

The round ends when three people have made a mistake. To me, this is the most difficult and nerve-wracking event. What you want to be able to do is memorize just enough not to run out of words before those three competitors get eliminated.

This means that the real trick is in figuring out how many words to memorize. It makes for a delicate balance between what you are capable of and what you think others can achieve.

Mind Explosion!

There have been years that the word count went up to 88, and others where it only went up to 35.

Everything depends on circumstance. People trip up on the most unpredictable things.

For example, favorite Johnny Briones recited “architecture” instead of “architect” in 2014. Top 5 finalist, Brad Zupp swapped the very two first words “aorta” and “office” in 2012. And many others have just blanked when they new up to 100 or so words. You just don’t know who’s going to trip up, so make sure you know YOUR words.

Typically I go for what I think is a safe minimum, around 100 words. Make sure you can do those 100 words, and do them perfectly. What’s tricky in recall is that you aren’t by yourself reciting. You have to be mentally prepared to say every 7th word or even less if someone gets knocked out before you. This can be a bit tricky and throw you off if you haven’t practiced.

TEA PARTY

Next up, six audience members come on stage and state eight factoids about themselves.

My advice:

Don’t bother listening to the people. Just listen for the name, memorize it, then put your head down, ignore them, and just study the sheet (the same information they speak is given to you in print). They talk way too fast to memorize it on the fly, so just read it instead.

Plus, you get an extra 7-9 minutes to review the packet info after the audience members are done speaking. On top of that, you get three strikes (not single elimination like SPOKEN WORDS).

I find this event the easiest because it’s so lenient. Typically it goes until two people are eliminated, but in recent years, no one has made three mistakes, so all five competitors qualify for the next round. Look for them to add a few more bits of info next year to make it harder.

DOUBLE DECK

So now you’ve made it to the finals! All you have to do is memorize two decks of cards in five minutes.

At this point, it’s most likely there are three competitors left (but it could be up to five). The goal is to memorize more than your opponents.

There was a time when memorizing around a deck and a half was championship winning, but not anymore. Last year four out of the five finalists memorized (or claimed to) both decks in their entirety. So then it comes down to accuracy.

How reliably can you recite those two decks perfectly? You won’t have to say all the cards, since you’ll be alternating between competitors, but as with the words, you need to be flexible and say any card when it comes to you. A few competitors have failed to do this over the years (me included) despite being clear favorites to win the title. It’s tricky, but can be overcome with practice.

Step 4 – Fly Under The Radar

Here’s an “inner game” tip to take with you for the whole competition:

Don’t talk hype. Just show up to the competition and kick some quiet ass.

For one, you’ll be no one’s focus. You can freely chill out in the back of the room hitting the scores that you practiced with zero attention coming your way.

But if people know about you or you’ve been around a few competitions and done well, you’ll get more attention. More attention means more stress and possibly more cameras in your face.

What I wouldn’t give to do my 2010 competition again. No one knew me, and I came out of the gates shocking everyone, quietly and confidently. The top guys didn’t know anything about me, and it made them nervous while I was in there just cruising.

Obviously there is still a lot of work you’ll have to do if you want to do well in all the events. But there is an endless amount of literature on just how to train your memory for competition. You can start at Art of Memory where you’ll find loads of resources created by other memory competitors.

Put all those things together and with enough luck and skill, you might just find yourself standing up on stage as the 2016 USA Memory Champ.

BOOM!

Further Resources

Extreme Memory Improvement interview with Nelson Dellis

Nelson’s Kickstarter campaign for a children’s picture book called I Forgot Something (But I Can’t Remember What It Was)

Help a good cause by taking the Extreme Memory Challenge and support Alzheimer’s research

Climb for Memory

How To Help Middle School Students Remember More

The post How To Win The USA Memory Championship appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

Absentmindedness sucks.

You forget where you put your keys. Your car disappears from the parking lot. You left the stove on again.

Well, guess what?

There’s a cure for absentmindedness.

It’s called focus, and you’re about to learn three ridiculously boring ways to develop it.

The following techniques work best in combination, but obviously life changes work best when you add them one by one, so pick your favorite and dive in.

But if you have to begin anywhere, I recommend that you start with establishing a basic framework by understanding …

The Stunning Magic Of Being Boring

Boring?

Oh yes, and here’s why:

Just about every successful person in history has lived a life of constraint. Check out the following video and beneath that, I’ll break out some of the key points.

As you’ve just learned, highly boring people live exciting lives. They reduce everything they do to the essentials, including:

• Wearing similar clothes and eating repetitive meals every day to eliminate decision fatigue.
• Isolating tasks and remove distractions. You can do this by working in cafes without WiFi. Leave your smartphone at home and bring only a pad of paper and a pen and your laptop if you must.
• Wear earplugs if noise bothers you, or if you like music, try an app that features focus­friendly compositions, like focusatwill.com.
• Hammering away at carefully defined tasks without adding new things to do willy nilly.
• Keeping a journal to record their activities and track their time. You can even keep an attention span journal.

The reason developing a life based on constraints helps develop focus and eliminates absentmindedness is because you give yourself far less about which to be absentminded.

Not only that, but should you fall prey to absentmindedness, you’ll find your way back to focus.

Why?

Because the mountains you climb in your daily life won’t be hidden behind the fog of multitasking.

Frankly, when you limit your activities and focus on the essentials, you’ll not only find and climb your mountains, you’ll move them entirely out of your life and move on to finer things.

Even if you have a boss, it should be possible for you to isolate your most high margin tasks. Write a proposal, make a meeting and ask to redefine your activities.

If your boss rejects your suggestion, either track your time on your own time to prove what you can do on your own, or …

Find Another Boss!

Speaking of which, if you want to bypass working for the man altogether, becoming an entrepreneur or self­-employed is a great way to develop focus.

Placing yourself in a situation that forces you to get results or starve will rip absentmindedness from your life and leave it wriggling on the floor like a helpless insect.

As you can see, developing a boring life really can add tremendous excitement to your days on planet earth. So get started. Time is ticking.

The Extraordinary Power Of Sitting Still For No Reason Whatsoever

One of the most regular activities you can add to your life involves one of the most boring ­ and yet tremendously exciting activities ­ ever invented by humanity …

Yes, we’re talking about meditation.

Would you like to know why so many people struggle to incorporate this simple activity into their daily routines?

The answer is simple:

It’s Because They’re Trying To Meditate

Sorry, dear Memorizers, but that’s the wrong road to enlightenment and a quick path to suffering.

But before we talk about how to meditate the Magnetic way, here’s what meditation can do for you. All of these features of the world’s oldest brain training technique are scientifically proven and should persuade you to add meditation to your daily routine.

Meditation …

• Increases focus
• Creates emotional control
• Improves your working memory (luca link)
• Reduces “wandering mind” syndrome
• Lowers pain

Each of these benefits of meditation reduces absentmindedness because when you’re not in pain, and you eliminate mind wandering, focus glides in to replace these distractions.

To maintained your renewed focus, all you need to do is keep meditating.

Boring, right?

Not necessarily.

Not when you know …

How To Meditate In A Buddha-­shaped Nutshell

Surprisingly, proper meditation is super easy to do. You need only chuck the idea that meditation is about experiencing so­called “no­mind” and sit just to sit.

That’s it.

Sit down and let your mind wander. When first starting out, don’t bother with breathing exercises or mantras.

Sit just to sit.

After a few moments, you’ll become aware of the fact that you’re sitting on the floor, completely lost in thought.

When this happens, you’ll become present. You’ll be in the room, totally focused on the present moment instead of fantasizing about the future, playing some alternative version of things you’ve done in the past, or talking to yourself.

In reality, all that inner­-dialogue is far more boring than meditating.

Why?

Because You’ve Repeated All That Junk To Yourself Before!

When that moment of clarity comes, even if it takes a few sessions to get into it, you’ll feel pleasure, elation, and yes, enlightenment. That’s all enlightenment is: the elucidation that the present moment is all we have and you can be in it.

Here’s a practical, step­-by­-step meditation guide you can use every day for the rest of your life.

1. Pick a time. Morning, noon, evening, it doesn’t matter. Regularity matters.

If you can’t commit to an actual time of day, create an After X meditation practice.

For example, meditate after eating a major meal. Meditating after eating can feel especially profound because, so long as you’ve eaten non­irritating foods, you’ll be physically content. And who knows? You might also digest your food better.

2. Pick a place to meditate. It could be your bedroom floor, basement rumpus room or backyard garden.

Face East, West, North, South … Take your pick. Which direction doesn’t matter, so long as you have one.

Remember, the way to eliminate absentmindedness and increase focus is to eliminate decision fatigue. If you give yourself too much to think about, you eliminate the chances that you’ll get down to business.

3. (Optional) Set a timer.

Tim Ferris suggests that you do less than you think you can. In other words, if you think you can sit still for ten minutes, set the timer for eight minutes, maybe even five.

If you do this, I would add that once the timer rings, you turn it off and then sit a little longer. You can move a little or even stand up,but do squeeze a few more moments into the session. It’s often in this second, untimed session where the magic happens.

4. Sit and do nothing else but sit.

A lot of people teach that you should progressively focus on each muscle of your body from head to foot. This practice is often called a “body scan.”

By all means, experiment with this. But understand that it is not waiting for your awareness of the present moment to arrive. It is not allowing yourself to be lost in thought so you can catch yourself everywhere but here.

5. When you finally arrive, enjoy and observe.

The more you practice this simple form of meditation, the longer these moments of arrival will last.

Clarity will also bubble up in different ways throughout your days. Although it’s unlikely ­ and undesirable ­ that absentminded fantasizing can be eliminated from your life, you can limit the amount of time your mind spends wandering out of control.

There are also dietary reasons why you can’t focus. If that’s the case …

Cut The Booze With A Vengeance

Drinking’s awesome, right? You get a buzz, inhibitions loosen and that ugly stranger across the room starts looking a lot more attractive.

By the same token, your vision blurs. Your speech slurs. You develop difficulty walking as your reactions slow. Worst of all, you impair your memory, including your working memory for two days or more.

Worse, alcohol interrupts neurogenesis. Scientists once thought that the brain doesn’t generate new cells, and once they’re gone, they’re gone.

However, we now know that new brain cells generate from stem cells and alcohol interferes with this process. The lack of new growth in super important parts of your brain (like the hippocampus) leads to foggy thinking, reduced concentration and poor decision-­making.

Of course, not all people react the same to alcohol, but even so, why take the risk?

Dump The Sugar

Did you know that sugar changes the structure of your brain?

Not only that, but it messes with neurotransmitters like acetylcholine. That, dear Memorizers, is one super­critical substance when it comes to your ability to learn.

Sugar also leads to brain atrophy, which itself leads to dementia and Alzheimer’s.

Those conditions involve more than absentmindedness. They are a complete and permanent journey into the void.

Eat brain healthy substances instead. These include:

• Leafy greens
• Berries
• Whole grains
• Nuts and seeds
• Fatty fish
• Avocado
• Bananas
• Green tea
• Beets
• Bone broth (link)
• Broccoli
• Celery
• Coconut oil
• Egg yolks
• Extra virgin olive oil
• Rosemary
• Tumeric
• Walnuts

Warning: Dark chocolate (but beware of this because prepared chocolate bars usually dissipate the helpful ingredients. You’d need to eat 70 or more to experience any benefits)

And of course, drink water. Like there’s no tomorrow. Without regular hydration, your brain will shrink in mass and it can’t detoxify.

And it’s 85% water, after all, so it’ll feel in good company when you keep it swimming.

This Is Just The Beginning

There is a lot more you can do to increase focus in your life. Reducing clutter, regular walks, playing games and being social all

contribute to greater focus.

Simple stuff, right?

Put these simple practices into your life and you’ll reduce absentmindedness to the bare minimum. You’ll focus like a hawk on your goals and become the Magnetic King or Queen of your realm, just like you’ve always wanted to be.

The post 3 Ridiculously Boring Ways To Add Focus And Excitement To Your Life appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

This is Andrew Barr and today I’m sitting in for Anthony in this guest post.

I’m from realfastspanish.com and over there I help Spanish students get a conversational level of Spanish using specific tactics and strategies to improve their effectiveness as language students.

And in this post I’m going to teach you how you can apply some of these strategies to significantly improve your effectiveness when it comes to your memorisation challenges using the principles of the Magnetic Memory Method.

Whether you are just starting out with memory palaces or you are a seasoned professional, today you will learn three ways you can improve your effectiveness with memory palaces in order to achieve your goals with less effort and in less time.

If you are already using Memory Palaces and mnemonics you are well ahead of the curve. You already know that using memory techniques improves the efficiency of learning. But, it is still possible to get even more out of your approach to memorisation.

It doesn’t matter whether you are using the Magnetic Memory Method for language learning, acing exams in school, vying for a memory championship title or trying to impress friends at a party. There are three steps you need to consider if you want to have even more success with your memory challenges.

Memory Palaces Are a Means, But …

What is the Goal?

“If I had an hour to solve a problem and my life depended on the solution, I would spend the first 55 minutes determining the proper question to ask, for once I know the proper question; I could solve the problem in less than five minutes.” — Albert Einstein.

“Begin with the end in mind” — Stephen Covey.

Before you can start to maximise the potential of your memory palace training you need a clear vision of what you are a trying to achieve. A memory palace is a tool that you can use to achieve any number of outcomes with incredible efficiency. But the real power comes when your outcome is sharply defined.

The problem is that, often, we don’t clearly define where we want to end up, which makes the path to get there a lot harder than it needs to be.

Recently, I met a guy who works for an oil company and was telling me about his vision to become rich. He said he had his whole plan mapped out. His plan was to buy property after property and then subdivide and develop. He told me he wanted to have a few million in property, a few million in stocks and a few million in cash for those “just in case” moments.

After mapping the whole plan out, I looked at him and said “Why? What is all this money for? If money is a means to an end, what is your end goal?”

He said “I want to work with children”.

I Couldn’t Believe It

I said “why don’t you become a teacher?” He said “I want to work with disadvantaged children”. He then told me that he didn’t need the money to pay for programs for the children, he needed it so he could live without needing to work to free up his time. I told him he didn’t need millions of dollars to do that.

I told him about a good friend of mine—a high school teacher who quit her job to work with disadvantaged children. She left her job here in Australia and moved to the Solomon Islands where she is working and living on a small allowance to cover her board and her food. She is working with the local teachers to develop a new curriculum in the school. As well as helping and teaching the children that live in the local area.

She didn’t need millions of dollars, she was clear about what she wanted to do and she went and did it.

After telling him the story, he just stared at me blankly.

He offered a few excuses but it was obvious there was a disconnect between the goal and the means for getting there.

Without a clear vision in mind, it is possible he will spend years trying to achieve a poorly defined goal. What if it takes him 30 years to meet his goal? Will it be worth it if he gets there in his 60s? Or worse, if he doesn’t get there at all?

Don’t Get Caught With A Poorly Defined Goal

He is not the only one, though, who got caught with a poorly defined goal. I too have found myself without a clear vision at times.

Seven years ago I decided I wanted to be fluent in Spanish. I did some online research and found some resources for beginners. I printed everything off and got to work. I practiced for quite some time learning whatever I could about the Spanish language.

Within two years, I organised my first trip to Spain. Before I got there I was so excited for the fun and adventure I was going to have with my new language skills. I was going to make local friends, I was going to go to interesting places only the locals knew about and I was going to experience Spain the way a typical tourist couldn’t.

Does Language Learning Overwhelm, Confuse And Frustrate You?

When I got there, the reality was a completely different thing. I was overwhelmed, confused and frustrated.

My Spanish was hopeless. It was miles from what I thought it was. I couldn’t understand what the locals were saying. I couldn’t remember what I had learnt. And when I did remember how to say something, I translated literally from English and got a lot of strange looks.

When I returned to Australia I was deflated. I thought my abilities in language learning were worthless and I should move on to other pursuits.

Shortly after my return, I met up with a few friends in bar. They brought along a friend from France. Her English was good but not amazing—it was good enough to communicate, better than my Spanish at least. I told her about my experience in Spain and for the next few hours we shared language learning war stories. She told me about her struggles with English. I asked her “despite what you are saying, I understand you perfectly, you can communicate. How did you get to this level?”

She then told me something about language learning that changed everything for me. She said “you can just keep learning forever, and that’s it!” I asked her what she meant.

She told me that, if I wanted to, I could spend every day for the rest of my life learning something about the Spanish language. But, if I wasn’t clear about what I actually wanted to do with the language I would be lost learning for learning’s sake.

What do I mean?

In the English language there are over 250,000 words yet only 20,000 are used in regular day-to-day communication.

Sure, You Can Memorize A Gazillion Spanish Words … But Why?

For Spanish, these numbers are even better—there are a total of 100,000 words in the language yet the top 1000 most frequent words make up 87% of spoken communication. It is really quite amazing, you only 1% of the total number of Spanish words in existence for almost 90% of the conversation language.

What I discovered after talking to the French girl in the bar was that I could spend the rest of my life learning about 99,000 words in Spanish, but if I couldn’t use the most common 1000 words properly I would never have a chance to meet the locals and experience parts of the culture I had always wanted to experience.

So the question is — how well have you defined your goals? How well do you know and understand the outcome you truly want from the use of your memory palaces? And is there actually a disconnect between the information you are placing into your memory palace and what you actually need to know?

Anthony has mentioned that one of his most popular podcasts was How To Memorize A Textbook. It is possible to memorise a whole textbook using memory palaces. But as Anthony mentioned, and I reiterate here, before you start filling your memory palaces, you should start by eliminating components of the textbook that you aren’t actually going to need.

If you are preparing for an upcoming exam, are there components of the course that you won’t be tested for?

For example, imagine you have an upcoming chemistry test. The teacher tells you that the test will be on the periodic table. The question is—do you have to memorise all 118 elements? Maybe some quick research uncovers from the previous exam tests or maybe the teacher tells you that they will only test your memory for the first 50 elements. Now you only need 50 memory stations instead 118. Through defining a clearer goal you have made the path easier.

If you are studying a language, are there low frequency words that you are unlikely to ever use? Or are there words that you can eliminate because you can easily say them in another way?

The 3 Person Test

If we use language learning as an example, one word that I don’t particularly like is the word fluency. I encourage all of my students at Real Fast Spanish to stop using this particular word when trying to set goals in language learning.

For example, I mentioned that there are 100,000 words in the Spanish language. If you wanted to be “fluent” in Spanish, how many of those 100,000 words should you put in a memory palace?

It is unclear, right? But …

What Does Fluency Mean?

Instead see if you can define a better goal for yourself. How? By using the 3 person test.

Start by coming up with an appropriate goal to help you move you from where you are now to where you want to be. Then ask 3 people if they clearly understand your goal. If they do, it is a good goal, if they don’t, you need to go back to the drawing board.

What you ultimately want from the 3 person test is a consensus from your panel of 3 when you have achieved your goal.

Let’s look at a few examples.

Imagine your goal is to count to 10 in Chinese. If you could do it, then the panel would all agree. Yes you have achieved your goal.

Now imagine your goal is to be fluent in German. When you ask three people if they think you are fluent then it is very possible you could get three different answers, when you think you are. One person might say ”yes”, one might say “maybe” and one might answer the question with another question. In this case your goal would fail the 3 person test.

Knowing and having a sharply defined outcome is the first step to maximising your effectiveness with your memory challenges. A clear end game allows you to carefully select the right information to place into your memory palace which will save you time and effort later.

Let’s look at the second step.

How to Overcome Resistance

“Resistance will tell you anything to keep you from doing your work” — Steven Pressfield.

Once you are clear about what you actually need to put into your network of memory palaces and you have eliminated all unnecessary memorisation, you simply need to create the associated images and locate them where you know you can to find them later.

But, this is easier said than done right?

In order to fill your memory palace, you need to actually do the work. You need to overcome resistance.

Resistance, unfortunately, is a part of nature. It’s everywhere.

In the physical world, resistance is called inertia. Have you ever tried to move a large boulder? Or have you ever tried to push a car when the engine isn’t running? If you want to move large objects in the physical world you need to apply a lot of energy. You need to find a few friends or get the help of a large machine to apply enough force to start moving the object.

In the biological world, resistance is called homeostasis. In the human body there are hundreds of processes all working to maintain the status quo. There are buffers in the blood to maintain pH. Insulin is used to maintain sugar levels. Our bodies also use metabolic and perspiration processes to maintain a constant internal body temperature.

If you want to change your internal body temperature—which is not recommended—you need to go into a freezing cold place or an extremely hot place and stay there for enough time to break down the body’s internal regulation systems. In other words, a lot of thermal energy is required to overcome biological resistance.

In the psychological world resistance is called procrastination. Let me ask you this question—have you ever procrastinated?

Why Do We Procrastinate?

It’s because procrastination is similar to inertia and homeostasis. And here’s the thing—it’s not your fault! If you have ever procrastinated it’s because resistance is everywhere in nature. Nature loves to resist change.

So if you want to overcome procrastination, like the large boulder or the internal body temperature, you need to apply enough energy to overcome the resistance. If you want to successfully populate your memory palace with all of the carefully selected data you have chosen in step 1, you need to overcome your psychological resistance to change. How? If you want to overcome resistance you need to apply enough energy. For psychological resistance …

You Need To Apply Emotional Energy

What does that mean?

Have you ever had a big exam, assignment or report due for work that you left to the very last minute? Maybe you left it until the night before or the morning of. Let me ask you this question—in the end, were you able to pull an all nighter or some other feat of poor health in order to get the assignment done? If so, what changed?

In the lead up to the assignment, you were resisting it—naturally. Then when the deadline came close, you started to worry about failing or getting in trouble at work. At a certain point the resistance to doing the work was overcome by the emotional energy that came out of the fear of failure or getting into trouble.

Knowing this, if you want to successfully fill your memory palace, you need to develop enough emotional energy to overcome the naturally occurring psychological resistance.

The Test of the Five Whys

One idea that you can use to build emotional energy is the test of the “the five whys”. This idea originally came from industrial manufacturing as a strategy to pinpoint the cause of potential breakdowns in the production chain. They needed the test because human beings aren’t particularly good at getting to the heart of an issue.

If you want to truly understand why you should do something you need to ask “why?” five times. The true answer is rarely obvious from the first why.

If you want to unearth a limitless source of emotional energy for overcoming resistance, you need to get to the heart of your motivation.

Let’s see an example. I will give an example for learning Spanish because it’s what I’m used to. But you can apply the test to whatever memory outcome you are striving for.

Imagine you have a well defined small task to place 10 new Spanish words into a memory palace.

The five “whys” test would go as follows:

Why do I have to learn these Spanish words? Because they are important for Spanish.
Why is knowing Spanish important? Because I want to be able to speak another language.
Why do I want to speak another language? Because I want to experience a new culture.
Why do I want to experience a new culture? Because it will enrich my life.
Why do I want to enrich my life? Because it is the best way to live!

As you can see, by using the five ”whys” test I have connected the trivial task of placing 10 words in a memory palace with a higher life purpose. By asking the question “why” five times you can access a deep well of emotional energy and use that energy to overcome procrastination and resistance.

Once you have a sharply defined goal and you have overcome resistance at a task level, the final step is to create a routine that will allow maximum effectiveness with the Magnetic Memory Method.

Creating a Routine Allows You to Create

“Discipline allows magic. To be a writer is to be the very best of assassins. You do not sit down and write every day to force the Muse to show up. You get into the habit of writing every day so that when she shows up, you have the maximum chance of catching her.” ― Lili St. Crow.

“You try to sit down at approximately the same time every day. This is how you train your unconscious to kick in for you creatively.” ― Anne Lamott.

One important aspect of memory palaces is the creation of associated imagery. If you want to fill a memory palace you need to create and be creative. You need to take an abstract word, sentence or formula and create an associated image that you can use to recall the idea later.

Said in another way, if you want to be more effective with memory palaces you need to improve your creative muscle.

How To Be More Creative

How then can you be more creative?

If I said the key to creativity is routine there would be artists all over that would cringe at the suggestion. Creativity is about spontaneity. It’s about moments of inspiration that can’t be bottled. And these types of moments come when we least expect them, right? At least that what I used to think.

What do Steve Jobs, Barack Obama, Albert Einstein and Mark Zuckerberg all have in common? They all wore the same clothes every day. Steve Jobs is famous for his black turtle neck and blue jeans. Barack Obama has said that he simply either wears a grey suit or a blue suit. Zuckerberg rocks a black hoodie. And Einstein was known for wearing a similar grey suit every single day.

Why do they limit their wardrobes? They all choose to wear the same clothes everyday because of a concept called decision fatigue.

The idea behind decision fatigue is simple—every time you make a decision a future decision will be slightly compromised. In other words, every time you make a decision you are more likely to make a worse decision later.

For President Obama, decision making is a crucial part of his job. He can’t afford to make bad decisions. Therefore he limits simple decisions like what to wear or what to eat to someone else. What this does is leave him more decision making power for the important decisions—the types of decisions that could affect the future of the country.

Have you ever had the feeling at the end of a long day at work or college and when it came time to do something as simple as choosing what to have for dinner, the decision of what to cook was overwhelming? This is due to decision fatigue.

So what does decision fatigue have to do with creativity?

There Is A Trade-Off Between Every Decision You Make And Your Highest Order Thinking

Creative types like Steve Jobs and Anne Lamott know that they need to reserve their best thinking for creation. In order to do this they cut down decision making in their lives to an absolute minimum. They did this through routine. Either by wearing the same clothes or sitting down at a desk to write at the same time every day.

The evidence of other artists that used routine for creation is overwhelming. In Mason Currey’s book “Daily Rituals: How Artists Work”, Currey lays out the daily routines and habits of 161 of the world’s greatest artists such as Woody Allen, Agatha Christie, Leo Tolstoy, Pablo Picasso, Benjamin Franklin and Jane Austen.

Why does routine work so well for creation?

Charles Duhigg, the author of the power of habit, says that the brain starts working less and less as we start to form regular habits. The brain can almost completely shut down and this is a huge advantage because it means you now have free mental space that you can dedicate to something else.

This is how the world’s greatest artists work and you can test it for yourself.

How To Easily Assign “Pre-Commitments”

If you want to harness the power of routine and minimise decision fatigue, start by creating pre-commitments.

A pre-commitment is a decision that you make a head of time. And ideally a decision you make only once.

There are so many decisions you may be making on a daily basis—decisions that may seem inconsequential but add up quickly to fatigue of your highest order thinking.

What you want to avoid is having to make hundred of decisions in any typical day:

– What should I eat for breakfast, lunch, dinner?
– What should I wear?
– What should I buy from the supermarket on the way home?
– Do we need extra supplies for the coming week?
– Should I buy that new jacket or those shoes?

Then after all those decisions:

– When should I sit down to work on my memory palace?
– Should I work on the memory palace in the morning, evening, on my lunch break, or after dinner?
– Should I work on my memory palace for 20 minutes or an hour?
– What parts of my memory palace should I be focusing on today?

But There Are So Many Decisions … It’s Overwhelming!

Start by taking stock of all of these daily decisions and start making pre-commitments. Try to make decisions ahead of time. For example, you could decide on a Sunday evening everything you are going to wear for the week and eat for every meal.

Here is a powerful strategy: can you work on your memory palace at the same time for the same amount of time every single day? Can you remove the decision of when or whether to work on your memory palace completely?

If you don’t have to make a decision of whether to work on your memory palace, you can save your best thinking for the first, second or third location based image you have to place in your memory palace.

Can you avoid decision fatigue? Can you use pre-commitments and routine to minimise as many decisions in your life as possible?

If you can, you will leave your mind maximum freedom to create and be creative. A freedom that will allow you to create amazing things, crazy and vivid imagery that will infinitely improve the power of your associated images and the effectiveness of the Magnetic Memory Method.

What Wikipedia Won’t Tell You About The Real Path To Overcoming Procrastination And Learning At The Deepest Possible Level

Memory devices and mnemonics improve learning efficiency. The Magnetic Memory Method is a wonderful framework for putting the use of memory devices in a usable process. Put simply—it works!

If you want to take the Magnetic Memory Method to the next level and be a more effective memoriser you should start with a clear vision of the outcome you want to achieve from the use of your memory palaces.

A clear vision allows you to save time by first removing information you don’t actually need to memorise. This in turn means you can focus more intensely on the information that truly matters.

Once you are clear about your destination, you then need to overcome psychological resistance to change. You can do this by connecting deeply with your underlying motivation in order to build the emotional energy you need to overcome procrastination.

And finally you can maximise the effectiveness of the Magnetic Memory Method by minimising decision fatigue and incorporating routines into your daily life. If you can reduce the daily mental load of simple inconsequential decisions, you can release your creative potential for a vivid world of associated imagery.

The post Why Goal­-Setting For Memory Improvement Should Be Your Number One Priority appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

Do you get overwhelmed and frustrated every time you need to come up with new ideas when using memory techniques as part of your brain training? Especially when learning a foreign language?

You know what it’s like struggling to come up with mnemonics. It can feel a bit like pulling nails out of dead wood with a pair of rusted tweezers.

And what really makes the pain so bad is that you know that your brain is teeming with ideas.

Great ideas …

If only you could catch them.

Here’s the good news. In this unconventional brain training post I’m going to teach you how …

You Can Catch More Great Ideas Than The Most Successful Fishing Fleet In The World (Catches Fish)!

Just pick and choose from these super simple brain training activities and start with the most appealing. We’re going to go deep into each one so that you’ll have the fullest possible understanding.

Add one or more per month over a year’s time and you’ll enjoy an overflow of ideas so powerful it will take ten lifetimes and thousands of employees to handle them.

Just Kidding – Most Will Be …

Crap. Seriously.

As awesome as having boatloads of ideas can be, the real power comes from the refinement brain training brings. We’ll talk about that too a bit further on so your ideas will always come out shining.

But here’s the important thing for now: You can’t refine what you don’t have.

And you can’t get more ideas to refine if you aren’t already producing a lot of ideas in the first place.

That’s why you need an unending flow of ideas that you can turn on at will and focus into form with laser intensity whenever you choose.

Here are 3 unconventional ways how brain training can make that happen.

1. Milk Your Mind For Ideas Each And Every Morning

Most people flush their most vibrant ideas down the toilet as soon as their feet hit the floor.

It’s true.

By the time you hit the head, you’ve forgotten most, if not all, of a valuable stream (pun intended) of ideas you’ll never get back.

I’m talking about your dreams.

Of course, most of what we dream makes little sense, at least not without practicing the art of dream recall. Even then, dreams remain fundamentally surreal and devoid of fixed meaning.

But just because they may be meaningless, doesn’t mean your dreams can’t help you create meaning.

Au Contraire!

Since the early beginnings of literature, for example, Daniel in the Bible, making dreams meaningful has been a practice powerful enough to direct the choices of kings.

And with The Interpretation Of Dreams, Freud created an entire industry by empowering people to interpret their dreams and generate ideas about what to do and how to live in the world.

You don’t have to use the dreams you remember to influence world leaders or deal with childhood trauma. You can simply jot down what you remember and then free-associate to the images and vignettes.

Here’s a quick way to get started with this form of brain training:

1. Get a dream journal and pen/pencil. Make it exclusive to your dream capture practice.

2. Place the journal where it’s impossible to miss near your bed. You can even date it before you go to sleep and leave it open at the page you’ll write on.

3. Make the commitment to remembering your dreams. Just say your personal version of, “I remember my dreams. I write them down.” That mantra in itself will serve as powerful brain training.

4. Free-associate to one or more of your dreams. It helps if you get relaxed first. Let ideas come to mind and jot them down. Don’t think about it or try to guide them. Let them breathe.

If you recall no dreams …

No. Big. Deal.

Write down, “no dreams” and perhaps a few notes about how you slept. Before you know it, you will start remembering your dreams with depth and intensity. And when you practice associating with these dreams, you’ll always be able to come up with new ideas.

The best part is that you’re journaling your dreams. This brain training practice means that you don’t have to associate only with recent dreams for new ideas.

You can go back through those pages for as long as you’ve been journaling. You’ll have a treasure trove of images, narrative snippets, and longer sequences as often as you please and always find some new angle on the material.

To give you an example, years ago I dreamed about the pyramids. I saw them filled with a scented lava that poured down the sides, creating a river.

When I finally got to visit Egypt, for some reason, I remembered the dream and started to explore it for ideas. I was there to research ancient Egyptian culture for its relationship to memory and reincarnation, past lives, etc.

That was all fine and dandy and I learned some great stuff in some of the museums I’ll be telling you about soon. But the fact that I remembered this dream and the lava was scented led me to think about aromas, and I wound up wondering if there is a relationship between scent and memory.

It turns out there is. I have found a wealth of research material on the matter, much of which centers on the use of oils in mummification – one of the most memory-centered activities in all of history.

Would I have thought to connect scent and memory without this dream that helped product it?

Maybe yes.

Maybe no.

But the point is that without the practice of dream journaling as a form of brain training, I probably never would have thought about scent and memory in the context of mummification and essential oils in Ancient Egypt.

Deliberately remembering your dreams is a way of engineering happy accidents and generating new ideas that come power packed with resonating value. It’s easy, fun, quick and easy to do. It creates long term value and can change your life in many other ways too.

2. Brain Training Pulls Ideas Out Of Thin Air
Like Pushups Pack Muscles On Your Arms

If dream recall doesn’t appeal, there’s always brute force.

And that’s the way the following approach may feel at first.

But once you get into it, things get faster, easier and more interesting.

You just have to be willing to train your brain.

Here’s how it works, as adapted from the original exercise taught by James Altucher in Choose Yourself:

Write down ten ideas every day.

The benefits of completing this exercise will become plain. Just like doing consistent sets of even just ten pushups on a daily basis cannot help but strengthen your muscles …

Writing Out Just Ten Ideas A Day Will Pump Up Your Thinking Pipes

Will the ideas be any good?

Many times no.

But that’s not the point. And often enough, the ideas will be good. Or they will become catalysts for betters ideas, or at least be amusing. As with pushups, so long as you keep good form, you can’t go wrong.

Interested?

Good. Here are more specific instructions.

1. Get a special notebook and pen exclusively for this brain training exercise.

2. Write 1-10 along the side of the page.

3. Don’t overthink the process. Start with the first blank space and write something down.

4. Write another idea down and keep going until you’ve reached 10.

As with nearly every exercise you’re learning now, coming with a relaxed body and mind will make a huge difference. By meditating first, or running in place, or even after performing some real pushups, your brain will be bursting with oxygen.

In this state …

You Can Experience Monumental Levels Of Creativity

More importantly, the volume of your critical voice will go down, if not disappear altogether.

You know the voice I mean.

It’s the voice that says, “I can’t. This is stupid, pointless and useless. Why bother?”

That Voice Is A Brain Training Killer!

When it comes to listening to this voice, why bother, indeed? Didn’t this voice already batter you with these same enthusiasm-destroying sentences yesterday?

Meditation will help get that voice out of the way, letting new ideas flow with greater ease.

For bonus points, you can use the same notebook you use for dream journaling. Just imagine compounding the value of the ideas nature gave you during sleep with your Altucher-style brute force ideas.

Quite frankly, the value of combining the two is awesome.

What’s that? You want an example?

Well … okay …

Here are three of my ten ideas from earlier this morning. Remember, I don’t judge these or even think about them too much. Just as with pushups, I’m concerned only with executing the moves with good form. In this case, good form means nothing more than …

Doing. It.

1. Construct a highway from the earth to the moon out of Levi jeans. People will travel to the moon in vehicles made out of zippers and buttons. The speedbumps will be made from pockets and stitches, and all traffic lights will be made from the red Levi’s tag. But they will never mean stop, only, “go faster.”

2. Professors who shoot pancakes from maple syrup guns get arrested by the Spatula Police and taken to a prison made from sticks of butter.

3. All the American presidents in history suddenly appear in the present and start tattoo parlors that specialize in squeezing the Declaration of Independence onto the surface of any body part you wish.

Silly stuff, right?

Of course it is.

But as goofy as these ideas may be, they came lightning fast and in multilayered formations. Speed and depth come from nothing more than making idea generation a daily brain training practice. It’s both an art and a habit. There are no true Eureka! Moments in creativity, only ongoing processes.

The longer, the better.

And so whether you want to have more ideas for working with mnemonics, your work or building a better future, all you have to do is start by writing down nothing more than ten ideas.

You can get started with this form of brain training today.

3. Copy, Amplify, Transform, Delete Or Downright Mutilate And Abuse The Ideas Of Others

If for any reason you can’t come up with any ideas at all or hit a dry spell, no stress. The world is filled with ideas already put out there. Sure, they’ve poured their heart and soul into creating them, but that’s no reason not to …

… Mess With Them!

Think of Banksy. He’s a master at monkeying with logos, brands, royalty and all manner of preexisting images. He copies, transforms and sometimes deletes parts of images to create new effects that lead to new feelings and ideas.

Let’s go through each of these approaches and see how you can make them work for you and your brain.

Talent Borrows, Genius Steals, Creatives Copy

Have you ever studied music? If so, then you’ve probably played compositions written by someone else.

If you’re an artist, or tried to be one, then you’ve probably copied at some point the works of a pro.

But if you’re a writer …

Copying the works of others is the last thing you’ve ever wanted to do.

Enter Kenneth Goldsmith. In this video, he talks about “uncreativity” and why you should copy, word for word, the works of other writers the way musicians and artists so all the time. (I’ve fast-forwarded the video to the interesting part.)

Notice that Goldsmith isn’t talking merely about copying the works of others. He’s talking about training your brain by analyzing your choices. You get an education from writing about what you copied and how the exercise made you feel while at the same time imprinting your mind with the rhythms and metaphors of writers you admire.

In other words, by studying your choices, you get ideas.

Incidentally, Goldsmith’s “uncreativity” exercises may sound controversial in the world of literature. Copying the writing of others to write at a higher level and produce stunning writing without hesitation has been on the radar of marketers and copywriters for decades.

You can read about Gary Halbert’s “neurological imprinting” and how to dig the writing of others even deeper into your mind here.

But as with Goldsmith, the point of such exercises is not to clone. It’s to train your brain to find connections and spontaneously produce new ideas of great wealth.

For more on writing, consider Ambidextrousness and Memory: Can Dual Handedness Boost Your Brain?

Cut Out The Best, Mess With The Rest

Sometimes the best way to milk existing ideas for new ones is to cut them to pieces.

Take Dan Walsh’s Garfield Minus Garfield, for example.

What makes Walsh’s work so brilliant is the consistent comedy gold he mines from a preexisting comic strip simply by removing its famous namesake. You get a completely different reading experience, and your perception of John completely shifts.

To take another example, try and find The Matrix DeZionized. Some people wanted to like The Matrix sequels but found the representation of Zion to be a deal-breaker. So instead of griping about it, they put all three movies together and removed Zion entirely.

I don’t know about you, but for me, that creates new ideas about The Matrix series that I couldn’t have had otherwise. Just watching it serves as a kind of brain training.

How do you use this technique to create an endless stream of your own ideas on demand?

Easy.

Pick your favorite novel or movie and then think about what it would be like without the lead character or some other critical element.

What would Superman be like without Lois Lane? How would Anne of Green Gables play out if the Cuthberts hadn’t adopted her? How would Columbo endlessly introduce himself back into the lives of his suspects if he couldn’t say, “Just one more thing”?

In some ways, this exercise relates to the “how many uses can you find for a paperclip?” game. But instead of adding ideas, you’re deleting them.

And when you delete, you can transform through replacement.

Imagine, for example, if the “creator” of Garfield — had replaced the cat with Conan the Barbarian. Or James Bond? Or Julia Roberts?

Okay, So Brain Training Made You Creative …

Now What?

By now, you’ve got a wealth of procedures, games and activities you can use to make your mind a machine of perpetual ideas. And you’ve done it all without playing any time-wasting brain games.

Rest assured, the powerful effects of exercises like these don’t stop here. These creativity drills infuse with everything else you do throughout the day. You will notice constant creative energy as new ideas show up left, right and center.

Of course …

With Great Ideas Comes Great Responsibility!

After all, these ideas are like your children. It would be criminal to neglect them.

That said, you do need to get rid of every idea that doesn’t scale.

Or rather, reshape it somehow.

Instead of thinking of the culling process as tossing your children out into the cold, just imagine that you’re trimming their hair.

That’s all it is. Shaving wool from a flock of sheep, weeding out the dud strands and using the rest to knit …

A Wearable, Warm And Wonderful Idea Sweater

The question is … How?

Actually, this form of brain training is quite easy …

Assign each idea with a value.

To keep things easy, create three categories. 1, 2, 3. Green for “go,” yellow for “caution,” red for “forget it.”

Or you can use a gold coin, silver coin and a copper coin. I like this model in particular because ideas are currency. Whether it’s a scratched up penny or a hundred dollar bill, you can spend all your ideas somewhere, sometime, somehow.

So here’s an experiment adapted from something Dean Jackson talks about in his amazing 50-minute Focus Finder video:

Using the idea generation techniques you’ve just learned, get out three envelopes and three coins.

Next, stick those envelopes to the back of the door in your workspace or on a wall or any place you’ll regularly see them. Stick one coin on each envelope to indicate their value.

Then, using index cards or slips of paper, sort your ideas into the envelopes based on how much value you’ve attached to them.

You’ll have to decide on your own valuation system, but …

Keep It Loose And Flexible

Flexibility means that you allow your ideas to appreciate. What starts off as a copper coin could easily wind up becoming silver or even leaping straight up to gold.

Likewise, ideas that may have seemed gold, may downgrade over time. But no matter how things evolve on the Stock Exchange of your ideas, all of them can stay in trade and hold potential.

And anytime you feel like you’re lacking in ideas, you’ll have three heavy bank accounts from which you can draw.

Just as you can get more out of having more memory memory training techniques from around the world in your toolbox.

You know that you can become more creative right now … right?

Good. Then go out there, gather some ideas as part of your brain training and make something special for the world.

Do it now.

The post Brain Training: 3 Unconventional Techniques Guaranteed To Help You Conjure Your Best-Ever Ideas appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

Here’s a great question about how to memorize textbooks I received from a Magnetic Memory Method fan:

What if I wanted to memorize a chapter in a textbook so I could ace a test on that subject?

That would be cool, wouldn’t it?

Good news: It’s 100% possible.

No Joke

When I was studying for my doctoral examinations and later for my dissertation defense (rigorous 2 hr. + grilling sessions in front of a committee of 4-7 accomplished professors), I read a total of over 500 books and articles.

I’m not kidding. I almost broke my back at the library on several occasions!

Here’s exactly how I used to operate – and still do when I’m conducting research or just want to memorize the contents of a book using memory techniques. It’s an ongoing memory improvement project to continue learning from textbooks and it all begins with this important step every time:

Leave Your Fear At The Door:
These Details Will Show You How To Memorize Textbooks

Unfortunately, a lot of people get hung up on the details when learning how to memorize textbooks.

For good reason:

There are some operational factors in what I’m about to describe that might not seem to involve memorization.

Trust me: Each step is essential as you learn how to memorize textbooks. If it weren’t, I wouldn’t have included it.

Before I take any of the steps that I’m about to describe, I always begin with a carefully defined Memory Palace. As I talk about in all of my trainings, I always make sure that each Memory Palace involves a location that I’m intimately familiar with.

If you’re having a hard time finding good Memory Palaces, check out the MMM Podcast episode: How to Find Memory Palaces. It will help.

Plus, make sure that you have the free Memory Improvement Kit so you can use the worksheets and videos as a guide.

Create Limited Set Memory Palaces Based On The Textbooks
You Want To Memorize

I always chart out between 4-10 stations within each room of that Memory Palace. In the past, I usually made more (like 50 or so, often with between 30-50 stations within a single room). These days, I’m more focused on small sets of information.

Why?

Because I find that leads to more meaningful quantity over time with my current Mandarin Chinese learning project.

For more information on how to create a Memory Palace, get my free memory improvement kit:

Next…

Create The Right Mindset

This is important:

Decide to work with the correct mental attitude. For example, when sitting with a textbook or journal article, I need to have the attitude that I will walk away with the most essential information firmly magnetized into my mind.

You should do this too.

Then Chillax

Seriously.

Take a moment to relax.

I recommend that you adopt a traditional meditation pose on the floor, or lay down for awhile and do some progressive relaxation. Either way, I spend time practicing a bit of pendulum breathing and maybe even the Human Charger.

With those operating procedures covered regarding how to memorize textbooks, let’s get into further detail.

1. Look At The Book And Read The Conclusion First

When approaching a new book, carefully examine the front cover and the back cover.

Next, read:

• the colophon page
• the table of contents
• the introduction
• the conclusion

Finally, scan through the index (if available).

The scholar Gerrard Genette calls these parts of a book the “paratext,” (the text beside the text). This step takes about five minutes and effectively trains your brain to understand the scope and dimension of the book with respect to its topic.

Why read the conclusion first? Part of the reason is to judge whether or not the author’s conclusion about his or her own subject was profound enough to warrant reading all of the steps needed to arrive at it. The introduction and conclusion also give clues regarding which chapters of the book might be the most important to focus on.

2. Manage Index Card Mania

It’s important to decide how much information you want to take away from a textbook in advance. That way, you don’t overwhelm yourself.

And you can start in a structure manner. Like this:

Take out an index card and write down the name of the author, the title of the book and all of the bibliographic information.

Number this card “1” in the top left corner. Before starting with a book, I tend to decide in advance exactly how many pieces of information I want to retain from it. This is the principle of “predetermination” that I discuss throughout the Magnetic Memory Method training. Often, I default to three facts or details per chapter, but always keep enough index cards on hand in case I want more.

The reason for deciding these matters in advance is because

a) failing to plan is generally planning to fail (especially when it comes to structured reading), and

b) predetermination prevents overwhelm.

Remember:

Less is more. When you use the Magnetic Memory Method for something like foreign language learning or studying, you’ll find that by focusing on just a few key points, a lot of the surrounding information will automatically “stick” to the memorized material.

Try it. It just happens.

3. Get Started

The beauty of having operating principles is that you never sit around wondering how to get started. You just dive in.

So after reading the introduction and conclusion, you should now have in mind which chapters you want to read first. Just get started with one of them.

If you’re having decision anxiety, just go in the order they appear in the book from beginning to end. Don’t let thinking get in the way of forward progress.

4.Think In Threes

Here’s the deal:

At this point, you know that there are three pieces of information you’re going to walk with away from each chapter. You’ve got your index cards ready to go and can start gathering the information.

It doesn’t have to be a limit of three. You might want to go for five or ten. The important point is to pick a structured operating principle and go with it.

5. The Ownership Mindset

Since you’ve already adopted the attitude that you’re going to succeed and literally “own” the key information in the book, it’s time to play a game totally unlike other brain games I teach. This game works especially well if the book is boring or completely outside your interest.

Pretend that you’re the talk show host of a program and later that evening and you’ve got to interview the author. Millions of people will be watching, so you really need to the book. And you need to read it fast.

What this mindset allows is for you to ask questions while you’re reading. You’ll get really curious, and instead of reading passively, you’ll actively engage with the writing.

Also, ask “else” questions. This means that instead of stopping after a round of:

• Who?
• What?
• Where?
• When?
• Why?
• How?

You add “else” to each one:

• Who else?
• What else?
• Where else?
• When else?
• Why else?
• How else?

This technique will help you create new knowledge as you learn.

Try it. You’ll love it.

6. Categorize Every Gem
(Studying Is A Numbers Game)

When y0u come across a gem of a detail, write it down on the index card. Write down the page number where you found the information on the bottom right corner.

Do this regardless of whether or not you’ve jotted down a quote. Should you ever need to find that information again, you’ll know where to go. If you have any secondary ideas, use the back of the index card to capture them.

At this point, don’t do any kind of memorization. You’re familiarizing yourself, learning, connecting the details with information you already know and gathering new facts and details. That’s it.

So let’s assume now that you’ve read a book that has ten chapters and you’ve got three index cards for each.

Each card is numbered, meaning that you now have 30 index cards. All you need now is to be prepared with 30 station in 1-3 Memory Palaces that you’ve hopefully already assigned to the book.

7. Start Memorizing (Magnetically)

Your next step is to simply start with card #1. You want to remember the title of the book and the name of its author. That information is memorized at station #1.

If you happen to know the title of the book already by heart, then you don’t need to use the first station in this way, but it can still be useful to do so, and here’s why:

8. Use The Author As A Visual Element

You can use the author as a “lexical bridge” or “Bridging Figure” to move from station to station as you learn how to memorize textbooks.

See if you can find a picture of the author online. Let’s say that you are reading the book Paratexts, by Gerrard Genette.

I’ve Googled him up and Genette looks like this. Gerrard Genette reminds me of Gillette razor blades, and so I see him shaving in that first room. To remember that it’s Genette and not Gillette, I see him shaving away a beard of Ns growing crazily out of his face. For “Paratexts,” I could ease either a pear bouncing up and down on a textbook, or a can of Para Paint splashing over a book – there are always options.

Here’s another option you can try for finding memorable characters to use as you learn how to memorize textbooks:

9. Exaggerate Everything

Now let’s say that card #2 says: “A text does not exist outside of the text itself.”

That sounds pretty obvious, doesn’t it?

Maybe, but we don’t often think about the fact that until someone comes along and reads a book, the book essentially doesn’t do anything. There are billions of books standing unread on shelves around the world that only “exist” when someone is reading them or talking about them. This is what Genette means when he says that “a text does n0t exist outside of the text itself.” Our minds are a kind of text, so when we are reading, two texts are intermingling.

To remember all of this, my second station will feature the book Paratexts itself. I imagine it as an object in the Memory Palace I’m using.

On that specific station in that specific Memory Palace, words are trying to escape from the book, and there’s poor Genette trying to beat them back in because, according to him, there is no text outside of the text itself. He needs to get all of that text back in!

As always, the images are big, bright, colorful and filled with exaggerated action.

To get some of the other concepts in Genette’s thinking that I’ve just described, I might see Genette giving up the battle, and then opening up a lid in his head, which is also filled with words, and allowing the words from Paratexts to mingle with the words in his mind.

From there, on to the next index card.

Now that you know how to memorize textbooks, you can model this process to remember any point, historical date, or formula in a book!

10. Test Yourself Before The Teacher Does

The final step when learning how to memorize textbooks is to test your memorization of the details, facts and concepts you have memorized from the textbook.

I recommend writing a summary from your mind and then checking it against the index cards. One of my supervisors required me to submit summaries to prove that I was reading the books on my list, so I got into that habit and have always been grateful for it.

If you’re a student, I highly recommend that you take this step now that you know how to memorize textbooks. It will not only deeply immerse you in your topic area, but it will provide you with material that you’ve already written when it comes to composing essays, pieces for publication and even your dissertation further on down the road if you decide to complete a PhD.

Also, be sure to revisit the information in your mind following a procedure like the Rule of 5 or the more rigorous Recall Rehearsal procedures of the Magnetic Memory Method. It’s by rehearsing the information into long term memory that you really make it your own.

The best part is that the more you read, the more connections you naturally make, reinforcing what you’ve already learned. Now that you know how to memorize textbooks, you’re going to be a Magnetic powerhouse of information!

Learning How To Memorize Textbooks Is Fun!

What happened during my doctoral examinations? Instead of being stressful as they are for nearly everyone else …

They were fun!

I had been in a relaxed state while reading and memorizing the material, and complimented this by spending a bit of time relaxing before attending the exams. I literally threw myself into a state of self-hypnosis in the corridor outside of the examination rooms.

When I was asked a question, my mind zoomed to where the material was stored in one of my Memory Palaces. Once I found the information, I was able to talk at length about, whether it was Gerrard Genette’s idea about “paratexts” or Aristotle’s philosophy of friendship in The Nichomeachean Ethics.

In case you’re wondering what I did with all those index cards:

I used to wrap them with an elastic band, one per book, and then store them in a shoe box. Somehow, index cards and shoes boxes were made for one another. But all those index cards are gone now and so I enjoy having nothing to do but go through the Memory Palaces in my mind. And thanks to the memory techniques and ongoing memory improvement work I do, that step is often unnecessary.

But it’s fun. And I’m confident it will be just as much fun for you.

Further Resources

Check out this infographic from How to Memorize A Textbook, a similar episode of the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast.

The post What If I Wanted To Memorize A Chapter In A Textbook So I Could Ace A Test On That Subject? appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

This Man Shows You How To Unlock The Extreme Power Of Your Memory

Interested?

I thought you might be.

The man in question is Nelson Dellis. He climbs mountains,memorizes playing cards underwater and works to solve Alzheimer’s by collecting data through the Extreme Memory Challenge. Take it now.

Not only does Nelson use his memory talents to create good in the world, he’s also on a mission to help and inspire you to do the same.

Because the fact of the matter is, when you have improved memory skills, you won’t be able to stop yourself from contributing to the world at a higher level.

Just remember …

With Great Power, Comes Great Responsibility

Please enjoy this episode of the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast by downloading the MP3 and listening to it. You’ll find the full transcript down below with some links throughout to help continue your education into the world of Extreme Memory Improvement.

Let’s get started and feel free to download the entire transcript as a PDF to your desktop for future reference.

Anthony: Nelson, it’s great to be able to speak with you. I’ve been following some of the things you’ve been doing for quite some time. Maybe, just for people who don’t know you, give a brief overview of what got you interested in memory and how you came to achieve what you’ve done and take it to the level of basically bringing social good out of the achievements you’ve had with memory.

Nelson: Yeah, you know this all started back when my grandmother was struggling with Alzheimer’s as she lived in Europe. I wouldn’t see her all the time but I think that made a bigger  impression on me because I would go visit every six months to a year and she had drastically changed, deteriorated immensely. That made a big imprint on me. Then she passed away the summer of 2009.

At that point, I had kind of dabbled in memory. I decided to take what I had read about and really drive it home and see if I could, at a young build a strong memory, a healthy brain, and I set the goal of myself winning the memory championship. That seemed like a good milestone to try to get to and to judge, test, and base all of my training scores on. I did, and I got very good at it and all motivated by my progress and eventually I ended up winning the U.S. Memory Championship four times. That’s now what I do. I teach people how to unlock their memories.

Anthony: That’s very cool and you know one of the things that is so extraordinary is that you also turn it into social good, which we’ll talk about. Talk a little bit about the book that you’re working on and who it is for and why developing memory abilities is so important for the audience that you’re creating it for.

What If Memorizing Could Be The Most Exciting Activity In The World?

Nelson: You know I still get a lot of people who approach me and talk about their father, their mother, or grandmother has early onset or has Alzheimer’s, and they ask me if it’s something that I can train their parents to improve their memory. Unfortunately, I don’t know much about that. In my opinion, I think learning these memory techniques is a habit thing. You’ve got to learn it, I think, at an early age. That is something that just sticks with you.

When you go into your higher education, you already know how to memorize. It is a skill that you were given in school. Right now, obviously, you see if you have a class or a teacher who gives you tips on how to improve your memory you just do it. Memorize this song. You go home. You struggle with it. You repeat it over and over and then you come back and you’re excited and it’s the most frustrating process.

What if you lived in an age where your teachers actually had a class or spent some time teaching you memory techniques at a young age? When it would come to that poem or med school textbook that you’ve got memorize, you would have some toolbox in your brain to figure that out faster and more efficiently. I’ve been working on a book. I actually wrote a book, it’s not published yet for normal people of normal age.

The one I’m really excited about is this one I’ve been working on for kids which is teaching them memory techniques at a very young age. It’s geared towards a first grader in a picture book style. Because I feel like if you can get that in the head of a kid who already has a fantastic imagination and memory, that those things could stick with them and help them be successful throughout life.

Anthony: I think that’s fundamental because often adults feel that they have lost their creativity somehow. It’s pounded out of them through work or whatever the case may be. How do you think the people could resuscitate creativity if they felt that they have lost it?

The Truth About Memory Techniques And Creativity

Nelson: I know that feeling. I have felt it myself over the years. A lot of people tell me creativity is hard for me. It is hard for me to do these techniques, for example, which take a lot of creativity and imagination, but I honestly believe that anybody can do this. If you’re not good at, or if you think you’re not good at being creative, I think it’s one of those things it is practice.

I was always pretty good. I was very artistic, but I would still say I’m not the most creative person. I knew a lot of people who were a lot more creative than me. When I first heard about these techniques, a little bit skeptical and maybe thought okay this might not be up my alley or something that I might be good at, but with all the practice I’ve done, yeah, I’m practicing memory techniques, but for sure I’m also practicing creativity techniques. My mind is, I feel now, way more creative than it was six or seven years ago when I started this.

Anthony: I’m curious about your process if we can talk shop a little bit. One of those issues really is being creative. I’ve always thought that, and I encountered this in Harry Lorayne is you’re just doing associations. At so many levels, creativity really isn’t the issue. It’s more of being able to pool associations together so like famous actors or politicians or football players or whatever. I’m just curious to what extent you rely on information that you already know like pop culture images, or whatever the case may be, as opposed to things you invent on the fly or fantasy images that are not really reality so to speak.

Nelson: Well, when I train for these memory competitions there’s a few events. One of them is the deck of cards. How fast can you memorize them? They give you a massive number and you’ve got five minutes to memorize as much of it as you can. For things like that, I have systems where they are already set out. I sat down one day and decided to give each three-digit number 000 to 999 a specific person.

When I came up with that list and when I use it, it’s all celebrities, fictional cartoon characters from books, shows, people, friends that I know. They’re all associations to things that I already know. There are other events where you have to kind of make stuff up on the fly, for example, a list of words or names. Most of that is where you have to be very creative because you don’t know what you’re going to get.

You’ve got to come up with the pictures, but what I do is I’ll look at a pair of words or a name and a last name, and I’ll come up with that association to something I know but on the fly. If I can’t, then I break it down into something smaller that is recognizable. That’s always the process  is to break it into something I know. It’s still a creative process whether you already have associations to things or not because you still have to interweave those images with, for example, a Memory Palace or some narrative that is totally make believe.

Why You Should Go Climb A Mountain If You Want To Find More Memory Palaces

Anthony: To what extent do you prefer Memory Palaces based on real locations you’ve actually visited to just made up Memory Palaces, or even based on places that exist but you’ve never been to.

Nelson: Right. I know some people who do all those that you mentioned. I’m more of the real places that I’ve been to and had a memorable experience there. To me, I love going to these places. I climbed Everest a few years ago, and I have a Memory Palace where I’m on the mountain going through base camp and the higher camps and all that. I love the fact that when I train I get to go to that place. I think that’s very important at least for me to make my memories, when I memorize stuff, that much more memorable. I do know some people who use video game settings or even fictional rooms. They maybe design them on their computer or draw it or whatever. It is not a real place but it works.

Anthony: One question a lot of people have is can you reuse a Memory Palace and what’s your experience with that?

Nelson: When I’m training, I do multiple decks a day so I’ve got to have a large collection of Memory Palaces. If I were to have just one and I use it over and over and over again, I’m going to get some echoes and some confusion. I’m sure if you practice, you could probably eliminate some of that. I like to have fresh Memory Palaces come competition time. I’ll use a few and then leave those alone for a few days while I use other ones and then cycle back to them so that they empty themselves out.

That being said, if I have something that I want to memorize forever  so this is what I’m talking about for training is temporary. I’m memorize a deck of cards, I recite it and then I don’t really care to keep that particular deck of cards any longer. It’s meaningless almost. That’s why I cycle through them. If it is some trivia set or something for school or something really important that I want to keep forever, then I typically take or design or find a Memory Palace specifically for that information and I use it only for that. I would never tape over it. I’ll just use it as this hard drive, external hard drive, if you will, to store that piece of information.

Anthony: How often do you feel you need to revisit or rehearse that information or to keep it fresh and overcome the forgetting curve?

Nelson: You know, probably when you start out review is essential frequently, but over time it’s something I – maybe every six months I’ll go back and check it out. If there are gaps in it, I can go back and kind of relearn it just to solidify it.

Why The Real Magic Of Memory Is In Keeping It Real

Anthony: Do you ever experiment with adding a condition to a Memory Palace so you can reuse it? I’m sure you are familiar with the procedure of taking an original Memory Palace and then having a version made out of ice, a version made out of wood, grass, or maybe there would be a blue version, a red version and a yellow version. You ever mess around with that stuff?

Nelson: Yeah, I’ve heard of that. More like you make it big or you imagine yourself miniature inside of it or something. I’ve heard of that. I’ve never actually tried it. I don’t know. I just like to do it as real as the place is.

Anthony: Right, that’s exactly how I like to work as well. One thing too, just if we can be nerdy about this a little bit more, I’m curious do you see yourself walking through the Memory Palace? Do you have a first person viewpoint or is it like a bird’s eye view of a blueprint? How is it working for you, or do you do all three in different situations?

Nelson: I’m not there. I guess its first person but looking at a location in this Memory Palace and something is happening there. It’s not like it’s me seeing it. It’s just like a security camera.

Anthony: Yeah, that’s cool. I mean that is just one question that I get again and again is how that people are supposed to navigate it and how they’re supposed to see it. I often try to encourage them to not see it at all but rather think of it as a star in a constellation that you’ve carefully crafted and reduce the reconstruction of the Memory Palace to the bare minimum so you can focus on those weird and crazy images that you’ve put there.

Nelson: Yeah, it’s an interesting thing. I don’t really think about whether I see it or who is seeing it or what angle it is. It’s just I just think of that slot, I create the image, and I move along.

How To Snag Anything You Want To Memorize By Associating It With Feelings

Anthony: That must be important for speed since you’re often engaging in speed drills.

Nelson: Yeah, when you first start out you linger and you make sure you have it in your head, but as you try to cut down your times to get faster at this process you really have to, like you said, cut these images down to their bare minimum where it’s almost just a fleeting part of that image. We were talking about it last week. There was a UK Championship and some of us were saying that it’s almost a feeling. When you get fast at it, and that’s honestly, we go really fast and sometimes we forget things.

When you have a really good run through say a deck of cards and it’s fast, what you’ll find is like the images that you were picturing were just all feeling. There’s my dad at this location. It’s not him per se at this point. It’s the essence of him or I guess how he makes me feel when he’s in my presence. Whatever, but he’s there. Which is interesting because when I first tell somebody how to do this technique, I tell them to sit there, close their eyes, really imagine your dad, if that’s what you’re picturing, his hair, how he smells, how he talks, all these little details to make that image memorable. Once you get faster at it, you’ve got to cut some of that out and really just cling on to the things that are what make it stick.

Anthony: One of the things that I think pushes people away from these extraordinary techniques is the element of let’s call it rigorous cartoon violence. To what extent do you find that’s necessary or are you able to use softer, gentler imagery to trigger the target information.

How To Safely Use Your Taboos For Extreme Memory Boosts

Nelson: Yeah, it’s funny. I did a talk once, and I feel like a lot of my images are violent/sexual. I’m not a violent person by nature but my images they tend to be. I was leading an audience through an example and one woman just couldn’t get it, and she was like I just can’t picture gruesome things. I just can’t do it. What she did from then on, she was a very spiritual person, she kind of related it all back to religion and that seemed to work for her.

What I pull from that is that everybody’s minds are different. I often encourage that you should go for pictures that are bizarre and silly, over the top and if you can, sexual or gruesome, grotesque in nature just because those stick because of them being so out there and loud. For me, I think that’s an important part. For numbers and cards, I have actions that are violent or sexual for sure.

Anthony: But you still manage to be a good citizen of the planet?

Nelson: Yeah, I’ve heard people say I don’t want to do that because I feel like it will take over my mind and I’m going to become a bad person, but that never happens.

Is Every School In The World Evil For Not Teaching Memory Techniques To Children? 

Anthony: Going back to the book for young people and the issue of getting them young to at least have exposure to these techniques, a lot of people ask me and have probably asked you. It’s one of the biggest questions. Why aren’t these memory techniques taught in school? It’s really easy to fall back on the idea, and there’s probably a truth to the idea, that we are stuck in a Victorian education system that was designed to create obedient factory workers and so forth. What’s you’re take on it?

Nelson: It’s interesting because on the flip side every time I go up to a school or university and I demonstrate or I talk to someone who has seen what I can do and they want me to come talk about it at the school, there’s always an excitement for it. They can’t believe it’s not in their school, that kids don’t know about.

But then what happens is, we get down the road, conversations, I do a few little talks and there’s times maybe working together involving these techniques into the curriculum and then it falls flat. I don’t understand it. It recurs a lot.

It’s just a funny thing. I guess memory because it’s so abstract I guess in a way and it’s not as tangible as say math. You can write your solutions on the board and then the work can stepped out. Whereas memory is very – everybody like I was talking about before is very different. You can’t really see how another student is memorizing. You guide them and hope that they’re following along.

I don’t know if that’s the reason why it still hasn’t caught on. I’ve been at this for a number of years and I’ve had so many people interested and promises and ideas and they just – some have gone through of course but not as many as I would like.

You know at first I did this just because it was a personal thing. I wanted to improve my memory and my brain health. Then I realized it’s a bit hard to train when you don’t have kind of the end goal. With memory improvement, if I want to have a competition what am I really training for? Yeah to improve my mind, fine, but I’m a very quantities person so how do you measure that. When is it good enough? To be honest, I don’t know actually have the answer. But at least with the memory championships I knew numbers and times that I had to achieve in order to be competitive for the title. That kept me very motivated in terms of driving me to compete.

Why Advanced Memory Skills Are The Best Addiction You’ll Never Want To Kick

The thing is this stuff is so addicting. Once you realize you have this power to memorize more than you ever thought you could, and then you train and get even faster it, it’s a hard thing to let go of and then when you see other people in your circle, your memory circle improving you want to stay up with them especially when you are already at the top. That’s my problem right now. I won it four times, and I keep saying I’m going to stop because I don’t want to end up losing. I always wrestled with that problem. Do I keep training? And if I do, I’ve got to train harder because the competitive levels keep rising versus just calling it quits. I’m just doing it for myself.

Anthony: Have you ever plateued?

Nelson: Oh yeah, I’m at a pretty big plateau or I have been this past two years. I think a lot of it has to do with difference in motivation from previous years. Whereas before I never won, I wanted to win, and then I won. I wanted to win again and then I lost the next year so I wanted to come and win that time. Now it’s like okay four is a good number. Why would five be any better? Do I really have to train that hard anymore? When you have that feeling that’s when you plateau. You’re not really trying to find new avenues to get better because where you’re at has been good enough. I don’t know how I won the U.S. Championship this year because – well I did very well in the names, but something I used to be the best at which is numbers and cards I was okay. Lance Tschirhart, another American, he broke the U.S. record 29 seconds in cards which is crazy. I’ve done that once in training. Then 360 digits, I’ve done that in training but never in competition. I need to push forward to break this plateau. I’m kind of where I was  around 300, around 30 seconds for cards. I need to change some things, which I’ve started to do and I’m seeing improvements now. It’s been a lot of work to break this particular plateau.

Anthony: What does a typical training session look like? Is there a fixed daily routine or how do you drill yourself to reach something like the 30-second area for 52 cards?

The Best Memory Routine Advice You’ll Ever Get

Nelson: It depends on where I am in terms of what’s coming up. Is there a memory competition down the road or is it off-season so to speak. I used to just train always. Like four to five hours a day, I’d do sets of numbers, cards, names, words, just every day. Then I pulled back a bit. I think after I won in 2014 it was the first time I took break and I didn’t touch anything for like six months, which made it really had to get back into.

Now that I’m training for The World Memory Championships, which has more different or varying disciplines, I have a lot more to train. I’ll kind of split up my weeks by Monday/Wednesday, Tuesday/Thursday and then Friday and one of the weekend days I kind of leave for experimenting and working on systems. All the days I will usually do speed numbers and speed cards, just memorizing cards and numbers.

Then on the Tuesdays and Thursdays, I’ll work on the longer disciplines. In the World Championships, they test you for an hour on how many numbers you can memorize and how many packs of cards you can memorize. I work on that. It just ends up being, when I’m really down to it, a five-hour training day.

Anthony: Wow! That sounds intense. Given that amount of investment, do you think memory competitions should be included in the Olympics, or do you have any ideas why it isn’t already in the Olympics?

Nelson: Yeah, I think so. I think the reason why it’s not though is because it’s horribly boring to watch. That’s not to say that you can’t make it exciting. I’m working on that, but the World Championships is extremely boring to watch. I love to compete in it of course, but compared to staring at someone for three days straight for eight hours a day watching them stare at a piece of paper taking tests.

How To Make Dudes And Dudettes Memorizing Stuff Look Sexy, Stimulating And Exciting As All Hell

That’s not the most exciting sport to watch but there’s a memory tournament that I created two years ago called the Extreme Memory Tournament and we try to make it somewhat of a spectator sport. I think we’re doing a good job so far.

The XMT, as we call it, is a two-day competition and everything is digital first of all. It’s all one-on-one matches. Everybody who is competing is split up into groups kind of like the World Cup. On Day 1, you play everybody in your group in each of the disciplines. There are cards, numbers, words, names and pictures. They are all short disciplines like one-minute memorization.

The cool thing is – so I’m going up against you for example. Let’s say we’re memorizing a deck of cards. Here we are on our laptops racing through this deck of cards as fast as possible and on the screen it’s broadcasted to the audience so people can see exactly how fast I’m going through my deck of cards versus you. Who finishes first and then during recall while constructing those decks, trying to remember their correct order, it’s who can get the most right. If we both got it right, who did it faster? It makes it very visual. It’s short. It’s exciting. It’s this battle. It’s not so much test taking anymore versus  there’s a little bit of strategy involved and it’s a lot more exciting that way.

Anthony: That sounds like it would be very exciting. Like speed chess basically.

Nelson: Yeah.

Anthony: Cool, well speaking of the word extreme, and your predilection for names talk about the Extreme Memory Challenge and the research that’s going on that you’re involved in.

Are There Genetically Superior Memorizers Roaming The Planet?

Nelson: Going back to this tournament, we started it because this company called Dart Neuroscience, they’re in San Diego. They were doing some research with Washington University in St. Louis, and I was part of that study amongst other memory experts. What they’re trying to do is to try to find and create a drug that improves memory and brain health and cognition. Not an easy task, but they have a lot of their funds going into a lot of universities for research and they’re doing their own research as well. I’ve worked with them obviously to help put together the tournament.

They were the key sponsor those two years we ran it. They are also working, and I’m helping them with this because I totally want it to succeed, is they developed a memory test. It is long-term memory test, and they’re just trying to get a million at least, honestly as many people to take the test as possible. The idea being we’re trying to locate or identify people who have naturally good long-term memories. That’s a very rare thing to find. Maybe not even somebody who we’ll find, but you will only know if you get enough people. Once we find those people, we’ll be able to do a lot of DNA testing to figure out what separates these people from the norm. That’s the idea.

It’s called Extreme Memory Challenge. It’s a pretty easy fun test. It doesn’t hurt. It’s easy. You’re helping research and if anybody is listening to this, I would love for you to just take the test and share it. The more people that take it the better and you can actually see how you compare to me. I’ve taken the test as well.

Anthony: We know that there are people who are extraordinarily good with mnemonics, mnemonists, and are you split testing them so that you have results from people who aren’t using mnemonics compared to those who are to take the test.

Nelson: At this point, we’re just honestly getting as many people to take the test. Once we have people who have scored highly, we’ll be more careful in how we weed those people out. That’s when we’ll investigate further whether they were using memory techniques or not. The goal is to find the people who were not using memory techniques. Right now, we’re just trying to get people to do well on the test.

Anthony: What do you think about the claims and the studies that say technology is now doing so much of our memory work that we’re going in the opposite direction where our memories are degrading? Have you found that for yourself and had that observation?

The Most Outrageously Powerful Definition About Memory Is Just One Word Long

Nelson: Definitely. The one thing I’ve learned about memory through this whole journey is that it’s attention. That’s all it is. When you talk about techniques, Memory Palaces and number systems all you’re doing at the very basis of it all is paying a lot of attention to something. You’re building this elaborate system for one specific thing. You’re sitting there thinking about it really hard. That’s paying attention to something and that’s what memory is. If you’re not paying attention to something, somebody says something that you should remember you’re not going to remember it.

This era is all distractions. Just think of when you’re out having a conversation with a friend. You usually have your phone out, whether it’s on the table or in your hand or in your pocket. It’s going off, it’s lighting up. Maybe theirs is lighting up to, versus when you would actually go out with someone back in the day, and you maybe didn’t have text messages awhile back. You’d have to say we’ll meet here at this time. You did and then actually paid attention to that person. That exchange was probably more memorable or easier to remember than ones you have these days because of that technology. I definitely believe that this day and age it is so hard to pay attention to things.

We’re constantly being bombarded. It’s just making memory that much more difficult. We don’t have to use it as much as well, so all that together just kind of makes our memories so along this journey as well I try to figure out a way to give back and to educate people on all the things I have kind of figured out.

As we talked about before, it’s shocking that this stuff isn’t in schools and that people don’t know about it. We all can do it. It’s all latent within us, the skill. I tried to figure out a way. How can I share this with people? I thought okay maybe I can create a blog/website where I post all these kind of tips and talk about memory and how do I make it a little more exciting. I tied it to another passion of mine which mountain climbing.

How To Memorize Safely – With Almost No Oxygen In Your Brain!

That’s where Climb for Memory came from. I started climbing mountains and updating my blogs about my trips and photos. I was trying to get people to be drawn to the site. Climbing Mt. Everest, things like that, things that people are kind of fascinated by and don’t always get the opportunity to learn about. It’s kind of a diversion. It’s like hey look here, but what you’re really looking at is this cause I’m climbing for, which I also happen to know a great deal about it. Here’s how you memorize this and that and keep your brain healthy. It was an effort to raise awareness for Alzheimer’s and also funds as well.

Anthony: If I understand correctly, you’re also doing some experiments and as you climb with different altitudes and how your memory responds or is that something you’re starting in the future.

Nelson: Yeah, I’ve done that on some of my higher altitude climbs. Since I train all the time. I kept doing it on these long expeditions. For example, Mt. Everest, not many people know but it’s a two-month expedition, so you’re at high altitude, 17,000 feet or higher for about six weeks there. Your body goes through some serious changes and near the top of the mountain, you’re getting a third of the oxygen you would at sea level. You need oxygen. Your body needs oxygen to function properly and to think straight.

If you ever see these videos online of pilots, they simulate oxygen just dropping. They test them and they just become idiots within seconds. It’s crazy. They can’t put a square peg through a square hole. They put it through the triangle you know something like that. They can’t do basic arithmetic.

For climbers, we spend a lot of time acclimatizing so that when we do get to the top we’re not like that. That’s not to say we’re not stupid but we can think a little better. I’ve have been testing that with memory. What’s surprising to me is I’ve actually done as good or better as I went up in altitude. I have no idea why, but I just love to test that kind of stuff to see how these techniques fair with the elements.

Anthony: They say that norepinephrine is produced in novel situations, which is thought to be an aid to memory, that chemical in the brain.

Nelson: Yeah, I’ve had some thoughts about it, and that’s the one that’s come up. It’s the most extraordinary experience being up there. You put yourself in some really memorable hairy, scary situations constantly for six to eight weeks. You walk away with an experience that is super memorable because of how novel it is, and I’m sure that plays into all your thoughts while
you’re up there including when I would do my memory training.

How Big Is Your Memory?

Anthony: Now you know personally the size and the dimension of Mt. Everest, do you have a sense or a feeling of the size of your memory?

Nelson: No, I don’t think so. Obviously, it’s contained to that thing that’s inside my head which has a finite size. But in terms of how many Memory Palaces I can have and how many bits of information I can store there, I have no idea.

I mean there can always be some way that I can press information into bigger chunks and Memory Palaces that, like you said, you know you alter things in your Memory Palace and you can memorize something totally new inside of it. Where is the limit?

These memory competitions are a great example because when they first started in the early 1990s the records there were, at the time, very impressive, but now they are a joke. At the time, you thought okay you can’t really go that much faster with a deck of cards and then somebody broke a minute. Now people are getting under 30 seconds like it’s the easiest thing in the world and people are approaching the 20second, people even in training getting 19, 18 seconds.

 Breaking The Speed Limit Of Memory One Card At A Time

Now you’re like, okay I don’t think you can get much faster than that. Who knows, at some point somebody is going to come up with something that allows you memorize a deck of cards in 10 seconds, which is crazy. When does it end? Obviously, you’ve got to look at the cards so there is a limit to that, but in terms of how much you can store and how limitless the memory is, it’s crazy to think about.

Anthony: I have an interview on the podcast with Phil Chambers who is chief arbiter of the World Memory Championships …

Nelson: Sure, yeah.

Anthony: He said that they’re working on an app (I guess it would be) that’s going to be able to show the cards faster than the human hands can move, which it sounds like you already have some version of that if you’re doing a digital read of the cards in your competitions.

Nelson: Yeah, I mean that’s what that would be, right. It’s a digital version that you could just click through. There another couple of training sites online that people use, and when we talk about personal bests, who has been able to do this a lot of them are doing faster times on the digital format because you don’t have to like thumb through the deck. You’re just moving an arrow, clicking an arrow to go to the right and you can go a lot faster.

Anthony: I think what he was talking about is that they would set a speed so you would not have any manual control over when or for how long the cards were displayed. Do you think you would be able to handle someone else controlling or an automatic process controlling the duration of the exposure?

It’s All A Matter Of Training

Nelson: It’s all a matter of training. If you tell me you’re going to show me a deck of cards, one every quarter second, okay, I’m going to train that. Maybe I can’t do it immediately. Maybe I’ll train with – well I can do it in about 30 seconds, so maybe that’s approaching a half second per card. I would start there and cut it down.

When you put these boundaries and these limitations is when people suddenly improve. You see somebody run the 4minute mile for the first time and then suddenly you can do it as well because it’s possible or it’s a barrier and now people have something to work towards. I don’t think it’s too hard unless you just don’t practice.

That’s it. I do a lot of cross training and some of these guys that end up winning, there’s a guy named Rich who won four times in a row. I mean these guys just work day in and day out lifting, working out crazy. I love watching videos of him  just how he trains and his mentality through it. I think that’s the only way to get better is practice with anything, honestly and that’s the biggest thing with memory.

People think it’s a natural thing or I have some talent for it naturally. Honestly, I don’t think so. I think it’s training. Yeah, maybe some people need less training to get to where I am or to get even better than me. If you train and you are gung ho and so motivated to do a certain thing, you can do anything.

Anthony: Do you have a favorite quote?

Nelson: Favorite quote? Yeah, I think every year before the memory championship I always Tweet and stuff. Let me see if I can say it right. It’s dumb, it’s so dumb, but it’s from, what movie is that? It’s one of those movies that came out in the 1990s. It’s a spoof.

Anyways, this guy is going out on the football field and he’s kind of down on himself. He doesn’t believe in himself, whatever. He sits on the bench and Mr. T comes up to him who is this high school janitor and he says before he goes out, he like “Believe in the ball and throw yourself.” Which you hear it and it’s like he’s just saying it backwards.

The guy looks at him kind of confused, but I always loved that because it’s kind of true. I think usually you’re supposed to say believe in yourself and throw the ball, or whatever it is, and that’s how you succeed. I think when you want to succeed you’ve got to train a lot. You’ve got to practice properly. You’ve got to really make this your life if you really want to achieve it.

When it comes down to performing in a competition, it’s not about believing in yourself, it’s believing in the thing that you know instinctively. You just believe in the ball and you just throw yourself into it. That’s what I was saying before. When I memorize and I get a really good time, it’s when I thought or memorized the least. It’s like I didn’t even feel like I was memorizing. It was just so natural. That’s what you strive for through your training. That you’ve done it so many times that it’s just a matter of throwing yourself out there and doing what you know.

Anthony: Something really interesting came up when you were searching in your mind for the quote and even the movie that it came from, and I was interviewed myself last night and there’s slips of the mind that come. Well, it some book I read at some time at some point, but people seem to expect that people using mnemonics wouldn’t have these same lapses.

There’s No Such Thing As A Bullet Proof Memory Champ

Do you ever prepare yourself for social situations? Like I presented about language learning and memory techniques at the polyglot conference in Berlin, and I went there prepared because I knew people were going to come up to me and give me some crazy phrase and I would be put on the spot. Of course, I want to demonstrate the validity of these techniques so I was really on the ball. It was successful the whole weekend, but there’s this pressure of performance. Do you ever have that or people throw you curve balls to see where you’re at? They somehow like in an example where you can’t quite recall the name of movie they say come on. What’s your experience with that kind of stuff?

Nelson: Yeah, over the years I’ve been caught off guard and kind of made a fool of. I’m not a tape recorder. A lot of these things and you can attest to this, is you’ve got to turn it off. It’s to me a memorizing machine. You’ve got to be actively doing it. Sometimes I just don’t want to do it. I’m tired and don’t want to focus and pay attention. I just want to veg out. When I have these talks I have to be on because I want to practice what I preach and I have little tricks that help me.

You know people catch me off guard. Most of all it’s just I turn it off. I really focus on being on point. If somebody comes up where they’re like hey what was your favorite movie and I’m like oh the one with the memory and I can’t remember. It’s just I feel like a situation like that kinds of make me seem human and normal which is what people want to see as well. It’s nice to see someone who seems superhuman, but on some level if there’s too much of that then you almost feel like I can’t do that. I think that’s actually maybe good to motivate someone. It’s like okay. I can do that. It doesn’t seem like he’s 100 percent but it’s still very impressive.

Anthony: Speaking about that, a lot of people they doubt themselves, they doubt that it’s possible for them. What do you think is just one little thing that a person could do that would give them a quick victory so they have a taste of what’s possible?

Two Ways To Turn Your Memory On And Keep It Humming

Nelson: I’ll give you two things. The first one is pay attention. It’s the most elementary thing of course but if I’m telling you that most of memory is paying attention, and you go out and say you have a meeting or a party you’re going to, and you tell yourself I’m going to pay attention and remember ten people’s names.

That’s my goal. Make it a game or something. You will. You will just from the fact that you’re telling yourself to do that. You’re wired, you’re turning it on to complete that particular task. You will perform 100 times better than if you just hoped to remember people’s names and you didn’t really think about it.

The second thing is the Memory Palace. Think of your house. It’s a quick thing. Think of your house. Start at your front door and whenever you want to memorize a list of things just picture each item along a path of your house. Then when you want to recall it, you just imagine yourself through that house and like you said, you can’t forget how to get from your front door to your bedroom or whatever. You will remember what was there. It’s surprisingly simple and surprisingly powerful as well.

Anthony: What’s the one question you wish that someone would ask you about memory that no one ever seems to narrow in on?

Nelson: Oh, that’s good. Another question that people should stop asking me and that’s do you play in Vegas? I don’t. I don’t think it would be much of a help to have a good memory there. What’s the one that I hope they would ask me is when can we start training?

Anthony: Very good. This has been a wonderful experience getting to speak with you and I know the people who listen to this podcast are going to love it and find it very inspiring. How can people who want to learn more about you, about Climb for Memory, about the Extreme Memory Challenge and your upcoming book, how can they find you online and get in touch with you and maybe there will be some people who love to ask you about hiring your help as a personal trainer.

Nelson: Yeah, the easiest way is to Climb for Memory. You can contact me through there. There’s a lot of information on there about memory and my climbs and stuff like that. Then I have my YouTube channel where there are a lot of videos of my climbs and little snippets of memory talks that I’ve done. There’s a lot if you just Google memory. You can throw my name in there too if you want to look at something specifically for me. Otherwise, there’s a lot of memory resources out there these days, there’s no shortage of it.

Further Resources

Nelson Dellis on Twitter

Man With The World’s Strongest Memory Crusades Against Alzheimer’s

USA Memory Champion Nelson Dellis On Memory, Tenacity & Conquering Anything on Jonathan Levi’s Becoming Superhuman Podcast

Nelson Dellis Interview On The Jeff Rubin Show

The post Extreme Memory Improvement With Memory Champion Nelson Dellis appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

Have you ever purchased something and hated it? And yet, for some reason, you gradually …

… started to love it?

Or have you seen a movie that thrilled you, only to find that your opinion suddenly sours?

If so, then it could be that …

Someone Is Seriously Messing With Your Memory!

And there’s bad news. The people involved in changing how you feel about products and media you’ve consumed hold more than one weapon of memory destruction.

Let’s look at just one of the ways advertisers manipulate your memory. But please understand that I am in no way talking about subliminal advertising. The tools we’ll explore rely solely on images and procedures that rehearse, train and retrain how you think by accessing your memory in particular ways.

One tool, for example, involves …

Blatant And Phoney Misinformation About The Competitors

Do you remember the Pepsi Taste Challenge? How thinly they disguised the fact that they were testing Coca Cola with the poor citizens they ambushed on the streets with Coca-Cola? How Pepsi used to call Coke, “the leading cola?”

By representing their main competitor in these challenges by association, Pepsi was capitalizing on the fact that human memory is constructed. Our memories don’t come from one location in the brain, but several.

This means that as our memories come to the fore, they can be changed by the catalyst responsible for summoning them. And because the advertisements make use of nostalgic images, rousing music and cleverly placed sound effects that also invoke nostalgia (the sound of a soda can being cracked open or bubbling pop snapping against ice), they create feelings.

These feelings cause your brain to associate positive experiences with the product and negative feelings with the competition.

Because as this documentary reveals, it’s not about selling a product. It’s about selling an idea:

At least, that’s the theory. Scientists and marketers call this effect “memory blending.” At its highest level, the injection of blended memories into your mind makes you think that you’re the one who formed your preferences.

And if advertising can change how you feel about something you’ve purchased in the past, you can be led to buy more and …

… Think It Was Your Idea!

Soda companies aren’t the only ones to use product comparison and misinformation to create blended memories. Many companies do, including airlines, stereo and speaker manufacturers and fashion designers.

The craziest part of all is that in so many cases, the difference between the products is marginal to none. If information is to be perceived by consumers …

It Must Be Done By Advertising

And because what matters most in these advertisement campaigns rely on how we feel about past experiences, advertisers constantly make references to childhood experiences. Playing with toys, camping in the woods, munching on cereal. You might see a mother with a child, a doctor with a patient or athletes with their trainers.

Or the ads may feature running on the beach, playing tennis or eating in a restaurant. These iconic, universal cues apply to almost everyone living in the West. Even when traveling in countries like Egypt, I have seen ads nearly indistinguishable from those we see in North America and England.

Two Routes To Radical Memory Change

Let’s look deeper at how all of this memory change works.

As we’ve already discussed with the Pepsi Taste Challenge example, the ads work at altering your subjective experiences if the past.

Secondly, the ads change how you think about an objective experience from your past.

Many ads, especially the Pepsi challenge, blend the two together.

To take another example, let’s look at an interesting experiment conducted by Kathryn Brown and reported upon in 1997.

In the experiment —- demonstrated that consumers will take second-hand information and use it to reconstruct memories of past experiences. They will do this completely outside of conscious experience.

Here are the basics of the experiment:

2o female and 30 undergrads at a university in Iowa were shown the trailer for a Johnny Depp movie called Nick of Time.

https://youtu.be/3ylx6aTM2hU

The researcher chose this movie because:

1. The plot and marketing were shaped to appeal to Generation X.

2. The movie had not been released in Iowa, reducing the likelihood that students were aware of it.

After viewing the film, the researcher asked the students to give their opinion of the film. They were asked to rate the trailer on traits such as acting, directing, pacing, etc. Brown also asked the participants if they would like to see the film in the future.

The researcher then thanked the participants for their time after a twenty minute period given for watching and rating the film. For all intents and purposes, the participants thought the experiment was over.

Next, however, the students were given reviews of the film to read. Although the reviews were professionally written, students were not given the names of the reviewers or the names of the newspapers or magazines from which the reviews were taken. Students, for example, might have a positive association with Rolling Stone magazine that could influence the experiment.

The reviews given to the students were either thumbs-up with 5 stars or thumbs-down with 0 stars.

After reading the reviews, the students were given a surprise memory test. The test asked them to reevaluate the movie trailer and then talk about how much they felt the reviews affected them. Although it was an option to say that they couldn’t remember their previous evaluation, less than a measurable percentage took this option.

As a result, students who received the positive reviews shifted to more positive evaluations the second time around. Likewise, students who received the negative reviews downgraded their opinion of the film.

Overall, when questioned, most participants believed:

1. That they had been consistent with their original evaluation.

2. Their original evaluation had not been affected by the second-hand information.

The results of the experiment suggest one thing:

Your Memory Of Opinions You Once Held Can Be Eradicated!

Not only that, but in addition to changing your thoughts about past opinion, your future choices can be altered too. Those who said they would like to see the film based on the trailer but were given negative reviews tended to change their mind.

And we’ve probably all had this experience. I remember being very excited to see Jupiter Rising after watching the trailer at the Sony Center Cinema in Berlin. But the reviews completely decimated that desire and to this day, I’ll never really know whether I might have liked the movie or not until I maybe one day watch it.

All this said, there’s one big fat white elephant in the room …

Is This Experiment Valid?

It seems so, but we need to question:

* The likelihood that they would not have seen the trailer on a national TV station. They do not appear to have been quizzed about their television viewing habits.

* They were university students, so we can assume that at least some of them came from another state. We do not know when they might last have traveled to another state.

* When people can’t properly remember their previous opinions, how can we trust them to remember whether or not they’ve seen a movie trailer before, let alone the entire movie?

Nonetheless, as worthy as these considerations are, I don’t think these problems affect the experiment too deeply.

But everything we learned about today does raise one very important question …

Is Selling Evil?

One of the world’s most successful marketing “gurus,” Dan Kennedy, often says that people selling products need to come to grips with one essential fact:

Marketing is always manipulation.

However, the extent to which manipulation to buy through the use of product comparisons, nostalgia and reviews is unethical or even insidious has much more to do with the product than the marketing.

Joe Polish sums it up best when he said in a video that …

And so if the product is crap – and let’s face it, soda pop does rot your body – then the marketing of the product may well seem to be evil.

But if the product is awesome and makes your life better, than you may have had that experience of saying, “I’m glad I saw that ad.” And in fact, here at the Magnetic Memory Method Headquarters in Berlin, hardly a day goes past when I don’t get an email that starts something like, “thank god I found you.”

So even if the quality of products may differ, the tools of effective marketing – the written ads, radio jingles and video presentations that get you itching to buy …

These Tools Of Unabashed Manipulation Are Exactly The Same!

And so at the end of the day, you’re truly on your own. You can do nothing more than decide for yourself.

And that’s why guarantees are so essential in today’s world. Whether it’s Amazon’s 7-day return policy or the Magnetic Memory Method 1-year guarantee, not trying items is that interest you is relatively risk-free in today’s world. Just don’t be a jerk and ask for a refund when you’ve used a product and gotten value from it.

In the words of the Fonz and one of my favorite marketing mentors (Frank Kern) …

Always.
Be.

Cool.

And if you’d like to grab my four free video series and Memory Improvement Kit, then you’re more than willing to do that. I promise, I’ll improve your memory, not bend it.

And once you’ve done that, I guarantee that between now and the next time we meet, it will be easy-peasy for you to keep your memory 100% Magnetic.

The post The Darkside And The Brightside Of How Marketers Manipulate Your Memory Every Single Day appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

Memory is not what you think it is.

Whereas we often use the word “memory” as if it’s a singular, globular entity, memory is more than one thing. It’s a collection a multiple entities that deal with different kinds of information, even …

Information About Things That Haven’t Happened Yet!

First we have, prospective memory. Prospective memory is that wonderful device that helps you remember tasks you need to complete and events you’re booked to attend in the future.

The only problem is …

… prospective memory isn’t necessarily all that good.

For example, how many times have you forgotten an appointment, to take a pill, to wash the shampoo from your hair?

These slips happen, but even more interesting is how prospective memory tends to fail us most in areas that it should be the most reliable.

I’m talking now about routinized tasks.

For example, most of us do our own shopping. And yet, why is it that we so often forget items we need and know we need?

Even pilots have this problem. Without checklists, even the most routine – and absolutely necessary operations for flight safety – would be forgotten as easily as you can forget eggs or milk.

Spend One Dollar And Benefit From This Memory Exercise Forever 

For prospective memory to work, you also need retrospective memory.

Retrospective memory helps you recall information that you learned in the past. Your home address, directions to a restaurant or where you put your medication all rely on your ability to recall where things are located in space. Without this kind memory, even if you do remember to take your pills, you won’t have a clue where they are.

Prospective memory and retrospective memory work together, and it’s quite easy to keep them fit. Here’s a fun exercise:

Go to a dollar store and buy an object. It could be a ball, a pack of clown stickers or hair elastics.

Next, visit a friend and ask them to let you hide the object in the back of a closet or somewhere deep beneath a bathroom sink. The more of the home you must navigate to reach the object, the better.

In other words, don’t put your object in the hallway closet directly inside the entrance. Put it down in that creepy basement bathroom where a hole in the wall exposes all those rusty pipes.

Then make an appointment to come the next day, the next week or even the next month to reclaim the object.

When you get home, replay the entire journey in your mind. See the entire path from your home to the store to the creepy basement in your friend’s home.

At the same time, see the object you placed in the home and nourish that image. Make it big, bright and colorful. Infuse it with a crazy energy, almost to the point of bursting.

Then, use the Major Method in combination with Dr. Jim Samuels‘ method for memorizing appointments and associate the object with the date and time of the appointment you made for pickup.

To complete the exercise, keep your appointment and claim your object. Then go hide it somewhere else and repeat the exercise as often as you like.

Sounds crazy, doesn’t it?

Not really.

It’s the way you use to exercise your memory as a kid, after all.

Only back then, you called it a treasure hunt.

And Now For Another Episode Of The You Show On The Brain Channel

Having gone to the store and the secret hiding place, you now have a nice little story in your head.

Your ability to recall that story is called episodic memory. Always connected to time, episodic memory makes it possible for you to recall elements of your last vacation, going to the movies and just about any expanse of experience that features a beginning, middle and end.

Then there’s semantic memory. This kind of memory trades in general facts that aren’t bound with time (as such). Vancouver, for example, is a city in British Columbia, one of several provinces in Canada.

Of course, if you’re a historian and can rattle off the dates of when Vancouver was founded and when British Columbia became a province, then you might be blending in a touch of imaginary episodic memory,

For example, when I think of places like Vancouver becoming a city, a little flash of story enters my mind. I see stiff European dudes with quills and parchment tricking the Natives into giving up all that precious territory for a few bottles of whiskey and a stack of shiny dimes.

To take a more practical example, if you know that Vancouver is in British Columbia, Canada and Seattle is in the American state of Washington, and you’re also aware of the fact that a ferry runs between them …

… you can take the ferry and then use episodic memory to recall all the beauty you saw along the way.

But here’s the weird thing …

Episodic Memories And Semantic Memories Are Stored In Two Completely Different Parts Of Your Brain!

Do you remember that interview on the Magnetic Memory Method podcast with Dr. Gary Small?

In that interview, he told us that our memories go into different neighborhoods of the brain. In those neighborhoods are tiny little houses in which parts of memories live.

In order to simultaneously remember facts about places and episodes of time that you may have experienced, your memories have to leave their respective neighborhoods and come together in yet another part of your brain. It’s like having a family reunion where everyone comes in from different cities to eat at Recall Restaurant on the tip of your tongue. (link to tip of tongue podcast)

And last but not least, there’s a very strange kind of memory, a kind of memory that often …

Doesn’t Require Your Conscious Awareness!

We fall this mysterious form of recall “procedural memory.”

Some experts disagree whether it is a kind of memory all on its own, or a subset of semantic memory.

I don’t know about you, but the ability to ride a bike without thinking about it seems quite different than the semantic knowledge of how and why bicycles work as they do.

The same thing goes for guitar. Knowledge of where to find notes on the fretboard and how to form chords requires a different kind of memory than the procedural memory that takes over when some maestro is ripping it up on the stage.

Of course, even though procedural memory can be accessed without conscious awareness, episodic memory can intervene.

For example, your mind can wander during rehearsal or performance, breaking the flow of the song and causing you to mess up.

Likewise, bike riding on autopilot while daydreaming can cause you to sail through a stop light or crash into another cyclist.

And then these too become episodic memories. Like, for example, the time I was hit by a car crossing an intersection on my bike and how vomited into my mouth the last time I performed on stage because my joint pain had gotten so bad.

Fun Stuff All This Memory Business, Isn’t It!

It sure is.

And now that you know about these different kinds of memory, you are truly empowered. You can exercise each of these special memory types and improve them.

And if you use the Magnetic Memory Method, you can probably already see exactly how my unique approach to encoding, storing and recalling information lets you harness the power of each kind of memory you’ve just learned about.

But if you don’t know about the Magnetic Memory Method, why then now is your chance to avail yourself of my special Memory Improvement Kit and 4 FREE video series. Grab hold of the magic of these truly special memory techniques right here.

And until next time …

Keep Magnetic!

The post These 5 Kinds Of Memory Make The World Awesome appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

Wouldn’t it be great if you could experience memory improvement …

… almost on auto-pilot?

Here’s the good news:

Even if you don’t use elaborate memory techniques and mnemonics, the following 5 ways will help you improve your memory almost without effort.

1. When Darkness Falls …

Go to sleep with the sun.

Seriously. What have you got to do after dark anyway?

Netflix? How boring.

Drinking in bars? How destructive to your memory.

Playing Scrabble? Well … okay. That’s at least halfway good for your brain.

But the reality is that we’re killing our memory by stating up late and waking up early.

And when you kill your memory, you murder something else too:

You Murder Your Intelligence!

And as with all acts of murder, you will get caught and you will be sentenced to life in the prison of stupidity and forgetfulness.

Mark my word.

Next to getting more sleep, it’s essential to …

2. Keep Your Brain Moist As The Soil Of A Mighty Rain Forest

That’s a fancy way of saying, drink lots of water.

All too often we forget to imbibe the world’s mightiest drink.

Oddly enough, some people don’t even like it. This strange, but true fact is responsible for forgetfulness around the world.

But it doesn’t have to be you.

And if for any reason you struggle to remember to drink deep from the tap in your kitchen, the solution is simple enough. You can create a visual mnemonic by placing a big fat bottle of water on your desk. Or you can print out a picture of a bottle of water and stick it on the wall or window directly behind your computer.

In addition to this …

Use Every Bit Of Technology You’ve Got To Remind You

Smart phones …

Dumb phones …

Computer calendars …

All of these of these come equipped with programmable alerts. Most of them can be set to repeat every hour on autopilot.

It’s easy enough to ignore these alerts, however, so it helps to get theatrical. Instead of “drink water,” program in something like:

Drink Water Or Else All The Cats On YouTube Will Suffer One Thousand And Seven Deaths!

If that doesn’t get your attention, I’m not sure what else will.

Well … maybe this:

3. Funnel Words Into Your Mind Like The Wind Shapes The Desert

One of the beautiful things about living in Berlin is that they still have bookstores all over the place. Not only that, but you still see people reading books too.

Here’s a quick guide on how to read a book:

Buy a book. No, it doesn’t have to be a book by me.

Whatever you read, by all means read on Kindle or some other digital reader, but I recommend also holding a physical book in your hands once in a while. As this article suggests reading books instead of Kindles can improve your memory, concentration and good looks.

Reading in general helps improve your memory because you hold the details of a story in your memory over an extended period of time. You also retain and maintain details about characters, objects and locations.

But you can also deliberately memorize elements of the books read by using memory techniques. For example, instead of relying on bookmarks or dog-earing pages, you can memorize the number of the last page you read before pausing. This provides you with delightful memory exercise.

Speaking of which …

4. Get Your Fat Butt Into Gear

Exercise is one of the best ways to improve your memory. It sends oxygen rich blood to your brain and brings fitness to your entire body.

Awesome, right?

You can also use your exercise time to reminisce over the books you’ve been reading. If you’re not a reader, you can play movies you’ve seen beginning to end in your mind (link to breaking bad movie post).

And if you use Memory Palaces (you do use Memory Palaces, don’t you?), then what better time to practice Recall Rehearsal than when you’re out and about, huffing and puffing and sweating up a storm?

Exercise also improves your mood, and when you use memory techniques, your mood improves even more. Nothing feels better than combining jogger’s high (wiki link) with the edification of recalling foreign language vocabulary. Or mathematical equations, song lyrics, professional terminology, or whatever else wets your whistle.

5. Stop Rolling Like A Stone And Gather A Bit Of Moss For Once In Your Life

Meditation makes everything in life better, including your memory.

The problem is … most people have been misled by weird definitions.

For example, many people think that they’re supposed to sit like a stone. And like a stone, they’re not supposed to have thoughts.

No, dear Memorizers. No, no and a thousand times no.

As the great Alan Watts pointed out …

Sitting Like A Rock Is Boring, Useless And An Utter Waste Of Time!

Instead of eradicating thoughts from your mind (which is technically impossible), don’t bother doing anything with them.

Watts most famously said that the best way to practice meditation is to sit just to sit.

Don’t “try” to do anything. Just sit there on the floor. Let your mind wander. Be mindless as you sit and float around in fantasies about the future, alternate versions of the present and strange wishes about an alternate version of the past.

Maybe not the first time, but eventually you’ll wake up from the mindless fantasies that have your mind the vice of your grip. It’ll go something like this. When you’re sitting there, all of a sudden you’ll say …

Holy Moley! I’ve Been Sitting Here On The Floor Lost In Thought And Didn’t Even Realize It!

Nothing will prepare you for the enlightenment that follows. It might not last for long, but the edification you feel will stay with you and bring a completely new shape to the contours of your day.

Not only that, but the experience will be hard to forget. And then the more you meditate, the more you’ll remember that you’re seated on the floor, sitting just to sit. Your periods of mindfulness will lengthen and you’ll take these levels of awareness deeper and longer into your days.

And the more mindful you are throughout the day, the more you’ll pay attention. And the more attention you pay, the more naturally and effortlessly you’ll remember the events and facts you experience as you go through life.

How To Be A Memory Scientist In The Laboratory Of Your Mind

You’ve now had just a taste of some of the ways you can increase your memory by barely lifting anything heavier than a book or a bottle of water. In the case of sleeping more and practicing meditation, you don’t have to lift anything at all.

Go ahead and give these few simple techniques a try. Keep a memory journal as you experiment so you can analyze the results. By measuring what you’re doing and when you’re doing it, you can create a picture of your daily life and how your memory serves you throughout.

And analyze every Memory Palace you create. By taking time to go through them, you’ll deepen your familiarity with each and every one. Memory Palace work, even without memorizing anything, is great mental exercise.

But …

The Easiest Way To Experience Massive Memory Improvement Is …

… do daily memory drills. An easy and compact way to do this involves a tiny set of objects known as playing cards. All you need to do is mix them up and use the Magnetic Memory Method to memorize them in ever knew arrays of random order.

And if you want to learn how to do that, then I invite you to join the Magnetic Memory Method Masterclass. But start by grabbing my Free Memory Improvement Kit in order to make sure that the Masterclass really is something for you.

If the Masterclass is something for you, then I want you to join it.

If the Masterclass isn’t something for you, then I don’t want you to join it.

Nothing could be simpler than that, dear Memorizer.

And so until we touch base again, never forget to keep yourself well-rested, well-hydrated, well-read, fit and fully meditated. Oh, and of course, always …

Always …

Always keep Magnetic.

Further Resources

The Amazing Doctor Who Wanted To Cure His Patients By Memorizing A Deck Of Cards

The post The Five-Fold Path To Memory Improvement appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

Have you ever had a fact you know like the back of your hand stick on the tip of your tongue?

And has your presque vu (as the French call it) ever been so bad that a completely different thought came to mind?

And not only did that other thought come to mind in place of the one you were looking for …

It Completely Took Over The Show!

Never fear, dear Memorizers. You’ve been suffering something known as “the ugly sister effect.”

It’s closely related to what mnemonists and memory champions call “ghosting.” I prefer to call it “Magnetic fossilization.”

Either way, if you’ve ever suffered either of these problems, here’s the good news:

In this post, you’re going to learn …

How To Turn That Interfering Memory Into Prince Charming

The Ugly Sister Effect gets its name from the Cinderella fairy tale. In many versions of the story, every time Prince Charming tries to get hold of Cinderella for a smooching session (and perhaps a little more), her ugly sisters intervene.

Not very cool of those ugly sisters, is it?

The reason the tip-of-the-tongue phenomenon gets this name is because when this happens with your memory, there’s a competition going on. It’s a struggle between the cue that causes you to look for the memory in the first place and the target information encoded somewhere in your mind.

Worse, these ugly sisters are other information that comes to mind. So, for example, let’s say the song Big Yellow Taxi by Joni Mitchell comes to mind, but you keep coming up with Joan Baez’s Diamonds and Rust instead.

Annoying, isn’t it? Well, as great a song as Diamonds and Rust is, in this case, it’s an ugly sister.

Good News: There’s A Well-Known Way To Deal With This Problem

The method has two parts:

1) Don’t make a big deal out of it.

2) Carry on with the discussion or change topics. The target information will probably pop into mind shortly after, or at some point in the future when it’s no longer relevant.

The important thing to realize is that these …

Ugly Sisters Are Perfectly Normal!

Now, when it comes to the world of mnemonics, we use Memory Palaces to store information.

We do this by using crazy, weird and exaggerated imagery to encode the information we want to memorize. No information exists that you can’t work with using these procedures.

This fact isn’t to say that you can achieve a state of perfection in which your mind instantly creates the best possible associative imagery and snaps everything you want to memorize flawlessly into place in your Memory Palaces.

Rather, you’ll find that you need to massage different kinds of information differently. Sometimes you’ll use a Bridging Figure, other times you’ll use a cartoonish stream of images across several stations. You need to be flexible, which is why the Magnetic Memory Method is a method, rather than a system. It teaches you to respond to information in an inviting way, to cradle it, to kindly Magnetize it in a way that makes it willing to stay.

But here’s the thing:

Some People Want To Memorize Oodles And Oodles Of Information …

… but they only have a limited set of resources upon which they can base their Memory Palaces.

Well, no problem. On the How to Find Memory Palaces episode of the podcast, we talked about your endless fountain of Memory Palaces just waiting for you to claim them.

And in the episodes about virtual Memory Palaces you can find here and here, you can learn about making Memory Palaces based on nothing more than your imagination.

Or, dear Memorizers, you can experiment with reusing the same Memory Palaces over and over again.

But watch out …

Some Of Your Memory Palaces Might Be Haunted!

That’s right.

And when that happens, you might find yourself running into some Ghosts of Memory Past.

Memory champs and mnemonists call this phenomenon “ghosting.” But normal people use this term too.

For example, here’s part of a letter I received a few days ago regarding “images too vivid leaving ‘ghost images’”.

Here’s what she wrote:

There are Memory Palaces I reuse like an etch-a-sketch, such as the cars for phone numbers (I use the Dominic number system) or my office to remember a grocery list or even the walk to the local shops to remember a speech.

My problem is that the images from the last time I used that palace are often very vivid still.

I can still see Einstein on his surfboard for example (Einstein being number 15 as you know) so the next time I picture Einstein in the drivers seat I can still see him surfing then it all gets muddled up with a previous set of information.

I have tried using the alphabet or months of the year as placeholders, but the abstract letters are not as memorable as locations. Could I have your advice?

Thanks and kind regards.

Lydia

The first thing I would say is that using the alphabet raw for Memory Palaces is a good idea, but it’s going to take lots of practice. Better – or at least less abstract – would be to use playing cards.

For example, you could have an Ace of Spades Memory Palace, a 2 of Spades Memory Palace and so forth.

The linear order of the cards in this manner would serve as an organizational device similar to the alphabet. The advantage is that you can rest more on an Ace of Spades than on the letter A. This ease happens because the Ace of Spades and cards in general are more palpable.

If you’re going to monkey around with this approach, start small. Create a row of five to ten Ace of Spades and let them hover like flying carpets. Or if you prefer, lay them out on an imaginary forest path, a corridor, or whatever else feels right for you.

It will help too if you can somehow bolt these flying carpet cards to a distinct journey. So, using a process I teach in more detail in the Masterclass called the Telesynoptic Memory Palace, you can bolt the cards onto a preexisting Memory Palace station.

This procedure is more challenging than others. When you travel the journey, you now need to reconstruct both the original Memory Palace and the added feature of an Ace of Spades at every station to differentiate it from the original version of the Memory Palace.

As ever …

Practice Makes For Magnetic Perfection!

Using a deck of cards like this with your Memory Palaces is one way to deal with ghosting. But I believe that, for most of us who just want to get in with things and skip the radical experimentation, there’s an easier way.

Relax.

Almost all issues with memory work using mnemonics arise from tension in the body and mind.

That, and people like to get worried about future skills when they haven’t met the basics yet. Let’s discuss that together here:

So … how do you overcome the fears of danger you might be experiencing?

It’s easy! …

Just Relax!

Never, ever memorize if you haven’t spent a bit of time meditating, doing some progressive muscle relaxation and ideally, Pendulum Breathing.

Next, stop thinking about those intrusive images as ghosts or ugly sisters or any other negative term. That simply does not and cannot help.

Rather, think of them as wonderful, beautiful and thoroughly Magnetic fossils. They should be treated with love and respect at all times.

Why?

Because they’re living proof that …

You Can Learn And Memorize Anything Using Nothing More Than The Elegant Powers Of Your Natural Imagination!

Use those preexisting images to practice what we call in the Magnetic Memory Method Masterclass, “compounding.”

So instead of rejecting these glorious proofs that your imagination is happily assisting your memory by coding and decoding information, get that associative-imagery on the side of the new information you want to memorize. In other words, work on letting the old memories support the new ones. If Einstein comes up with old information, invite him to help you with the new. 

Compounding is especially powerful if you’re using and reusing Memory Palaces for language learning. For example, when I study and memorize Spanish words and phrases, I don’t have to rely on English alone to benefit from compounding and homophonic transliteration. I can also use, for example, the German words and sounds I know.

In fact, at least in my experience, German is especially helpful for creating powerful associative-imagery for Greek.

Now, all of the magic Magnetic Compounding creates assumes that you’ve correctly used Recall Rehearsal to get the target information from your previous pass through the Memory Palace into long-term memory.

If not, do that first before you use the power and the glory of Magnetic Memory Method compounding.

If, failing all these techniques, you still struggle with ghosting, ugly sisters, fossils or whatever you want to call them …

Get Down On Your Hands And Knees And Scrub Your Memory Palaces Clean As If You Were Cinderella

Seriously.

The same way you can use your imagination to create Memory Palaces based on real or imagined locations, you can imagine yourself with Pine-Sol or Mr. Clean and a mop. See yourself doing the work of getting your Memory Palaces fresh and clean for new uses.

Again, relax. Warm up with a bit of card memorization or the childhood memory exercises I gave you a few weeks back.

And then get busy. In fact, try everything I’ve talked about in this issue of the podcast.

Why?

Because nothing will help you more than one simple little skill. To practice it, all you have to do is …

Harness The Value Of Practice

That’s right.

Even if you struggle …

Even if you sweat …

Even if you strain …

And, yes, even if it causes you pain …

Practice is the only way to improve …

Even If You’re The Best Memorizer In The World!

There’s no turnkey, set-and-forget engine that keeps running once you learn and use memory techniques as part of your daily life.

No. What you’re doing is learning to play your memory like a musical instrument.

Leave that guitar or flute or tuba or whatever you want to play in its case for a week, a month or a year and you’re going to feel your talent slipping.

But practice every day and run your scales, arpeggios and chord studies every day with a few new challenges thrown in and you will always grow. At the very least, you’ll maintain your state and have the potential to push the limits of what you can do now.

Doesn’t that sound fair?

Of course it does.

So now that our exorcism of all those evil memory spirits and ugly sisters is through, I’m going to go watch Ghostbusters.

What are you going to do?

Further Resources

How to Keep A Memory Journal And Remember More

The post Beginner’s Guide To Overcoming The Ugly Sister Effect appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

Have You Ever Had A Past Life Experience? Do You Believe In Reincarnation? How Much Karma Do You Spread On Your Mummified Animal Crackers?

If so, it’s time we had a little chat.

And in this one-to-one between just you and me (sorry, no apparitions from times yore allowed), we’re going to talk about past life memories, past life regression and how regression is performed in a clinical setting.

The emphasis being on how regression is performed to give people the feeling that they’re remembering past lives. And to accomplish all this, we’re going to see how the entire notion and the culture surrounding past lives fits into the larger context of our shared psychological needs around the globe.

Oh … and I’ll even tell you about my past life experience too.

Warning: Reincarnation Can Make You Fat

A few weeks ago, we talked about The Surprising Truth About Hypnosis And Memory Improvement and some of the controversial issues surrounding the topic. For example, hypnosis can produce all kinds of memories, the quality and integrity of which vary. We looked at one of the most consequential ways that hypnotically induced memories play out: in courtroom testimony.

Like memories produced by hypnosis, past life memory is a controversial and highly unlikely topic.

At its worst, the ability to recall past lives is a sham sold in books, live or online courses and supposedly therapeutic past life regression hypnotherapy. Content creators direct these at the gullible.

For example, in Many Lives, Many Masters, Brian Weiss makes the claim that exploring past lives can cure all kinds of ailments, phobias and anxieties. He suggests focusing on clinical results and forgetting about whether past lives are real or not. Easy to say when your wallet is bursting with fees from patients seeking relief and willing to try anything.

Then There’s The Dark Side

On the opposite end of the scale, people have reported bringing back ugly scars from their regressions, or later becoming obese thanks to things seen in visions of the past.

But we certainly must admit that that past life regression and the memories it seems to produce may have some legitimate therapeutic value that goes beyond placebo and hypnosis. I’ll talk about my experience with descending into a previous life a little further on.

Helpful or fraught with danger, to be ethical, the hypnotherapist or “regressionist” must make it clear that the techniques induce dream­like fantasies, not realities. Past life memories, no matter how clear or intense, are mirages produced by the mind, not HDTV memories based on anything that ever actually happened.

How To Win A Million Dollars With Just One Of Your Past Lives!

And if you feel that I stand to be corrected, please let me direct me to the James Randi Foundation and the Million Dollar Challenge. They’ll be pleased to receive your evidence and reward you with a handsome sum upon reasonable validation of your material.

In any case, I see no reason to believe that past lives exist. And any value past life regression can probably acquired by other means without questionable sessions with a hypnotist. All the same, let’s look at the issue in detail and try to figure out why some people do believe in it. The reasons are fascinating, and we all stand to learn something from them.

The first thing we need to realize is that …

Past Lives Are Not About The Past!

No, no and a million times no.

Past life regression is all about the future. It’s about life after death and the fantasy that we never really die.

As I’m sure you know, your mind has a hard time conceiving of the planet without you. So at its core, past life fantasies drive forward as much as they dive backward to ease the anxiety that when we’re gone …

We’re Really, Really Gone!

In case I haven’t convinced you that past lives are really about the future, consider Karma.

Karma is an idea tied to notions of immortality and rebirth. Karma supposedly brings to the present attitudes, beliefs and actions from another time that you can “read” or interpret. Interpret these signs in just the right way, you stand to have an easier life the next time around.

Screw up, on the other hand, and continuous living is not going to work in your favor. You will suffer the consequences of being bad in this life in your next one.

Past lives and fantasies of reincarnation also fascinate societies around the world because these beliefs let people hunt for patterns.

People Love Patterns!

And there are certainly many patterns to find.

Look at literature throughout history, for example. Archetypes are everywhere, and for more on that you can check out the research and writings of the delightful Canadian scholar Northrop Frye. Here’s a decent rundown of how his theory of archetypes connects different kinds of human character with the seasons.

Patterns can make you feel transcendent because there is the oft­ cited saying that those who know the past aren’t doomed to repeat it.

But is it really true?

After all, haven’t all kinds of world leaders (both politicians and royalty) been schooled in history?

Can Knowledge Of The Past Really Make The Future Better?

Steven Pinker has some good and favorable points to make on the matter, but it’s still not at all clear that insight about the past helps anyone evade mishaps in the future. So many of the ongoing failures our leaders bomb us into should be obvious as chaps on a cowboy, but still we’re lead into quagmires our best schooled in political history should help us avoid.

Perhaps, as the Oedipus myth would have it, often evading fate causes us to construct it, something we see in memory as well. For example, trying to run away from troubling memories only adds fuel to the fire.

So recognizing past patterns gives us the illusion of choice. It gives us the feeling that if you could just recognize in yourself what you got wrong the last time, due to whatever deeply ingrained archetype, you could escape the wheel of suffering. At least for a little while.

But …

Does Choice Really Exist?

In Free Will, Sam Harris suggests that we can only describe the choices we make, but not explain why we make them. He gives, as an example, having given up martial arts at a certain point in his life, and then for no apparent reason, deciding to practice again. He can describe the transition in and out, but in no way can explain why he made those choices.

At best, we can only speculate about why we do the things we do and draw after­-the-­fact conclusions ­ with or without pointing to patterns and archetypes. But at the end of the day, the answers we give can never be more than compilations of possibilities based on self-­interpretation.

If Harris is right, then pointing to patterns and archetypes from previous lives is a convenient way for some people to give a “why” to the reasons they behave and make choices as they do.

In addition to creating the illusion of choice, belief in past lives also helps people satisfy the need to see the soul as something separate from the body.

Even though we now know beyond doubt that the human mind is the product of the body, people ignore the science. They prefer the idea that the essence of a person can float from one body into the next. Likewise, that soul can eventually float into some version of heaven and finally find a place in eternity. Again, we see that the attempt to access past lives is really all about creating visions of a future that features far greater certainty than the present moment ever can.

When Philosophy And Religion Should Send You Running For Cover

Nearly every religion and philosophical tradition has at one point or another featured reincarnation in some shape or form.

Some books you can read include:

The Principle Upanishads
Bhagavad Gita

These Hindu books discuss the need to develop spiritual knowledge and compassion for everyone in the world. Doing so creates illumination, edification and ultimately freedom from reincarnation.

From the Buddhist tradition:

The Dhammapada. This book is particularly frustrating because it contains so many parables and much centers on the idea that the truth cannot be known. We only get to have words about the truth. In this case, it appears that the words point to ten realms in the mind of all people, including Buddhas.

These realms undergo constant change as a person lives and acts in their part of the world. So the game is not so much about avoiding the repetition of wrong actions from the past but doing good things in the present so that more good things can come.

From the Judaic tradition, the Kabbalah talks about how a single soul repeatedly visits different bodies between visits to a different world. A Kabbalist is therefore someone who can sense this other world and in effect, live in both of them at the same time. To get to this stage of actualization apparently takes 6000 years, so if you’re happy and you know it… raise your hand.

As for the Greeks, they had metempsychosis, which is the transference or transmigration of the soul into another body at the moment of death. This process was not thought to be exclusive to humans. It could happen to plants and animals too.

In more recent times, the Western world has seen Theosophy and Anthroposophy. In Theosophy, it is said that reincarnation is not immediate, but requires intervals in a place like heaven. This heaven needs to exactly match the person’s vision of the afterlife they carried with them throughout life. (Probably not a good thing for many people …)

According to Anthroposophy, there are bodies walking with no soul. For whatever reason, the bodies did not receive a reincarnated spirit of a deceased person. Instead, they are occupied by demon­like entities.

In fact, the head of Anthroposophy may well have had a demon inside his body. Reports tell us that he threatened people who did not accept his ideas with violence. This fact, in effect, makes Anthroposophy a cult.

Weird.

How To Regress Into A Past Life In 3 Easy Stages

As you know, I studied hypnosis as part of my graduate research. One of the exercises involved past life regression, and the instructors taught us how to use it in a clinical session.

Hypnotic regression comes with strict guidelines. To treat someone using the technique, you need to have a note from the client’s doctor approving the procedure. The person must be absent of mental illness and not under the influence of alcohol.

And above all, as a beginner, you should practice under the direct supervision of an experienced hypnotherapist.

To prepare for hypnotic regression, it’s important first to create what hypnotists call a “yes set.” This technique involves a series of questions for which yes is the only obvious answer.

For example, you might ask in relatively rapid order, “Are you feeling awake? Are those new shoes?” and anything else that produces a yes based on whatever the hypnotist can perceive.

The idea is that when the hypnotist asks, “Are you ready to go into a deep state of hypnosis and regress into a past life,” the client has been primed to say yes. Magicians will sometimes set the stage for compliance using similar sleight­-of­-mouth tactics as well.

The hypnotist also wants to create rapport with the client to start influencing the client’s unconscious mind before the session has even begun. The hypnotist will hold their body as the client does, try to match the client’s breathing and speech patterns and essentially mirror them. Then, with rapport established, they will slowly start changing their behaviors. The hypnotist does this to “pull” the client towards them and into to a state of relaxation and hypnosis to go along with the verbal techniques of hypnosis.

Monkey See, Monkey Do

If this sounds woo woo, it really isn’t. We’ve all yawned after seeing someone else yawn and walked into traffic against a red light simply because the person beside us started walking. You may have even found yourself leaning in during a discussion on autopilot at the same time as your date.

We mirror and influence people in many ways all the time, and it is possible to engineer or at least influence the psychological states of others through body language. Actors and musicians do it to us all the time.

Next comes the formal induction. By this point, the hypnotist will have determined which style of verbal hypnosis they want to use language patterns to help the client achieve deep states of relaxation.

These methods can include guided visualization, music, aromas and touch. The hypnotist will typically continue to mirror the clients breathing in order to “pace and lead” the progression into deeper and deeper states of relaxation.

The exact language and procedures will vary from hypnotist to hypnotist depending on the suggestibility of the client.

Lifestyles Of The Young And The Restless

They may, for example, encourage age regression by asking the client to imagine themselves at younger and younger ages. They may ultimately have clients picture themselves back in the womb and then move into the immediate previous life or even further back.

Or, the hypnotist will simply encourage the client to let images from the past arise, seemingly of their own accord.

In therapeutic hypnosis, the material produced by the client is then integrated with the present, usually to help bring insight to a current problem or heal an ailment.

The stories that come into memory from the past may be pleasant or terrifying. If the memories have good feelings associated with them, the hypnotist may attempt to transfer those good feelings to a present ailment or concern and anchor them there.

Or if the memory is unpleasant, the hypnotist may use a variety of techniques to help the client be rid of the bad memory. Ideally, this expulsion will take the ailment along with it as the memory flees the mind and body.

In all cases, imprinting is the main feature of regression, past lives, reincarnation and Karma. Therapeutic past life regression, along with the others, is meant to create detachment and distance if not outright banishment of these imprints.

At its most innocent level, the person experiences cathartic transformation. At its most sinister level, forms of this practice show up in cult­like organizations like Scientology, a cult in which they have developed procedures and technology for exorcising imprints from your soul. Scientologists also have developed elaborate terminology to describe what is essentially past life regression performed in an interrogation room with two tin cans in your hands. Operation Clambake has some detailed resources if you’d care to learn more.

The Story Of Automatic Jim

By now, you’ve probably noticed that I’m more than a touch skeptical about past lives even though its clear than hypnosis can induce experiences in which you may legitimately feel as though you’ve made contact with a previous version of yourself.

I’ve had it happen.

Following the lessons in past life regression, we heard a fantastic testimonial. One of the instructors claimed he had established contact with a Japanese past life. After establishing contact, he instantly became fluent in Japanese without studying a single character.

Mercifully, he didn’t demonstrate any of his Japanese, so we took our lunch break and then moved on to curing phobias.

Following this lesson in erasing simple household fears, I hypnotized my student partner first to help him overcome his fear of spiders. As a matter of coincidence, as soon as he opened his eyes, he spotted a spider on the wall. He immediately scooped it up and let it run up and down his arm and all over his hands.

It Was Miraculous!

Well … not really. It was a small spider, after all. But he did seem genuinely transformed and delighted by his new ability to connect so deeply with a spider he’d only just met.

When my turn arrived, I elected to deal with my fear of heights. Now, I must admit that I broke the rules ­ naughty naughty ­ because I do have a mental illness and shouldn’t have been doing the exercise at all. And my fear of heights, at least at the time, seems to me deeply connected to impulse control.

All the same, what happened next astonished me.

At some point during the induction, I flashed into a vision so real and intense, it has barely diminished in the twelve years since it happened.

As I sat in the chair listening to the sounds of Spiderman’s voice, I suddenly found myself in the cockpit of a Vietnam fighter jet. Within seconds, my vessel slammed into another jet or helicopter, and I saw billowing clouds of fire as I fell into the jungle.

And that was it.

Except that wasn’t it at all. In addition to breaking out in a sweat and needing the main instructor to break me out of a near panic, I found that I knew all kinds of information about this fighter pilot. A man I had apparently once been.

I knew his first name, his age, the girlfriend he had left behind and what kind of car he drove. I could see his neighborhood, his high school and felt all kinds of physical drives normally foreign to me. I had never been terribly fascinated with legs, for example, preferring buttocks and breasts, but all of a sudden legs were driving me crazy!

In any case, I lived in Toronto at the time and had the neurotic tendency to avoid walking over the Bloor­-Danforth aqueduct (or Prince Edward Viaduct as Wikipedia insists on calling it). The bridge near Castle Frank station terrified me as well, even though there are many beautiful trees along that part of Bloor Street to enjoy.

But on that day, all fear tossed aside, I decided to walk home instead of taking the subway. For the first time, I felt no fear. I had seen what death was like and it bemused me that my fear of heights could be connected to the violent military death of some dude named Jim.

So what did I do?

I Wrote The Dead Dude’s Autobiography!

And to do it, I used self-­hypnosis to reconnect with Jim. Sat at the keyboard and tranced out from deep breathing and the hypnotic suggestions I gave myself, I allowed my fingers to type. Seemingly of their own accord (or Jim’s), my fingers produced page after page of semi-­narrative images and situations.

Because I was in essence practicing automatic-­writing, I called the piece Automatic Jim and eventually published it in an anthology of my (terrible) poetry called Lex Talionis Schadenfreude.

Of course, it was only a matter of a few days before the terror of those two bridges came back and I started avoiding them again. They’ve since erected a suicide barrier on the Bloor­-Danforth viaduct, so when I’m in Toronto I can enjoy the view of downtown when walking across the bridge, but I often think of the reprieve that Automatic Jim gave me from this irrational fear of heights. Temporary, but powerful and unforgettable.

Beware The Human Imagination

In sum, our minds are incredibly malleable. Just as a hypnotist can prime clients by using a “yes set,” I had been primed to experience a past life regression.

I have no idea why my mind produced that particular imagery, but as an avid dream journaler, I know well just how profoundly my mind produces incredibly complete and often reasonably well-constructed narrative fantasies. Plus, plane crashes have been a recurring theme throughout my life and the imagery often very intense.

And yet … never have I pulled from a dream so many facts about a figure at once so familiar and foreign to myself.

Thus, this experience demonstrates, not that past lives exist and can be remembered, but that context and priming can induce incredible psychological experiences.

Although I’ve since outgrown much ­ though not all ­ of my fear of heights, the therapeutic effects of meeting Automatic Jim were fleeting at best. The writing my experiences with him produced certainly has some interesting imagery and lovely rhythms. But at the end of the day, it’s babble and I won’t be offered a job as poet laureate anytime soon.

What Would The World Be Like Without The Irrationality Produced By Human Needs?

The issue here is that we all have a need for meaning in our lives, particularly when it comes to our problems. We want to know why we suffer and memory is an attractive means of finding explanations. Everyone from Freud to Madame Blavatsky, to the ancient Greeks and Scientologists have used memory as cures for real and perceived ailments.

And in far too many cases, hoodwinking runs awry. For in reality, humans have managed to revolutionize the world with computers that can remember keystrokes you made twenty years ago in a relatively short period.

But the fact that no one has perfected a means of accessing past lives in thousands and thousands of years of civilization suggests that there is no past to access when it comes to the human psyche. The old recordings we have are distributed throughout the media of sculpture, writing, painting, theatre and now film, video and virtual reality.

Whatever and wherever the past is, whether in humans or our processing machines …

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How Psychics Abuse Your Working Memory To Rip You Off

The post Reincarnation, Past Life Regression And Other Former Life Myths That Go Bump In The Night appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

To celebrate the release of a course I put together with Jonathan Levi called, Branding You: How To Build A Multimedia Internet Empire, we’re re-releasing an interview I gave on his Becoming a Superhuman podcast. So when you’re ready, hit play and learn …

How To Outsmart Forgetfulness Forever With Superhuman Memory Skills!

Jonathan: Hello Ladies and Gentleman, and welcome to the Becoming Superhuman Podcast.  I am your host Jonathan Levi.  For those of you who don’t know, I teach a course on a web platform called Udemy, which is one of the world’s largest online course platforms.  It is through that platform and through that platform and through being an instructor that I met my guest today.

Dr. Anthony Metivier is an experienced author, consultant and an expert in the field of memory and learning.  Dr. Anthony is a fellow instructor on Udemy and he’s been a friend of mine since I originally appeared on his highly rated podcast, the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast.  Anthony’s innovations in the field of mnemonics helped him teach people all over the world to exceed in academics, learning languages, memorizing poetry and a whole host of other amazing skills.  This podcast goes into a lot of different topics and Anthony and I cover a lot of ground from different mnemonics and memorialization techniques all the way to meditation.  So now I am very excited to introduce you to Dr. Anthony Metivier.

So Anthony, good evening, welcome to the show.  Thank you so much for making the time.  I had so much fun with you on your podcast, the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast.  It was one of the things that actually inspired me to do this show, and I want to thank you for that, and I thought it would be really fun to have you as one of our first guests.  So welcome.

Anthony: Well thank you for having and I know my audience of the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast really responded well to your interview, and I know it sent some people to your course so it was fantastic.

Jonathan: It did and thank you for that.  It was such a blast and I think the audience picked up on that.  You and I kind of having this mind meld, and we had a really good time and I’m sure we’re going to have a great time on this podcast as well.

Anthony: Yeah, absolutely.  I think people really respond to it too because it’s not really coming from MENSA or championship stuff, and nothing wrong with that, but it is more down to earth and real application to our studies and so forth from people who use it for those purposes.

Jonathan: Definitely.  Actually you have been involved in memory and accelerated learning for a long time.  Before I was and also before it became kind of a really trendy topic.  Maybe  share with our audience the story of how you got into this field.

Anthony: Well it was just happenstance and a very lucky one because I had been in graduate school in Toronto at York University and these hard Toronto winters and something wrong with my biology sent me into a real bad depression.  I couldn’t think and I couldn’t concentrate.  I had the weight of all these exams on my shoulders for my doctoral exams.  For people who aren’t in a PhD program now or have been, then they would know that there is these committees you have to go and sit in front of and they grill you over hundreds and hundreds of books that you are supposed to have covered, and I could hardly get out of bed.  So it was just a crazy time.

To avoid life, to avoid facing all of this and to avoid the horrid pain of cracking another book of obscure French philosophy with terms like architectonic tautology and just things that rattle your brain, I was starting to play with cards and magic tricks.  I could focus on that.  I could watch these videos.  I didn’t have to read a book or anything like that.  You don’t get far in the world card magic without coming across one of the holy grails which is a memorized deck and most people to some kind of trick.  It’s not really memorized but there is another class of people who actually memorize the deck.  There is a whole bunch of different techniques.

I thought no way this is crazy I thought I would never be able to do this because I can’t even read.  I couldn’t even read Harry Potter which is one of the books I had to read for a course where I was a teacher’s assistant and barely able to get out of bed for that.  I apologize to all of those students that I misdirected with showing up to class unprepared for Harry Potter.  In any case, I tried it and it was incredible.  It is like a light saber through all that fog and all the inability to concentrate.

That is what really hooked me on memory techniques.  It is irrelevant how bad you feel.  It is irrelevant how tight you are.  It is irrelevant how hungry you are.  You can actually just go to this place in your mind and these images that you have created and they are bulletproof so long as you’ve created them correctly.  That was real miraculous for me.

It has actually helped with a lot of concentration issues and a lot of mental confusion.  Those things are still there and I still have to take medicine for them, but these memory skills when used properly just do not fail regardless of what the mood may be or the condition.

I kept using them and studying and I have done hundreds of hours of research, thousands of hours really of application and figuring out the best ways that work.  Then through a series of mysterious and unusual circumstances I wound up teaching them at a school and I wrote them down for the students.  That wound up becoming a series of books and video courses.  That is how I got there.

Jonathan: Amazing, and I assume things kind of turned around in the PhD program once you kind of learned how to use and learn how to process all of that material.

Anthony: Yes, it got kind of ridiculous because then I was saying things like, “Oh, and by the way that’s on page 19.”

I think for everybody who gets into this stuff there is always a little bit of a showing off period.  Nonetheless, it was incredible because I would go to these things and just be able to recall all this information and really crazy stuff.  It is a funny story, but when I finally got to my dissertation defense, they call in a person from outside the University and outside the country if possible and he is called the external-external or she is called the external-external which means they are external to the program and external to the university.

Anyway he came and they were grilling me really hard and they asked some tough questions and there was someone who even wanted to fail me and I knew she wanted to fail me really badly.  At the end he said, “You know, you are cooler then Miles Davis.  You hardly blinked during this whole thing and all the stress that these people were putting on you.”  I didn’t know what to say.  I didn’t even really know that much about Miles Davis, but I just thought, “It was memory, man, that’s all it is.”  There’s nothing to be nervous about it all.

Jonathan: Amazing, and actually your Magnetic Memory Method rubbed off on me quite a bit.  You were one of the people who convinced me to start using these kind of techniques, the spatial awareness techniques to put it into my course and to use it in my own daily life, but maybe our listeners don’t know about the Magnetic Memory Method.  They might not be familiar with mnemonics and you and I are telling these awesome stories about them.  Maybe we can explain what the Magnetic Memory Method is and explain a little bit about how it works.

Anthony: There is a lot to it and I don’t want anybody to feel cheated if I kind of gloss over certain things but it brings together a whole bunch of elements.  The core of it is to actually use locations religiously and make the Memory Palace the foundation of all this.

Because there are so many memory techniques is there are stairs to heaven (in the Led Zeppelin song) there is just so many.  A lot of them just involve just making mental associations and pictures and they are just floating around in the void of your mind.  That never worked for me very well.

What always worked very well was combining the basics of memory techniques which are creating exaggerated images and then locating them somewhere so that they could be found and you essentially increase your chances the more that you combine location with these exaggerated images.  But then I started to go farther.  I thought what if we study this information in a particular way and break it down into components so that you could link sounds with parts of words and create images that are very, very integrally linked to those images and those actions that the images make.  Then they are in those locations and make it more and more powerful and it got to like Jedi levels of thinking about this and actually implementing it and applying it.

It is a bit involved to learn and it sounds almost insane, but for the people who use it, they get such amazing results.  It is incredible and I have just been super pleased that it wasn’t just something in my head but something that other people could use.  But there is definitely a formula to it and there is a recipe to it.

I specifically call it a method rather than a system because there is a need for people to adapt it to their own learning style in their own ways of going about things in their own homes in their own buildings that they are familiar with.  So there is universal principles that structure it, but there is a methodology that you need to adapt.

It is kind of like the difference between kung fu or karate and wrestling.  You have forms in karate and you have certain if-then, this-that kind of interactions with your enemy.  But wrestling is more flexible and wrapping yourself around and innovating on the fly and there is not as many rules as such but there is universal principles.  Just so that you could flop around like a fish when you need to and get the job done.

Jonathan: Definitely.  I am actually dying of curiosity.  How many Memory Palaces do you have? Can you quantify them are you in the hundreds or?

Anthony: Yes there is now 183 actually.  Last June was 175 and I added to that since then for some various experiments but there is a go to amount as well.  I mean I build some that actually never get used but the actual building of Memory Palaces is an important activity in and of itself even if you don’t use them because it just strengthens every other one you have.  It strengthens your understanding of how they work and what you can do with them and it’s just a great way of preparing yourself.  It’s like having extra bullets in your gun belt.

Jonathan: Of course.  So you are kind of walking around your city or cities that you visit and exploring buildings with that purpose?

Anthony: Yes, a lot of people ask me, you have this idea that we should be having dozens of Memory Palaces.  Where are we going to find them all?  I always just think, on my street there are still places that I haven’t explored.  There is like a clinic I could go into that I’ve never gone into.  So if push came to shove there is one, and that’s not to mention the dozens of buildings on the streets around me that I have never really gotten exploited.  Every time I travel and make special note of the hotels that I stay in because they are all perfect for their own little tiny Memory Palaces admittedly but they can be quite useful.  There is another good reason to use Memory Palaces that you build from travel and that is because when we’re in novel locations or new locations we’ve never been to the brain secrete something called norepinephrine that makes things a lot more memorable when we have this chemical rolling around in our brain which tends to happen when we are traveling.  Those can become super powerful Memory Palaces if you choose to focus on them in that way.

Jonathan: Incredible, plus the benefit of remembering more of your vacation and that’s a huge benefit.

Anthony: Yes, it kind of goes along with that feeling where you feel that you can really remember your first time in the city when you first arrived there.  Those first couple of days can be very impactful and that has a lot to do with that chemical.

Jonathan: Incredible.  On of the important steps for me when I kind of became what I call a SuperLearner was to understand the differences between working memory, short-term memory and long-term memory.  Now that we understand a little bit about how your method works can you give us an idea of how you managed to create memories that stick not just in your short-term memory, a month or two until you deliver your thesis, but also for years and years and years?

Anthony: That is really quite simple.  There is different theories and all kinds of things and one of the guys who had theories that are half-correct and half-tested and debunked and still very interesting one way or another is a guy named Hermann Ebbinghaus.

Ebbinghaus had these ideas like the forgetting curve and he basically suggested there is something called the primacy effect which is that if you were giving a list of words he would remember the first second and third words very well and then maybe the last three and four words very well but in the middle there would be this decay.

I thought about that a lot and tested it and it seems pretty well correct, but I thought there has got to be a way to hack this.  So if you had a Memory Palace for example and there were 15 stations you would experience that primacy effect.  The way to hack it is to actually go forward through the Memory Palace, go back through the Memory Palace, start in the middle of the Memory Palace go back to the front, and start the middle and go to the end, and the leapfrog over all the stations.  You do this about 5 times a day or for a few days.

I mean it sounds kind of weird to be doing this, but how many times you go to the washroom and you could do this with a list of really important information.  I mean that is just to be bulletproof.  You can do a lot less but that’s just kind the bulletproof thing if it really counts that you have this information.

It is kind of like being a spaced repetition software machine organically and not relying on external technology to do the repetition for you, but deciding what your list is or what kinds of information you are memorizing and actually visiting it intentionally and that is what is going to get it into long-term memory.

Dominic O’Brien has a rule of five but I think the rule of five is not enough.  It should be a little more rigorous like five times a day for five days and then after that, once a week for maybe five weeks and something like that and then you are really going to get it into long-term memory.

Jonathan: Wow.  So I know you have some very successful book for learning languages and poetry and again, you have been providing me mentorship and guidance in publishing my own book, but what are some other applications that your students use the Magnetic Memory Method for with success?

Anthony: Oh there is so much.  For instance, programming languages.  I know that is basically language, but the application is quite different in the sense that those are pretty obscure codes and whatnot.  Then there is mathematical formulas and just practical things with numbers.

A lot of people couldn’t tell you what their credit card number is for example and that is an incredibly useful thing to know actually.  The amount of time you can spend looking for your wallet and digging it out and going back to the computer and typing it out and getting it wrong, you know you can really change your life just by having your credit card number and the amount of time you spend.  Yes, there is all kinds of things.

There are people who have used some of the techniques that I teach in my Names and Faces course to memorize or get a better sense of locations that they had visited so that they can actually go and paint them.  That is been an interesting thing that I hadn’t heard of before.

Then there is just the general boost in the critical and creative thinking that.  People experience because of how the this opens them up to different ways of using their mind and their creative intelligence.  So it spills out all over the place.

Jonathan: Definitely.  Actually, that raises another question especially talking about creativity and I know some people think creativity is innate.  Others understand that it is very largely trained, but my question would be can anyone do this?  You know I have some strong opinions on it considering I also teach accelerated learning, but I’m curious to hear whether you have seen a difference in some sort of innate ability and all the students you have worked with or do some people just generally have a better memory out-of-the-box?

Anthony: I don’t know if anybody has a better memory out-of-the-box, but there seems to be that phenomenon, there seems to be that feeling.  I find that when you ask people who just have a “natural memory” they usually describe the process that is very close to what happens in mnemonics.  They sort of do it anyway without having to train.

It isn’t really the case that anybody has some special edge on other people.  Because, the people who win all the memory championships, they are as dull as doorknobs without those techniques.  They are all great people but they will always be the first person to admit that I couldn’t do this without those techniques I’m just a plumber or whatever they may be.

There is nothing particularly innate, but there is one kind of criteria I believe and that is actually wanting to achieve the outcome, and it seems being interested in doing the work and getting a kind of kick out of it.  Because if you’re not having fun, then I don’t think all of the cheerleading in the world is going to get you over the hump of doing something that makes you miserable.  I don’t understand why it would make anyone miserable, but some people just don’t have fun with it, and I have to accept that.  I’ve done all kinds of clowning around and jokes and fun and games and there are still people who don’t enjoy doing it.  I think that that’s really the great divide is having fun are not having fun.  That applies to just about anything.

Jonathan: Definitely.  One of the things that we added to our course was an explanation of Malcolm Knowles’ work.  This guy in the 1950s basically figured out that there are six requirements for information to get in and stay in for an adult learner and one of them is do they enjoy the material and do they have a practical application.  Which is to say, you know kids, a lot
of kids at a younger age will learn because they are told they have to.  With adults it just doesn’t work that way.  You need to know why you are learning it.  You need to feel respected.  You need to be able to tie to your day-to-day life and understand how you are going to use it or it’s just not going to happen.

Anthony: I think that there is two real things that this reminds me of with adults and not having fun with the memory techniques is because they don’t always completely understand why thinking about crazy monkeys cutting cheese off of the Statute of Liberty is going to help them remember something.  They also often feel very compressed and restricted, and they don’t allow their imaginations to produce that kind of imagery.  So they can be quite conservative and that is another sort of issue, but if they allow themselves to relax and have fun, then I think that they will find that their imaginations are much more equipped to create the kind of zany images that become memorable that allow you to encode information in order to have this kind of fun.

Jonathan: Right.

Anthony: It’s not that they aren’t fun it is just that there are a lot of barriers to finding them is fun.

Jonathan: I think, honestly, your method added a lot of fun.  You and I talked about it a little bit when I was a guest on your podcast and it kind of influenced me.  Since then, first off, I have a lot more fun.  I am personally learning Russian right now which can be to put it lightly not very fun.  But I’m having a lot of fun and I can learn usually about 20 new words in a 20 or 30-minute session.  I use is really fun outrageous visual markers that you gave me.

For instance the Russian word for open is открытый.  I think about myself with a migraine standing in front of a closed pharmacy just shaking my head in this absolute pain, or I can picture myself with a bullet wound, heaven forbid, and thinking the pharmacy ought to be open because it’s critical, right.  So with открытый and that’s been really helpful.  My question and I have a little bit of a personal motive on this, what about learning grammar?  I am struggling quite a bit with Russian grammar, and I’m sure you’ve overcome this in the many languages you teach for your books.

Anthony: With the exception of English I haven’t produced anything specifically about memorizing grammar, but the principles are more or less the same.  So basically if you had a Memory Palace you wanted to focus on some grammar, the first thing to do would be to figure out what grammar you want to focus on.  So instead of being overwhelmed by the giant engines of grammar you just pick one.  So for instance declensions of verbs or whatever, and then you start in one corner and you and you think about how that is declined for that particular piece of language and you follow that linearly.

In Spanish, for example, you have yo for I, and then you have tú for you, and then you have el or ella for he or she and you have all of these things.  You put those in corners and then you add the next thing.  You know what I’m saying?  Like you add what the next word part is.  So if you get to ellos which is the last of that list in Spanish then you would see a big sun.  So that would be ellos sun.  Or tú aires you would see a big statue of Aires in that location doing something really crazy.

Jonathan: How interesting.

Anthony: You know things like that.  I am just going to my own Memory Palaces for that and then you go to the next set of principles and you go to the next set of principles and you just lay them out.  In essence you make images to create the examples and you create kind of a crib sheet.  Then what you do is go out ASAP once you got the stuff in your memory and you start writing sentences.  You start speaking.  You start listening to the language every day and to add that memorized material to a flow of other encounters.  Because the more you include the memory techniques and the memorization process with reading, writing, speaking and listening then you create an ecosystem and things can get very fast after that.

Jonathan: Right, I definitely need to do that.  I hadn’t thought of actually breaking down the connecting words and stuff like that.  In Russian you have I think it is 18 different ways to say “this” which can be very challenging.  So I need to start creating these visual images for each one of those different variants it sounds like.

Anthony: Yeah, I mean that’s what I would do and I would have them patterned out against Memory Palace and then do that exact thing, forwards and backwards, from the middle to the front, from the middle to the back and then a bit of leapfrogging from station to station like one, three, five, seven, or two, four, six, eight and you will really get a lot of speed and quickly wrap it into midterm and long-term memory acquisition, and, then again, reading, writing, speaking and listening.  You can use all the memory techniques in the world but it is not going to lead to fluency without those other big four activities.

Why that I came up with this is because I am pretty good at those for other four activities.  The only problem is I can’t remember anything.  So it’s really been the magic bullet so to speak.  I mean it is a magic bullet that takes effort to take it out of your gun belt and put it into the gun enroll the chamber and point it at the target and shoot the gun.  That’s all effort and so forth, but once that bullet is spinning, I mean that’s as magical as it gets.

Jonathan: Right.  I had kind of a little bit, kind of not argument but disagreement with my partners when we were building our course because I’m of the belief that people need to understand how it works and people should understand just a little bit of the neuroscience behind mnemonics and how do they work and why does your brain respond to this stuff.  Do you think that that’s the case or do you think that it is something like with a good technology product where the confusion and the technicality should be hidden from the end-user?

Anthony: What I had the great honor to interview Harry Lorraine who people probably know that name.  He’s really one of the kings of the memory-training world, and I asked him the same question.  I said you talk in your books all the time about how people don’t care about the science they just want to know how it works.  I tend to fall on that myself.  Although I have had criticism from a podcast listener who said that I have deeply undercut my credibility because of how I dismiss science and the science of memory, but that is not technically true and it is also because I do kind of fall in that camp that if you’re interested in the science by all means go and study it, but it in and of itself is not the recipe to get results.

I mean there is no right answer to it but I know for myself when I am reading books and I start getting into memory books and they start explaining to me about why it all works and how it all works in the brain I just skip over it because one thing that is very important actually for people to know is that science is a process.  It is in process everything that you read about science is going to be improved upon, it’s going to be changed but what is not going to be changed are the fundamental techniques of how memory skills work.  They are ancient.

There are innovations that come now and again when somebody comes up with some things that other people can copy and use for themselves, they are pretty rare but they happen.  In principle but universal techniques are not going to change.  So again, I don’t mean to undercut science but I still fall in that camp that if you’re interested in it, there are loads of books about it, but if you want to get the results from memory techniques, the science isn’t going to change the fundamental techniques and they are not really going to give you some deep insight about how they work.

What is going to give you insight about how they work is learning them in using them and you are going to learn more from using them then you are about reading them.  There is more to movement than meditation and reading about the science is a form of meditation rather than taking action.

Jonathan: Interesting.  You mentioned that there are innovations every year in these techniques and I think that that is one of the interesting things.  Also you mentioned that these are thousand-year-old techniques and both of those are topics that come up in Joshua Foer’s recent book, Moonwalking with Einstein.  I think that is an interesting book because it has really brought to the mass public the techniques that you have been teaching for years or you know that the Greeks were using 2000 years ago.  What do you think about the recent popularity of guys like Joshua Foer or Ed Cooke, some of these memory athletes who are winning champions and stuff like that?

Anthony: Well I think it’s fantastic.  There is absolutely nothing to criticize although with Moonwalking with Einstein, if you go and read the reviews a lot of people are disappointed that he doesn’t actually teach the techniques.  He sort of glosses over them but it is really a book of cultural history and this phenomenon of what is sort of an underworld.  Not that many people know about memory championships and so forth.  It is a really interesting book and it has brought a lot of attention to these ancient techniques.

Ed Cooke also with Memrise and the things that he does.  There is a really great interview with him recently on Tim Ferriss’ podcast that I recommend people listen to.  At least the first hour, after that they kind of get drunk.

Jonathan: They end up in the woods as that podcast often does, but it is really enjoyable how Ed kind of walks through and he tricks Tim into memorizing this list of really ridiculous stuff.

Anthony: That gets back to the thing about having fun.  You’ve really got to trick yourself into doing it then you see how much fun it is and you get hooked and things really change for you.  I think that really what it comes down to, a lot of these people, not Foer or Cooke in particular, but the whole world that has been around for a long time and is just growing and growing, is a lot of people use the word system and there are no systems.  There are just methods that allow you to create your own system.  I think things would be a lot easier for people if more of these big names in memory would make that clear.  So that is really important.

I mean it has just been this kind of idea of it being a system since Giordano Bruno did his stuff in the 16th century.  I don’t know if people are aware of him, but he had these really complicated books that he wrote for royalty, or at least so that they would fund the printing of the books, they are always dedicated to royalty, and he just created these massive systems but he just says use these instead of here’s the principles behind how I have used these for you can map your own learning style and your own interests in your own homes on top of them.  So that is what a lot of these books have been about.  They have been about how the other person used them but not extracting the methodology behind it and making that is clear as possible.

Jonathan: I think you are absolutely right.  I think the actual nuts and bolts are much more obscure.  I mean down to like the nitty-gritty things like what kind of loci or locations or anchor points are better than others?  Am I supposed to be storing my memories on a bookshelf or can I put a couple of memories on the bed?  It’s like to really nitty-gritty details of okay great, I have built my Memory Palace, how do I actually use this thing and what do I put in it and where?

Anthony: Basically that has been the core of my success because I go into all of that stuff in detail.  I have written more than 1000 pages just with those specifics about can you use a bed, can you use under your bed, can you go underneath the sheets.  I mean every possibility I’ve gone through one way or the other and yet at the same time hardly a month goes by when someone doesn’t email me with some new application that they are using that I never thought of before.

Jonathan: It’s interesting.

Anthony: It’s pretty crazy.

Jonathan: I’d actually be very fascinated, I assume our audience would be as well, can you walk me through may be one of the first sentences you learned in another language and tell me what words are where out of curiosity?

Anthony: Sentences in another language.  Okay.  That’s interesting because I actually don’t normally memorize sentences, just vocabulary, then because I know the grammar it’s not that I really memorize phrase.  I’m focusing more on vocabulary so nothing leaps to mind, but I can give something in English because memorizing poetry is more where I would use that.  I will explain exactly how it works.

There is a famous little book called the Iliad by some guy named Homer.  This is a particular translation, this is Dryden’s translation, there are others that you will come across is what I’m about to say doesn’t quite match what you come across.  It says, “Of Peleus’ son, Achilles, sing, O muse, / The vengeance, deep and deadly; whence to Greece / Unnumbered ills arose.”  It’s not even the first sentence, but it’s the first major statement.

To do this I created a Memory Palace and actually I was memorizing it to demonstrate to a coaching client I had exactly how this could be done and I used her school, because she had the school, she still has school.  I used the coffee room where coffee is made and then decide that there is a wall that has a painting and then there is an office that I sometimes worked in myself and then there was a classroom and that’s all that was needed for this particular thing.  You want me to go through that and unpack that and how that works?

Jonathan: Sure, if you don’t mind.  I find it very fascinating.

Anthony: Here is where I have to actually, because you don’t really need the training wheels after a while, but basically what I saw was Brad Pitt who played Achilles in the movie Troy, and he is kicking a pail.  So “Of Peleus’ son, Achilles, sing, O muse.” He’s kicking the pail at the Statue of Liberty who is singing and she gets hit in the head by this pail which makes her feel vengeance, and she’s also at the same time digging in the dirt, “The vengeance, deep and deadly;” and throwing it at a map of Greece that has replaced this painting that’s on the wall in this school.  So “whence to Greece” and then I’m standing at this office door wiping away numbers on the chalkboard.  “Whence to Greece unnumbered ills arose.”

You might notice that I’m not accounting for every single word in that line but just enough.  That’s an important question that a lot of people have.  Do I have to have an image for every single word?  And the answer is no.  You just had need to have enough that you want to honor your mind and let it fill in the blanks.  You say potato.  I say potato.  You can fill in the blanks and your mind has that kind of ability so you give it space.  As beginners you might want to do word for word but it’s really just a simple image.  Brad Pitt kicking a pail of Statue of Liberty who is digging in the earth throwing the dirt at a map and I’m wiping away numbers.

Jonathan: I noticed you compressed those symbols.  We talk about this a little about this in my course create linkages between them.  So it’s not a statue of Brad Pitt and then a statue of a pale but rather Brad Pitt kicking the pail and that’s in one location in your Memory Palace.

Anthony: The real secret to it is it is a vignette that is strung along a journey and it has space in it.  A lot of people will try to do that same thing inside of a single room or inside of a single image as you are suggesting, but I think that the fluidity comes from giving it space and obviously the entire Iliad would require a lot more space than this one school would offer, but that’s just how it works and if you wanted to, then you could find all that space to do the entire Iliad and people do.  It is not unusual actually.  When you look into it there’s all kinds of people walking around with entire books in their head.

Jonathan: Well I think it’s interesting that you said “and people do” about the Iliad because people did and one of the things I found so fascinating about Foer’s book is he talks about some  researchers who figured out that most of Homer’s works were written and reproduced for so many years with Memory Palaces.  Just by the structure of the text they were able to figure out that you wouldn’t really write it this way unless someone was trying to convert it to a visual symbol, and the story would kind of double back on itself if it wasn’t being somewhere along the way someone crossed their own memory journey.  I think it is so fascinating because these books are known for being huge volumes, very long works that were actually committed for thousands of years to memory.

Anthony: Well sure, there was only eating, drinking, going to war and memorizing.  That’s all they had or reciting what they memorized.

Jonathan: It’s amazing as a species what we did before we had these tools that in a lot of ways help us but in a lot of ways, who even knows any of their friends phone numbers anymore much less credit card numbers or anything like that.  When I was a kid I knew all of my friends’ phone numbers and then cell phones came out.  So slowly but surely we have completely obliterated the skill of memory as a species and as a culture which is just a shame.

Anthony: Well, but at same time, what is so interesting to me is that it is at the same moment that we appear to be eradicating our memory through technology, that memory techniques have basically come into a Renaissance.  It is almost like a tidal wave has built the ship that will save you from the storm.

Jonathan: Well also in Homer’s time, someone was very lucky to come across one, or two or three or ten such stories, the entirety of mythology and stuff like that was just about everything they were learning, whereas today I try to read two books a month and I try to read ten blog posts and articles a day.  We don’t digest and redigest and reprocess the material.  We are really going for breadth more than depth.

Anthony: That’s true.  There was always a saying when I was a student that you are better off mastering one book than knowing 1000.  To the extent, and that is a bit exaggerated, but there is that question that I often think about when I read certain things is so much of what I am reading is either ignorant of or grounded in things that I already know from having a more traditional training.  That does come from knowing a few books really well rather than 1000 not so well at all, if you know what I mean.

Jonathan: Actually that raises another question, if I can kind of dig a little deeper into the Magnetic Memory Method.  I think there is two ways to organize.  Let’s say I do a lot of reading about programming and technology in general.  I can organize it by here is a book that I read and every single book gets its own palace or I could be grouping, right.  So any blog post that I read goes into a palace about Ruby on Rails if it happens to touch on that, just a just as an example. Do you group information book by book in its own palace or do you kind of take subjects and put them into their own palaces and many sources can feed one palace?

Anthony: Well it depends what is going on.  When I was studying for my dissertation defense for example, I made Memory Palaces per philosopher.  It wasn’t as if Jacques Derrida would mention ____ or vice versa that I would somehow have to have this big confusion of what I was going to do.  It is they just independent based on who they were and that person.

Incidentally those Memory Palaces had what I call a bridging figure and is bridging figures would be those would be those philosophers and just sort of follow them around through their adventures and to be able to recall the stuff.  But in terms of like branching out and having tunnels between this and that, I don’t deliberately build that because it builds itself anyway.

It becomes what I call rhizomatic which a lot of knowledge and education is taught in a top-down tree structure, so you go from the branches down to the truck and into the roots, but a rhizome is something that is more beneath the earth and spreads out laterally and can even pop up new bulbs in ways that don’t even seem connected to the original plant.

It can go up/down, left/right and center, diagonal and all kinds of different kinds of permutations can just pop out at anywhere, but I think that that is best produced by having kind of a grid that you don’t deliberately try to interweave too much other than you interweave it based on your understanding of the world around you using those buildings that you know to deliberately create well structured journeys and memorize stuff there and the actual connections will happen on their own.

Jonathan: That is super interesting.  Have you ever made a list on pen and paper or on the computer of your hundred and 83 Memory Palaces and what they contain or is that complete blasphemy?

Anthony: Again, that depends on what the project is and it is not blasphemy it is insurance.  It is actually the best thing to do because you are getting multiple modalities going at the same time.  Basically, you asked me before about midterm and long-term memory and this is basically one really great way to use paper and pen or your computer in combination with these techniques.

Let’s say you’ve got a list of 50 words that you want to memorize and you have a 50-station Memory Palace and you actually have that Memory Palace in your mind and you have it as an Excel file.  So 1 to 50 and it lists the station and it lists the words that you memorized and another column lists the meaning of the word (or one or two meanings, you don’t want to overburden it at first, you can go back and add later).  Then the next column has the record of the image you created.

As you are going along making your associative imagery, you make a record of it you can do it with a pen on paper or you can do it with an Excel file and then you are going to go and remove yourself from that source material.  No books, no dictionaries, no computer, nothing.  Just you, a piece of paper and a writing device, pen or pencil.  Then you reproduce everything from your mind and you go and check it against the record.

Jonathan: Wow!

Anthony: That’s the full-bore method.  Again, you can do this the forward and back and from the middle to the end and all those different ways that I was talking about but do it on paper completely from your mind and you are achieving multiple things at the same time.  You are deepening your knowledge of your Memory Palaces and your memory techniques.  You are deepening your knowledge of what it is that you are studying.

You are deepening your ability to use imagination, imagery and actions and you are deepening your discipline to actually sit and be able to reproduce information from your mind and then you are rewarding yourself going back to that list and seeing, oh my goodness, this is 90 percent correct, 98 percent correct, 88 percent correct and it gives you the basis to make corrections and go back and say, well that man hitting a cat with toast is really not working.  I have got to make that cat battle tighter or whatever and you can make corrections and that again makes you more imaginative and it gives you more exposure to what it is that you are trying to memorize.  So it is just a completely different way of approaching information and working with information that is fun and exciting and more interesting than just trying to hammer it into your head with pure raw repetition.

Jonathan: I think you have inspired me.  I’ve been working on Russian with the tips you gave me last time but I think I’m going to try to commit it to actual physical locations in a Memory Palace.  The only issue is Pushkin, who the Russians love to admire, and they have this saying that “Pushkin is our everything.”  Their language is what they are most proud of in their culture.  The guy knew 50,000 words, which is why there is a lot rumors about him similar to there were about Shakespeare that there could not have been one person writing this work.  So I am going to need to really start accumulating quite a bit of Memory Palaces.  Maybe one for words that start with O and one for words that start with P and so on and so forth.

Anthony: A lot of people think I’m pretty crazy for suggesting that.  But the benefit of doing that is you don’t have to learn 50,000 words because when you are using an alphabetized Memory Palace system you are actually studying how those language works in a much more detailed way to the point that you can just start guessing what words mean.  You are not going to be right all the time but your familiarity with the structure of the words and how they are patterned out develops really in this rhizomatic that I was suggesting.

So you can read quite easily and you know we do it in our own mother tongue anyway.  We read and go, “Oh, what does that word mean again or I never heard that word,” but you get the context and you just keep going or you make note of it and check it out later.  I mean 50,000 words in Russian would be absolutely fantastic but whether it is a requirement to understand Pushkin I don’t know.

Jonathan: I would be happy with 10,000 words at this point.  The words, like I said, are only a very small part of the challenge of such a complex language.  You mentioned in the beginning of the podcast memorizing cards and I happen to pick up as I was doing my research for this podcast, you actually just released a new course on Udemy on memorizing cards.  Tell me about that.  I’ve never actually had the motivation to do it myself.  I know how it’s done and some of the latest techniques in compressing but explain why someone would want to learn that skill, and why it might appeal.

Anthony: There are lots of reasons why.  It is one of those things, again, where it just sounds absolutely crazy.  Why would anybody want to do this?

Jonathan: Unless they are going to Vegas, in which case you know if you can memorize four decks of cards in order you might be in pretty good shape.

Anthony: You would certainly give yourself a small advantage, you know like maybe a 1 to 2 percent advantage but especially if you can do number calculation system as well like with blackjack.  I just gave that example from the Iliad and I talked about having space in between things.  One thing that makes my card memory a method rather than a system is unique is it teaches you to create that space between things.

It is not necessarily the fastest way to memorize cards and I don’t teach it as a speed drill as such, although you will get faster.  I teach it as a creativity drill and getting better at using locations in combination with images.  So if you are interested in memory techniques, that is one thing that it will help you do.  You can apply these card drills to everything else you want to memorize and it is something you can do for 5 minutes before you memorize foreign language vocabulary just to get the mind warm.

There is other benefits also just in terms of being something you can carry around with you to practice and you can get apps for it as well.  You are just studying how your mind is working.  You are thinking about your creative imagination.  .  You are applying your creative imagination and there is also so something to the repetitiveness of it.  So it is kind of like running where you get to a jogger’s high.  You train yourself to feel that and you can apply that feeling to other things.

Jonathan: Fascinating.  So it’s a very good way to practice the entire methodology in a standardized way.  Every deck of cards, you know, standardized deck of cards looks the same, has the same characters and so people all over the world I guess are practicing the skill and it is a great way to develop subsets of that skill that can then be applied to memorizing credit cards and phone numbers.  Is that what kind of what you’re saying?

Anthony: Yes and the other thing that is neat about it is it is a real nice combination of concrete and abstract things.  That is a really great thing to have mastery of especially if you’re going to learn foreign language vocabulary and grammar principles.  You recognize it, you know what letters are, you know what sounds are, those are the concrete parts and yet what their meaning is completely abstract.  So what is the meaning of seven of diamonds, nothing.  But you learn to apply meaning to it because you create it through a process into an image and by taking things that are largely abstract and applying imagery to them you get very good very fast at applying that to anything else.

Jonathan: Right and any new piece of knowledge, especially with foreign languages for example, you start out with something like the 7 of hearts that means nothing right now and needs to soon mean something very real and tangible and memorable to you.  So I can definitely see how learning to apply that would have huge repercussions, positive repercussions for anything you want to learn.

Anthony: The way I teach it is actually quite different than most people teach it.  So definitely explore other things and if you do listen to that Ed Cooke interview and see some of his videos on YouTube he has a completely different way of doing it and mine is less arbitrary.  So if you are into that kind of way that he approaches or the Dominick method of approaching it, that’s totally fine but there is a way that is much less arbitrary and based more snuggly on principles they can reduce some of that arbitrariness.

Jonathan: very cool.  So I really enjoyed it.  Actually the last time I listen to your podcast it happened to be in an episode where you shared a message that you had from a student who was really impacted by your methods and I found that (a) to be a really great thing to include in a podcast, but (B) super inspirational.  Do you have any recent stories that you have gotten our recent messages that you might want to share about some student’s success?

Anthony: I mean almost every day something comes but there was a student who was really stressed out about the exams that he had coming up and it was actually really nice he had never even really bought anything yet but just sort of cobbled everything together from my podcasts and he thanked me and he said, “I got 98 percent on this test and it was just unbelievable.”  Then he bought my Master Class (www.MagneticMemoryMethod.com) which is not on Udemy but its own separate thing and it was just kind of like this big thank you because of the results that he got from the Magnetic Memory Method.

Yes, there is people all around the world.  I heard from a guy in Italy who is just super happy that he is making so much progress with the dictionary that he got.  I suggested that he look at a particular kind of dictionary that he was able to find.  It is just incredible.  I heard from a law student today who is working on Latin and in order to get a better understanding of the law and he is doing really great.  He is even teaching this approach at school now and the dean has invited him to give a presentation about it.

It is really just spreading like wildfire, this particular approach which is great.  I am very happy that if it’s just even gets interest in memory techniques in and of itself.  Because to me that is really the most important thing is that people just start to see the magic and the power of this and just do something because there is so much suffering in the world that has to do with memory and there is so much opportunity that is lost because people cannot achieve their goals without it, and that suffering is simply just not necessary.

Jonathan: Definitely.  I also struggled a great deal through high school.  To a larger extent, you know when a lot of the memory stuff was happening with when I was a lot younger.  I just suffered and suffered through history class and through math class largely because of memory.  There is no real teaching of this in academia which I just find mind-boggling.  Nobody ever stopped and explained to me that I needed to create visual memories not until after college.  I was lucky to run into someone like yourself who is an expert, and I tell the whole story kind of in my courses, but I just think what if I had never encountered this and I went through my entire life thinking that there was this huge barrier to learning.  Today I am learning how to podcast, and I’m learning how to blog, and I’m learning all this different kind of stuff that it doesn’t faze me at all to approach a new language in my free time because learning has become this fun, friction-free process, and I just think what a shame that people think they have to suffer to learn.

Anthony: There are all kinds of theories about why schools exist in the first place.  I don’t necessarily want to get into that.  For anybody who is suffering with school, know that there is a light at the end of the tunnel and you can start using these things now to make your school experience a whole lot more enjoyable if you are still somewhere in the middle of the road.

Jonathan: Definitely.  I have also heard from a number of my students, if you are dealing in and at traditional academic setting where concessions are made for the fact that learning is very hard for people who do it wrong to be kind of not politically correct.  Once you start using these kind of techniques, the kind that you and I both teach, it becomes like fishing with dynamite.  At least 98 percent test results are pretty common among people who know how to apply the proper methods and I just think that is so much fun that you probably have students all over the world who are setting the curve and really angering their classmates and it is simple stuff that is accessible online and takes a little bit of training.

Anthony: I think that thing about angering their fellow classmates, one thing that I always try to do in just about every message that I send if you have learned something from this is pass it on because two things happen.  You get better at them, because something taught is something learned twice and you also get to help those other people.  There is no competition in the world.  People who are tied up in competition are really just hurting themselves.

But fishing with dynamite is a great metaphor and I think that also raises the important thing that you and I as teachers, and if you do take up these skills, becoming a teacher of them is that we really need people who know how to fish and are not waiting for fish to land in their boat.  That has really been my great passion in and how I approach teaching in terms of showing how it is done rather than getting a lot of examples on how to do it.

Jonathan: Definitely and that is without a doubt one of the most rewarding if not the most rewarding part of teaching is forget the ego boost, forget all of that stuff is when you get an email from a kid who has been seeing a psychiatrist for years and years about severe ADD and stuff like that and all of a sudden gets to stop seeing that psychiatrist.  The psychiatrist cuts him back to once every 2-month meetings because hey, you are getting 90 percent on all of your exams and you are not having suicidal thoughts before every exam.  That is a really impactful thing.  So what is next for you if you do not mind sharing, what are you working on?

Anthony: I am about to release a book on sleeping.

Jonathan: Really?  That is actually another topic that you and I share a lot of interest in.  Do tell.

Anthony: Well it is probably one of the more unique books on sleeping that is out there.  I’ve certainly never encountered anything like this and I have been using it for years.  The book, and it will eventually be a video course, is called The Ultimate Sleep Remedy, How To Fall Asleep Anytime And Anyplace With Ease, The Life-Changing No-Nonsense Rapid Results Guide To Getting A Better Rest And More Sanity In Your Waking Life which is one of these great long titles.

Jonathan: I was going to say do you have a Memory Palace to remember the title when people ask you at cocktail parties?

Anthony: Well you have to when you write titles that long.  Basically, one of the things about a lot of sleep remedy books and training and stuff like that is if they tell you shouldn’t stay in bed if you can’t sleep and go out of bed until you feel tired and then go back to bed.  That is something that I have found that is true to a certain extent, but there is a better way.  I talk about that.

The other thing is that there are all kinds of sleep rituals.  Like brush your teeth at the same time and go to the bathroom 2 hours before you sleep or whatever.  We are not robots.  Nobody is going to brush their teeth at the same time every night.  What we need is the ability to lay down in bed and fall asleep.

So what I teach is being comfortable lying in bed no matter how painful it is to sit there and not be able to sleep and learn to be comfortable in that situation.  That is the true path to sleeping at will basically.  Is just to think about sleep completely differently and think about lying in bed differently.  I wrote a whole book about it.

Jonathan: Amazing!  I have two questions on that.  The first is do you think you can teach to fall asleep sitting up because I’m one of these guys if I am not lying on either my stomach or my side it’s not going to happen which makes long haul flights absolutely miserable.

Anthony: Well yes, I think this would work for sitting up and I have sort of used it that way in terms of just being generally relaxed but not as a sleep remedy but I am sure that it will address that need as well.

Jonathan: My second question, and you’ve already sold me, my second question is are you a believer in in biphasic or polyphasic sleep?

Anthony: I don’t know that much about it and I’ve done some reading about and experiments and so forth.  But again, it’s kind of one of these things where I’m personally not such a person that has such rhythms and to even try to get on the surfboard and let alone ride the wave is just going to be not something that I would gladly happily do and just the rhythms of my day don’t respond it.  It would just be a losing battle to do that kind of like hacking.

Jonathan: I have found, specifically in grad school, I found that the nap worked really well but anything above that, you know getting into the two, three, four naps a day just completely wreaked havoc on my lifestyle.  So I thought I would ask if you similarly had experimented with it.

Anthony: Well I certainly have used napping but there is a moment in napping where your brain will start to secrete chemicals that put you into the position of longer-term sleeping so that is why you often feel hung over and worse off than when you went to sleep.  I think that meditation has always worked better for me.

Jonathan: You read my mind.

Anthony: But again, it is not like with the clock, ding-ding time to meditate or anything like that.  I think that the real power with meditation is actually to meditate all the time.  It’s like nonstop shopping.  You just develop a kind of awareness and of course that awareness is broken but you can get it longer and longer and longer and become more conscious and aware for greater lengths of time and then combine that was sitting.  I always loved Alan Watts’ idea of sitting just to sit and as being the ultimate meditation.

Jonathan: When you say sit, I mean a lot of meditation enthusiasts use the term “sit” and they actually mean sit meditation.  I get the sense that you mean just sit quietly eyes open kind of thing?

Anthony: Yes, because basically what happens if you sit just to sit, then you are going to fall into those other sorts of techniques and strategies anyway.  You are going to sit there and you are going to be aware eventually that you are just sitting there and you will start to laugh or whatever and you will come into basically “enlightenment” and the enlightenment is only 5 minutes away.  It is just sitting just to sit and just wait for something to happen.  Don’t move until something happens and you will know enlightenment very quickly.  At least that is my feeling and I have developed it to a certain thing but I just love these moments were I am just walking around the streets and I went shopping or whatever and I suddenly catch myself not present at all and I just start to laugh because it is just the most hilarious thing to be mindless.

Jonathan: Yes and it is the most common thing on the planet as well.  I think in a vast majority of people just by the way we live our lives we spend a lot of our time even once we are aware of presence and mindfulness, we spend the vast majority of our time caught up in a lot of minutia that pulls us out of kind of our present state.

Anthony: There is no one who is free from it but there are varying degrees of freedom and it is definitely worth cultivating because it can really change your life in some very powerful ways.

Jonathan: And your brain, which I think is really interesting and they are starting to do a lot more research.  I have my ticklers that send me whenever there is new research about this but they are really starting to understand the neurological changes caused by meditation and presence and even stuff like positive affirmations are literally changing the mechanical structure of your brain.  I think that for anyone who is taking anti depression medication or attention deficit medication that is a really exciting prospect like I can sit for 20 minutes a day and I can change my neurochemistry for free.  That has got to be one of the most exciting things happening in science to me.

Anthony: It is actually pretty amazing because you can get free opium and all you have to do is sit for 20 minutes to get it or even shorter periods of time.

Jonathan: Right, without the withdrawal

Anthony: In fact it is totally without the withdrawal.  It has the opposite effect.  It is give me more withdrawal whatever.

Jonathan: You sit, and when I say sit I mean meditate, eyes closed, focus on breathing kind of thing.  Do you sit every day?

Anthony: I do all kinds of things.  So I will sit.  One of the most powerful medications that I ever learned was the corner exercise which is just to find the corner of something and look at it and then start to be able to look at the space around it and see that air is really a kind of Jell-O that is pushing against everything and that object is pushing against the Jell-O and it is just kind of a neat way to blend yourself into presence in the room and think about that air pressing upon you as kind of like really a Jell-O.  Air is an object and in and of itself an object filled with many objects.  So I will do that and I also do certain kinds of breathing when I feel like it or I don’t and I really like something called psychic nostril breathing which is without using your finger to hold down a nostril, you just imagine the air is coming up your left nostril and out your right nostril and then up your right nostril and out the left nostril and you just sort of cycle that.

Then you can combine that with something called Pendulum Breathing.  Pendulum Breathing is breeding in and then breathing in again and breathing out and breathing out again and you swing your breath that way and you combine those two things together, it’s a little bit like syncopated drumming, but once you get used to it is just an incredible thing in and of itself and you don’t do it for any kind of end goal.  You do it just to do it while you are sitting just to sit in the most incredible things happen.

Jonathan: Right.  I think that is really cool because a lot of beginners, myself included, start with a very common meditation practice and you are supposed to sit there just focus on your breathing and inevitably your breathing is not very interesting.  So I like the idea of making it a little more interesting.  Sometimes my breathing won’t captivate my attention so I will listen to
our feel my heart rate but I will definitely try that out, in twice and then out twice.

Anthony: What do you think about combining meditation with technology?

Jonathan: You know I have mixed feelings about it.  On the one hand you have this very pure beautiful practice that is estimated to be about 5000 years old.  In a lot of ways it shares that characteristic with the Memory Palace.  You don’t need a technological innovation to use a Memory Palace.  It is something that we as humans have kind of inherited down from ancestry and I think there is beauty in that.  On the other hand, I think it is an amazing way to connect to millions of people and if you look at an app like Headspace or Calm, these apps are all over the news and they are raising awareness and they are creating what some people call the mindfulness revolution.  I think that is great.  I personally got into meditation because someone told me to try out Headspace and I tried their 10-day trial, at which point I decided that, no matter how lovely Dr. Andy’s accent was, I’d probably be better off with just some noise isolating headphones.

But I will tell you one piece of technology that I’ve been very excited and very disappointed by is kind of home ECG.  So I have this had been sitting here that is supposed to measure my brain waves and tell me how I am doing and help me understand the changes in my brain.  How are my alpha waves changing?  How my delta waves changing over time?  I think that is really motivating and really exciting.  The technology is definitely not there yet and I’m looking forward to a time when that will be there.  But I don’t know what you think about it?

Anthony: I am not that big of a fan either but there is some benefit to it sometimes.  I really like an app called Stillpoint, which plays three different kinds of sounds and you can mix them.  So you have like a baseline, not a bass guitar line, but a baseline sound and then you can add like some sort of heartbeat or something like that and then you can add a periodic ohm are periodic tootle-lou or whatever.  You’ve got different options and when my mind is really sped up, sometimes I will go to that because it is just really pleasant to listen to and really does provide a point of focus that I may not be able to give for myself.

Jonathan: Interesting.  Is it a little bit like binaural beats?

Anthony: Yes, except for without the binaural stuff.  I mean I don’t know, to tell you the truth, I didn’t memorize the packaging when I got it but it really struck me as being quite interesting because it wasn’t really in that sort of fringe of science and I’m not that studied in what research they have done but it was just kind of like this is just sounds that you can put together to help you focus and no real claims above that were beyond it.

But you reminded me of something when you mentioned 4000 years of meditation and a lot of people think the Memory Palace technique came from ancient Greece but the reality is that it did, except for that it also came from the ancient East and a lot of the Buddhist meditations used location-based memorization.

Jonathan: Really!

Anthony: For example, I learned a meditation one time and I thought man this is a Memory Palace.  I mean it is one of those specific meditations where you are not just sitting to sit but you are actually doing stuff.  The teacher said imagine that you are in this temple and at this particular location there is a bridge and as you walk across the bridge you see all these people at the bottom of the bridge and they are throwing stones at you trying to make you fall down.  At the other end of the bridge you are at a party and everybody is cheering you on and offering you food and wine.

Then over at this corner of the temple imagine this big black dog and that dog is always chasing you and that is the representation of death, and then it went on and on.  I remember this because I am going through my mind right now thinking of all these things.  This is 10 years ago that I had done this meditation and so all of these things represent stuff.  Like the people throwing rocks at you are reminding you to remember all of the people you dislike or that you consider his enemies and forgive them.  The people at the party are also your friends but you forget them they are trying to poison you with all the good stuff or whatever.  And the dog is death literally always behind you and you practice the meditation realizing that death is coming.  It is a Memory Palace basically.

Jonathan: Fascinating!

Anthony: And that meditation is thousands of years old.

Jonathan: Amazing!  So Anthony I don’t want to take up too much of your time.  I know you are quite a prolific man and you have very much lived up to your Miles Davis nickname from your PhD dissertation.  I know you are doing books.  You are doing podcasts, Udemy courses.  You also have a Master Course that apparently I really need to check out.  If listeners want to learn more about you or maybe start training in the Magnetic Memory Method, where did they start finding all this different material?

Anthony: Well, what I would really like to do is give listeners to your podcast some worksheets and a free video series which you can find here.

Jonathan: Awesome, that would be perfect.  I know that there is so much different stuff that you have put out there and you know thousands of pages on whether or not I should be storing Brad Pitt in my bed that I would love to speed read through so I’m actually going to check that link out myself.

Anthony: Yeah you’ve just got to decide above the sheets, below the sheets or

Jonathan: I think it depends if it is a female listener or a male listener.

Anthony: Yeah, but for people who are listening to this and who are really interested there are worksheets and there are videos that will make it a lot more concrete and you can see what is going on.

Jonathan: Awesome and we are going to put up notes to all the different resources, some of which I’m going to research myself, different links we talked about, books, stuff like that, it will all be up on our website.

Anthony: Cool.

Jonathan: Awesome.  Anthony thanks so much for your time it has been a real pleasure as always chatting with you.

Anthony: Well thank you and keep up all the good work and I can’t wait for the next time.

Jonathan: Awesome take care.

Further Resources

Jonathan Levi’s Becoming A Superhuman Podcast

Download the transcript of this interview as a PDF

The post How To Develop Superhuman Memory Skills appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

The thought of memory improvement excites you, doesn’t it?

But then you start reading all the books and watching the videos and within seconds …

Improving your memory suddenly starts to feel like a lot of hard work!

It’s understandable. Using a Memory Palace, associative-imagery and practicing Recall Rehearsal can be tough. It involves a lot of moving parts. But if you’ve gotten hold of my free Memory Improvement Kit, then you know that in reality, it’s actually pretty simple.

But if you’re not interested in beelining directly towards total memory mastery, no sweat. Here are three games and exercises you can play starting today. They will exercise your memory, move the muscles of your imagination and renew access to parts of yourself you’ve probably long forgotten.

Warning!

Before we get started, you’ll need something to write with. And what you’re about to experience could well change your life forever. (In a good way, of course.)

And when I say write, I mean “write.” Sure, you can play these memory games by writing in Evernote or whatever. But don’t. You’ll get more from them by using old-fashioned pencil and paper.

You can also use your mind on its own too. These exercises can be completed while daydreaming on a park bench or wherever you find yourself.

But with writing, the pages you fill will prove to you that your mind is a vast place with many recesses. And you’ll enjoy the exercise more when you see what emerges from the depths of your imagination.

Plus, you’ll be able to feel the weight of your memory in the paper on your hands. And that is a sensation you can’t get from any app in the world. (Though a device that gets heavier the more information  it contains could be a fun option for those who want to go on a data diet!)

Do These Things Now If You Want To Improve Your Memory Without Sweat, Blood Or Tears

1. Make a list of all the places you can remember visiting.

Start local and go back as far as you can remember. For example, here are some of the first places that I remember visiting:

• Where my dad used to train his duck hunting dogs
• The farm at Tranquille where my mom used to work
• A chocolate factory we visited on a field trip in Kindergarten

Immerse yourself in these memories. Think about colors, smells, textures. Recall the people you were with and call up as many people as you can.

Then you can start listing other towns and cities. Again, go as deep into the past as you can. I remember flying to Prince Rupert with my dad where he bought me cowboy boots.

Get All The Memory Guidance You Need From Someone Close To Home

Next, take these early memories and ask someone in your family to give them your version. When I press my memory for sensory detail, I remember nothing of the flight. But I do have glimpses of how the city looked, and I can smell beer on my dad’s breath.

For bonus points in your own memory play, move from the deep past up until the present. And do your best to establish a linear time line so you have a feeling for the chronology.

But at this point …

Don’t Worry About Exact Dates …

… except for seasons if your sensory memory provides them.

For example, in my first memory of watching my dad train one of the dogs, he’s wearing the white sweater my mom knit for him.

Although there was no snow on the ground on those mountain plains, white clouds were shooshing from the dog’s noise as it ran after the dummy. And I remember my dad letting me the starter pistol and how cold it felt in my hand. These details make it safe to assume it was Fall.

Once you’ve gotten your sensory details gathered, come back and add dates if you wish for an extra memory massage. For that you should learn the Major Method for memorizing numbers.

Or you can proceed the next of our memory games:

2. Recall the names of every classmate you can remember.

Again, go as deep into the past as you can.

From preschool, I remember Ryan and Clayton. Ryan moved away with his family in grade one, but I would know Clayton for many years to come. I believe the last time I saw him was grade nine, and we’ve only had a quick series of exchanges on Facebook since.

For each friend you can remember from this deepest place …

Fill In As Many Sensory And Narrative Details As You Can …

Recall their homes, their parents and your activities together.

With Ryan, I remember a white house at the top of a lawned hill with a backyard with white wood fences on either side and a chicken coup at the back. We played downstairs, and he once proudly displayed an American dollar. His mom worked for the Buy & Sell newspaper, and I distinctly remember eating tomato soup.

With Clayton, I remember much more. It would take a novella to write it all out, but I find sharp highlights in my memory. These include building blanket tents, watching Chuck Norris movies during sleepovers, going to the pool, smoking cigarettes for my first time and once getting our bikes taken by weird apple orchard farmers for trespassing.

Later our bad-ass dads, both bikers, spun by on their Harleys and sorted things out. Clayton’s bikes were always cooler than mine, but I was happy nonetheless to get mine back.

Amazing, Isn’t It?

There’s a ton of detail tumbling around in the depths of my memory. And yours too!

But the point of all these examples isn’t to wow you with the details of my life. I mean only to show how much amazing information lays dormant in your mind. Do a little spade work and when you hit a pipe, you’ll be amazed by the valuable oil that gushes out.

And your memory will get an easy workout. The exercise will expand your sense of place and time. And the more friends and classmates you list, the more you’ll enjoy the wines of those times you haven’t thought of forever.

3. Recall the Rules of Childhood Games

First, list all the games you can remember playing:

• Tag
• Hopscotch
• Hide and go seek

Although with these games, there’s not a huge amount of rules to remember, you can still pull up sounds, sensations and locations.

You may also recall different versions and hear the sounds of your playmates in your ears.

Then move on to card games and board games:

• Go Fish
• Monopoly
• Uno

I can distinctly remember the friends of my parents visiting to play Uno. The sensory parts are easy, but it’s a workout to remember the rules. Plus, it’s inspiring to think  about how on earth I could have understood those rules at such a young age.

From there you can list video games and role playing games. I remember Pong as the coolest thing on earth,  Chuck Norris and Tron for Coleco, Pacman and Space Invaders for Atari and Contra for Nintendo.

The list goes on and on. The more you press your memory for the details and rules of each game, the more fitness your memory will receive.

Did You Like Learning About These Games?

I hope so.

Obviously, these are memory games you can come back to again and again. And it took me less than an hour to draft what you’re reading now. Just think of what you can do yourself in a cafe some afternoon using nothing more than a pen, pencil and that special thing called memory floating between your ears.

Want to learn more about how to improve your memory? Check out this FREE Memory Improvement Kit and learn how to build a Memory Palace so you can learn, memorize and recall anything at any time, anywhere and under any circumstances.

Further Resources

How to Teach Your Kids Memory Techniques

3 Simple Exercises That Make Your Life Worth Remembering

5 Brain Exercises That Ensure Memory Improvement

The post 3 Memory Games You Can Play With Your Childhood appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

How Much Would The Quality Of Your Life Skyrocket If You Could Remember More About Your Daily Life?

The days rush by, don’t they?

And it can be hard to remember what exactly happened. Forgetfulness about your own life is not only frustrating, but it’s downright painful.

At least … It should be.

And that’s the problem, isn’t it?

You get bothered by certain things and yet …

You Do Absolutely Nothing To Make Changes!

But what if I were to tell you that there’s one simple thing you can do to remember more about your life?

And what if I told you that this one thing is also fun and will even make you more productive too?

If that sounds interesting to you, then keep reading each and every word on this page. Why? Because the simple activity I want to share with you is the kind of game changer you simply cannot afford to ignore.

Do You Wake Or Sleep?

That’s what Keats asked himself back in May of 1819 when he wrote Ode to a Nightingale. Check it out. It’s well worth memorizing.

The cool thing about Keats is that he wrote letters. Lots of them.

No email.

No fax.

Heck, Keats didn’t even have a laser jet printer.

But he still wrote.

Every single freakin’ day.

And then he got tuberculosis and died.

But here’s the thing:

It’s Scientifically Proven That If You Write Every Day You Will Remember More About Your Life!

Not only that, but by writing every day about your daily activities, your experience of time expands.

In other words, you not only remember more, but you feel like you have had more time on a daily basis in which to remember more.

Pretty cool, right?

Well, I don’t know if it’ll be cool for you or not, so …

You Absolutely Have To Try It!

Seriously, just do it. Here are 3.5 amazing ways to give writing about your daily life a try.

Journal When You Get Up Every Morning

You know how fitness freaks talk about keeping their running shoes beside their beds so they don’t forget to get fit first thing every morning?

You can do the same thing every morning with your journaling.

Seriously. Go out and buy the fattest journal you can find and the hugest pencil or pen. Plop those puppies on the floor where you normally place your feet when you get out of bed and just try ignoring them every morning.

When I’ve done this, I take the journal with me to the washroom. And yes, even as a man, I sit down for this even if I’m engaging only duty number one.

(Hey, if you can kill two birds with one wet stone, why not?)

For bonus points, write down any dreams you remember as well. This practice also expands your sense of time because dream journaling expands your awareness of how time passes while you sleep.

Trust me.

Just Try It

There’s an entire course about remembering your dreams in the Magnetic Memory Method Masterclass if you need more help.

But even if you don’t go through all that training, here’s the thing:

If you just commit to writing down your dreams, you’ll be amazed by what will happen in your life.

And if you can’t remember any dreams, don’t worry. Write that down. It’s as simple as one sentence: “I didn’t remember any dreams.”

Believe it or not, that simple exercise will help you remember dreams, no matter how skeptical you might be.

But I know, I know. You might be thinking, “What If I’m not a morning person?”

No problemo.

Here’s …

The Amazing Secret Of Writing Magical “Remember More” Spells Before You Turn Into Pumpkin

I don’t know about you, but I have rules about when I go to bed that I try to keep, almost religiously. It helps me keep the blues away, burn more fat, build more muscle and, of course, remember more dreams.

And if you want to remember more about what happened during your day, put that plump journal square on your pillow. That way you won’t be able to ignore it come bed time.

Next, set a timer for five minutes (or even less) and write down everything you remember about your day.

Don’t Overthink This Activity!

Just write whatever comes to mind starting with breakfast.

And don’t judge yourself. Nothing you write is stupid or insignificant. That little voice in your mind that’s always trying to wreck everything will tell you the entire exercise is dumb, but put a gag on it.

Trust me. That jerk doesn’t have a clue what he, she (or it) is talking about.

For bonus points, put the journal where your feet hit the floor first thing in the morning and then write down your dreams when you get up.

And yes, you should even make note of it when you can’t remember any dreams at all. We know that even one simple sentence acknowledging that you can’t remember any dreams can (and most likely will) trigger dream recall.

If none of these suggestions appeal to you, try this technique on for size:

The Miraculous Memory ­Improving Wonders Of Having An Accountability Partner

Sarah Peterson from Unsettle.org is my accountability partner. We write each other 3-­4 times a week, sometimes more. We do this exchange for two purposes:

1) To tell each other what we’ve been up to. This practice automatically helps us remember more of what we’ve been doing with our days.

2) To tell each other what we’re going to do next. Each simple report on what’s coming up for us in our businesses massively increases the chances that we’ll actually follow through.

And when you follow through, the effects are magical. Stuff gets done.

Pretty sweet, right?

You Bet It Is. Sweeter Than Candy Wrapped In Magnetic Memory Silver!

So here’s your homework:

Ask a friend who you know is keen on getting more out of life to be your accountability partner.

Don’t overthink this process. Just whip out an email to the first person that comes to mind.

And if you need a quick template to kick your butt into motion, here’s a template for you;

“Hey [insert name],

I was just listening to the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast and Anthony was talking about how having an accountability partner can help you remember more about our life and even be more productive on a daily basis.

I know that you’re trying to achieve [insert goal] and you know I’d love to [insert goal]. How would you feel about emailing each other every day or every couple of days to check in and see where we’re both at.

Let me know and I’ll send you his podcast with more info on how it works and we’ll get our accountability party started.

Sincerely,

[Your name]

Pretty easy, right?

Well, you don’t have to take my word for it. You can get in contact with Sarah here and she’ll give you her side of the story and some cool free stuff that will make you even more productive too.

I never tell Sarah about any of the dreams I remember, but now that I’m putting this lesson in remembering more about your life together, maybe I should …

In any case …

Just make sure to ask permission before you start spilling the contents of your unconscious mind into your accountability emails. You don’t want to freak your partner out or distract from the matter at hand: remembering more about your daily activities and becoming more productive in a targeted manner.

And if all of these ideas still don’t appeal because you’re simply not into writing (but still want memory improvement), here’s …

How To Supercharge Your Memory By Keeping An Audio Or Video Journal

It’s pretty easy. Here’s what you do:

1. Get a device that records video and/or audio

2. Press record

3. Let it all out.

And to show you how it’s done, I’ve made made that quick example video for you on the day I wrote this post. Just scroll up to the top and watch it from beginning to end. I show you how to keep a journal and improve your memory in three ways by giving you an example of this third way.

No need to share these recordings like I’ve done on a YouTube channel or podcast, but heck, why not? You never know: It might go viral and you’ll wind being the next internet celebrity, win new friends and positively influence people.

Stranger things have happened.

So here’s the ultimate question:

Are you down with one of these daily journaling techniques?

If so, just get started. I guarantee that you’ll remember more about your life and, yes, be more productive.

And if all that weren’t enough, I invite you to learn how to improve your memory even more by claiming this free Memory Improvement Kit. It’ll show you how to create and use a Memory Palace so you can learn, memorize and recall anything in a way that is simple, easy, elegant and fun.

Till next time …

Keep Magnetic!

The post How To Keep A Journal And Remember More appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

How Would You Like A Quote That Will Change Your Life – And Your Memory – For The Better?

If the answer is yes, then pay attention to every word of this quote and my commentary on it.

But prepare yourself …

This quote may well contain the most important set of thoughts you will ever read.

“To young writers I give only two secrets that really exist… all the other hints of Rosetta Stones are jiggery-pokery. The two secrets are these:

First, the most important book you can ever read, not only to prepare you as a writer, but to prepare you for life, is not the Bible or some handbook on syntax. It is the complete canon of Sherlock Holmes stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

The Holmes mysteries are nailed to the fixed point of logic and rational observation. They teach that ratiocination, and a denial of paralogia, go straight to the heart of Pasteur’s admonition that “Chance favors the prepared mind.” The more you know, the more unflinchingly you deny casual beliefs and Accepted Wisdom when it flies in the face of reality, the more carefully you observe the world and its people around you, the better chance you have of writing something meaningful and well-crafted.

From Doyle’s stories an awakened intelligence can learn a system of rational behavior coupled with an ability to bring the process of deductive logic to bear on even the smallest measure of day-to-day existence. It works in life, and it works in art. We call it the writer’s eye. And that, melded to talent and composure, is what one can find in the work of every fine writer.

The second secret, what they never tell you, is that yes, anyone can become a writer…. The trick is not to become a writer, it is to stay a writer. Day after day, year after year, book after book. And for that, you must keep working, even when it seems beyond you. In the words-to-live-by of Thomas Carlyle, “Produce! Produce! Were it but the pitifullest infinitesimal fraction of a Product, produce it in God’s name! ‘Tis the utmost thou has in thee: out with it, then. Up, up! Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy whole might. Work while it is called Today; for the Night cometh, wherein no man can work.”

All that, and learn the accurate meaning of “viable,” do not pronounce it noo-kew-ler, understand the difference between “in a moment” and “momentarily,” and don’t say “hopefully” when you mean “it is to be hoped” or “one hopes.” Because, for one last quotation, as Molly Haskell has written: “language: the one tool that enables us to grasp hold of our lives and transcend our fate by understanding it.”

This quote comes from Harlan Ellison. It has got so much packed into it – and that’s not even to mention the quotes inside the quote.

Why Reading Properly Is The Ultimate Cure To Ignorance

Here’s a secret:

A lot of people read.

Except that they aren’t really reading.

What does it mean to read a book?

I talk about this in the podcast episode How To Memorize A Textbook. So if you haven’t checked it out, give it a listen.

In brief, it shoes you how to memorize the right parts of a book, not every page. A lot of people think they need to memorize an entire book, but it isn’t true.

There’s a circular question that’s been going round for thousands of years: Is it better to learn and memorize thousands of books to get a broad education? Or is it better to know just a few books better than most people ever will?

The Answer Is Pretty Simple!

The best book that you ever read, the most important book you can ever read is the book that you actually read.

Of course, it’s up to you which book you read. You don’t have to take Ellison’s advice that it must be Sherlock Holmes.

Ellison asks us to see a life lesson in Holmes: “Chance favors the prepared mind.”

And that’s really what Holmes is all about. After all, using Memory Palaces or Mind Palaces is the ultimate preparation.

At the same time, it’s not really that Holmes has some super intellect or that he uses Memory Palaces or that he is more intelligent than anyone else. It’s just that he has a prepared mind.

And this leads us back to this idea of reading a thousand books or reading one book.

Memorize! Memorize! Memorize!

Do you remember the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast episode How to Tap the Mind of a Ten‑Year-Old Memory Palace Master?

In it, I interviewed Alicia Crosby, the 10‑year-old who used Memory Palaces to memorize all of the Shakespeare plays in historical order by title.

Not the actual content of the plays, mind you, but the title of every play – which is still an extraordinary feat.

On the interview, we also heard from her father. Together, they were talking motorcycle rides and making Memory Palaces along the way. These Memory Palaces were filled with beautiful stations found along the way.

All done at speed.

And that’s a beautiful thing. But (and with respect to my speedreading friends) …

Reading At Speed Is Not Always The Best Way To Invite Information Into Your Mind!

During the interview, I told a story from Kafka.

In that story, a young man has to travel to a different city to get to work. Day in and day out, he takes the train.

Then one day he misses the train, so he has to take a bicycle.

When he gets to the town, he sees this old man who is sitting on a bench.

He says to the old man, “My, I have never noticed so much about this journey, but now that I’ve taken a bicycle, wow, this is amazing. I noticed so much detail. I became aware of so many things that were never evident to me before.”

The old man says, “Yeah, well just wait and see what you discover when you walk next time.”

There’s No Shame In Slowing Down

This story from Kafka is about slowing down. It is about actively noticing the world around you. And being prepared to do so.

This man on the bike – he wasn’t prepared at all. In fact, as he was constantly taking the train, life was passing him by. All the different details whizzed past so that he never had a chance to memorize anything because he was just not paying attention to anything.

But slowing things down by taking the bike, made so many details evident.

And for the kicker ending, as the old man suggests, walking makes the details of the world even more evident.

The World Becomes Eye-Catching When You Walk “Psychogeographically”

Have you ever read Will Self?

If not, check out his book Psychogeography.

Psychogeography is the idea that you can walk to an airport, for example, get on a plane and then walk to your hotel.

According to self, your body will not know that you haven’t walked to New York.

For example, Self talks about flying from Heathrow in London to JFK in New York and how going by foot to the airport and then walking from the airport to his hotel tricked his body into thinking he walked the whole way.

Now, to the extent that Self’s procedure actually tricks your mind, I don’t know, but the term “psychogeography” certainly is an appropriate because when you walk, you can notice more things.

And the more things you notice, the more things you can notice. Just like with learning, the more you can learn, the more you can learn because you have more of a basis upon which to ground more learning.

Fantastic, right?

Good.

Then Just Do It

And then take another look at the Thomas Carlyle quote Harlan Ellison gives us.

In it, Carlyle is saying, “Produce! Produce!”

Do something.

Do it.

And whatever you have before you to do, do it with your entire mind, and with your entire body. Do it with your entire soul. Get in there and do it.

Do it in a way that is whole and complete, in a way that has a beginning and a middle and an end.

Why?

Because as Carlyle says, “the Night cometh,” and nobody can work in the night.

What is night in this quote?

Night Is Death

Look, most of us work with half our butt hanging out of our pants.

We’re not fully involved in our work.

We are half involved in it.

We’re a quarter involved in it.

Maybe we’re even just 10 percent involved in it (or less).

That’s no good.

Worse …

It’s No Way To Live!

And so that’s why being prepared with memory techniques and Memory Palaces is one of the best things you can do for yourself.

Why?

Because you are able to focus on information in a completely different way, at a much deeper level, at a 100 percent level.

Don’t you think that’s much better than passively trying to get information into your memory?

Or do you prefer hoping or praying or wishing on a cloud that what you need to learn will osmosisize itself into your brain?

Here’s The Ugly Truth …

It ain’t gonna happen!

Or at least, it’s not going to happen in any way that is nearly as miraculous, magical and almost as instantaneously as when you use memory techniques.

And When You’ve Got The Right Memory Techniques Working For You …

You can do things with your whole might like Carlyle advises.

You can do every completely when you’re using memory techniques because of the very nature of this learning practice changes the information.

As Wayne Dyer often quotes, when you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change.

And it’s true.

When you look at a foreign language word and use memory techniques, it looks completely different than when you don’t use them.

Why?

Because when you don’t use memory techniques, you take the word as a whole.

But when you use something like the Magnetic Memory Method, you breaking the word apart.

You start thinking creatively. For example, what happens if I attach this part of the word to Al Pacino?

What about if I attach this other part of the word to Homer Simpson?

And what if I have them doing something together to help me remember the meaning of the word?

Doing This Makes Learning Tastier Than Candy!

The learning process becomes like liquorish in a candy store. You just can’t help but suck on every last jawbreaker and you don’t want to chew it and you don’t want to swallow it because it tastes so good and you want to hold that wonderful taste of knowledge in your mouth much longer.

So you hold it in your mind much longer.

You become interested in the information in a completely different way.

The information becomes part of the theatre in your mind.

The information becomes a character.

The information becomes real.

But You Have To Give It 100% Of Your Attention

Not 25% percent of your attention.

Not scribbles on an index card attention.

Not passive spaced repetition software attention.

You’ve Got To Give It The Attention Of Your Entire Soul

And more than that, your whole mind, your whole imagination, your whole being.

So get out there.

Get prepared with a dedicated memory strategy and at least one solid Memory Palace and never forget:

“Chance favors the prepared mind.”

Further Resources

Grab my FREE Memory Improvement Kit

Read this book:

The post The Simple Reading Technique That Prepares Your Memory For Anything appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

You’d like to have psychic powers, wouldn’t you?

Go on. Admit it. Life would be easier if you could read the mind of your friends and lovers. And you could be rich overnight by divining the insights of the best stock pickers alive.

But the reality is that psychic powers do not exist. Or at least, there’s no meaningful evidence to suggest that they do.

Yet the question is, why do so many people believe in psychic powers? Why are tarot readings and crystal divinations and all kinds of claptrap so attractive to so many people.

Perhaps some of the answer to these questions involves working memory. So in this episode of the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast, let’s talk about how.

What is working memory?

Working memory is the system that is responsible for holding and processing new and already stored information – for a short time.

Having working memory is important  for reasoning, comprehension, learning and memory updating.

As a term, working memory is generally used synonymously with short term memory. Yet, the two concepts are distinct and should be distinguished from one another.

Whereas working memory is a theoretical framework that refers to structures and processes used for temporarily storing and manipulating information, short-term memory refers to the short-term storage of information, and does not entail the manipulation or organization of material held in memory.

Given these facts about working memory, it seems clear that it plays a roll in why people believe the psychics and their readings.

Here’s why …

First off, psychics overwhelm their clients with questions. By asking them to access so much about their past, it can be difficult, if not impossible to remember the questions the psychic asked.

As a result, the person sitting for the psychic reading will only remember the hits and not the misses. “Hits,” just to define this term, is the word used to describe any time a psychic gets something right. “Misses” refers to any time the psychic gets something wrong.

As we’ll see, talented psychics use language as a tool for increasing the recall of hits and obliterating our memory of the misses.

Magicians know how to use this effect as well. For example, they use what is commonly called misdirection. But in reality, they use …

Focused Attention

By using focused attention, you are not misdirected but rather directed to pay attention on the wrong things. The audience then remembers only the big moves the magician makes, and should they have spotted the small moves in which the dirty work is done, the cognitive overload of the big moves erases the memory of anything else.

In fact, the most rewarding compliment a magician can hear is, “but he didn’t do anything.” In these cases, the big moves have been so natural or ordinary that they have no meaning for working memory to grasp onto.

But “misdirection” isn’t the best word for this technique. A better term would be focused attention. To “misdirect” is to draw attention away from something. But sleight of hand works best when concentration is so focused on innocent movements that it cannot pay attention to the dirty ones.

Psychics use the exact same process, but in this case, instead of calling it sleight of hand, we should call it …

Sleight Of Mouth

Psychics often hide their moves by asking questions that for most people will generate “yes” answers.

Drawing from Ian Rowland’s excellent The Full Facts Book of Cold Reading, here are some of those questions. Follow along and think about how many of these questions would generate a yes from you.

• Have you recently come across some old photographs, some in albums, some that still need to be properly arranged?
• Have you recently thrown out some medical supplies that had gone out of date or expired?
• Have you recently thrown out or donated some old books, toys or clothing?
• Is there a note on your fridge or by the phone that is no longer relevant but you haven’t yet thrown away?
• Are there any stuck drawers or drawers that don’t slide properly in your home?
• Do you have keys that you cannot remember what locks they belong to?
• Do you own a broken watch or clock you’ve been meaning to get fixed?
• Have you ever had an accident or near-accident involving water?
• Is the number 2 in your address or does someone significant in your life have the number 2?
• Do you have a scar on your elbow or knee?
• Is there a blue car or truck parked across the street from your home or work?
• Do you carry photos of a loved one in your wallet or purse?
• Is there a set of earrings that you’ve lost one half of? (For a man, the psychic can ask the same question about the jewelry collection of a girlfriend or wife.)

And so on.

Chances are that you probably answers yes to a significant number of these questions. All of them rely on accessing your long term temporal memory and often your spatial memory.

Whether you say yes or no, the psychic will quickly overload your short term working memory by saying “yes and” or “no but,” a tactic identified by the great magician and mentalist Kenton Knepper.

To illustrate how this works …

Imagine the following psychic reading …

Psychic: Have you or someone in you family recently experienced an illness?

Client: Yes …

Psychic: Yes and they needed to take some medicine for that?

Client: No …

Psychic: No, but they did eventually get well on their own.

By stringing together a long series of questions linked by “yes and” plus “no but” statements, the psychic creates the illusion of always being right. In reality, the psychic is right about general aspects of life that almost certainly must be true.

They can heighten this effect by gauging the age of the client. For example, if the client is young, the psychic might not ask them about illness in the family. But the older the client is, the more likely they or a family member has experienced an illness.

By asking questions that cause the client to access the general past and then helping the client link their answers to “yes and”/”no but” statements, the psychic completely overloads and distorts the client’s working memory.

The client will not only think that the psychic knew an overwhelming amount of info about them. The client will distort the experience and remember things that never happened during the psychic reading.

Magicians also create this distortion effect. I’ve seen it many times. For example, years later people will ask me to repeat magic tricks I once performed for them. But the trick they describe bears little resemblance to the trick I actually performed. Due to the powers of focused attention and the words I used during the trick, working memory becomes the enemy of reality and long term memory is tricked into remembering miracles better than even the best magicians are capable of creating.
 

Psychics do not have super powers.

Rather, they are masters of memory (just not in the way we would normally use that term). Psychics overwhelm working memory by distorting the present with leading questions and tricky language that creates paths toward their desired results.

They use our memory against us to exploit our desire for certainty in life and create false impressions that encourage us to take out our wallets again and again for more of the same.

How to Defeat Psychics At Their Own Game

The way to test a psychic is to use the very same tools against them and overwhelm their working memory.

For example, if a psychic gets a hit, you can answer with “yes and” or “no but.” Like this:

Psychic: Have you experienced an accident involving water, either in the recent past or when you were younger?

Client: No, but I did fall off my bike and scarred my knee in the center of the city with no water around. Didn’t you know that?

Or:

Psychic: Am I sensing it right that you or someone close to you had the number 1 or 3 in you address?

You: Yes, we both do, and I also have 4 and 6 in my postal code as does everyone in my neighborhood. Why don’t you know that?

By using the “yes and” and “no but” principle to your advantage, you will overload the psychics own working memory with tracking their own errors.
They will start to seem like a bad lawyer who can’t track any of the details going on in the courtroom and soon lose the case.

And so, now you know how your working memory can be used against you and how you can use working memory against them in your defense. So get out there and have a blast and see how you can’t extend your new knowledge to other areas of life where advertisements, politicians and teachers are also using working memory against you to distort your perceptions and even control entire aspects of your
life.

Further Reading

The Surprising Truth About Hypnosis And Memory Improvement

The post How Psychics Abuse Your Working Memory To Rip You Off appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

How To Use Your Emotions To Memorize More Instead Of Letting Them Take Over Your Life And Make A Big Fat Mess Of Everything

You’re an emotional person, aren’t you?

Those uncontrollable feelings well up from time to time, perhaps even taking over the show. In other words, emotions replace the you that you know with someone quite different.

At least, that’s one way of looking at it. Emotions are different versions of ourselves. The self that becomes overwhelmed by laughter is different than the self who drowns in sorrow and misery.

But then eventually you find your way back. You become you once again.

The Only Problem Is That You Don’t Become You!

Strong emotional states change you, and I’ll bet you remember at least a couple of times that you’ve been changed so strongly by an emotional state that you’ve had no means of going back. You’re as chemically changed as toast is to bread.

The question is, to what extent is this change due to memory? Has the experience of emotion changed you as such, or does it impact your memory so much that you literally remember to be a different person.

Certainly, post traumatic stress disorder provides some examples of people affected by memories so strongly that constant recall of the traumatic event causes that new version of the person to hold fast.

But that state does have to be renewed. Even if the person feels that the memories are coming back of their own accord, they must at some level be participating in the reconstruction.

And such events don’t mean that trauma has improved memory in that instant so much so that the person remembers everything in sparkling detail. Traumatic memory in no way ensures accuracy and it can also lead to the repression of memory.

The Return Of The Repressed

Repression and suppression of memory is really intense because it is essentially an attempt to obliterate memories from the mind. But as Sigmund Freud made himself famous for saying, what we repress returns, usually in the form of a monster.

Post-Freud, we have some interesting research about the suppression of memory. For example, test subjects asked to repress feelings of disgust while watching a horror movie remembered far less about the story and with much less accuracy than those not asked to repress their feelings.

And plane crash survivors who remain calm have been said to remember more than people overwhelmed by hysterics.

I’ve experienced this memory effect myself following a near miss trying to land in Toronto. I was going there from New York to sit for a field exam when the plane suddenly pulled up and circled over the city. We late learned that another plane had still been on the runway ahead of us, and thank goodness the pilot pulled us out of there in time enough to avoid a fiery collision.

Although I didn’t go crazy in terms of screaming or crying out, my inner life went nuts, something that affected my memory for days and days after. While sitting for the exam, for the first time I felt a real disruption in accessing my Memory Palaces and mnemonics. All the more so because one person on the committee was in the warpath and doing her best to see me fail.

But luckily, I had relaxation on my side and calmed myself. I reminded myself of the combined power of memory and relaxation and without suppressing or repressing the feelings of terror I remembered from the previous days’s adventure in the sky, I managed to handle that remembered stress and the current stress at the same time.

And this is interesting because I could have broken down into tears or hysterics in that examination room because I was so fragile. But according to some theories, memories and the emotions tied to them don’t force us to act in particular ways. But these emotional memories do influence our actions.

And that’s good news because with the exception of hungry lions and tigers and bears (like during that examination), most everything that influences us, we can influence back.

Control:

The One Advantage You Can Use When Your Emotions Get Really Crazy

Emotions and memories share one major characteristic: they are both highly manipulable.

Think of emotions and memory like blinking and breathing. Both blinking and breathing happen on autopilot. We don’t have to think about them in the least in order for them to happen.

But we can think about them and control them – at least for a while. You can choose to have a staring contest, you can keep you eyes closed even though you are not sleeping or you can flutter your eye lids at anyone you fancy. You can do this entirely at will.

Likewise, you can influence your breathing. You can hold your breath, cause yourself to gasp and deliberately sync inhalations with exhalations as you walk or jog.

And so it is with memory. You can deliberately call up memories of your childhood. You can say, “I want to think about grade one” and deliberately call up – or try to call up – the name of your teacher.

Along with this deliberate action, emotions might also arise. And it makes for a good memory exercise.

Try This Amazing Exercise

Want to experience memory improvement? Try this:

Think of every teacher you can remember and explore at least one emotion associated with them.

When I did this, I was amazed by how many teachers I can recall by name. From grades one to twelve, the names of only three teachers evade me, not counting substitute teachers, of course.

And for each teacher I can remember an emotion. In some cases, the emotions are similar: frustration at being told what to do. In other cases, it is fondness, or the feeling of being liked by the teacher. And in yet other cases, yes, I can remember even the emotion of lust, even at a young age.

It’s a fascinating exercise, one that will teach you much about the depth and breadth of your memory. Even if you bump up against limitations, that’s okay. Explore them. Feel the borders. Give them a gentle push without trying to force them to extend.

Massage the name out if the woodwork, so to speak, by seeing yourself in the classroom, bringing up all the nuances and details of the atmosphere. Bask in what you can recall and more is much more likely to come then if you give up in frustration.

And If You Come Up Totally Blank …

…give it a rest. Come back to it. Maybe something will percolate.

And if the memory of bad emotions come up, massage them too. Explore how you can use your imagination to eliminate their power. You can change their shape, remove their color, turn them into a funny cartoon. You can manipulate those feelings in any way you want.

And because the negative feelings you’ll drum up from high school are probably tame, you’ll get good practice manipulating the really dramatic emotions that life will throw at you later. Because the only thing we know emotional states is that they will come. We cannot predict what they will or why they’ll happen. But even so, we can be prepared for them.

So take notes and remember to do these exercises to help you develop emotional control, starting with remembering all the teachers you can and at least one emotion you associate with each.

Then manipulate that emotion. Practice working it out and not so much eliminating it or trying to force it out of memory, but transforming it the way you can turn bread into toast, in a way that it can never return to its original negative state.

Practice this and you’ll soon be able to work with any emotion that comes up in real time with ease. That will help you remember more because you’re not repressing the unpredictable but letting it be.

Further Resources:

Do You Remember Enough To Write An Accurate Book About Your Life?

The post Laugh And Cry Your Way To Memory Improvement appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

How Cool Would It Be If You Could Hypnotize Your Way To A Better Memory?

Well, good luck. As you’re about to learn, there’s no scientific basis or reason to believe that hypnosis can cause memory improvement.

But to look at this issue, it will be helpful to focus on one area where hypnosis has been used in the attempt to improve memory: court cases.

So our question is, can hypnosis really improve the memory of witnesses? Read every word of this post if you want to learn several key ways that you can still make strides with your memory improvement goals even if hypnosis turns out to be a dud when it comes to enhanced memory.

Would You Believe That Hypnosis For Memory Improvement Goes This Far Back?

Hypnosis in the courts has a long history. If we can focus solely on America, I’ve read that hypnosis to improve the memories of witnesses was first rejected in 1897 by the Supreme Court of California.

After that, there’s a dark spot until after World War II. Given all that happened during this war, officials wanted reliable ways to enhance the recall of witnesses.

But despite all kinds of testing, to this date, no meaningful evidence supports hypnosis as a reliable means of improving memory. Especially not for providing testimony in a court of law.

Let’s break this issue down into parts so we can get both a broad and specific perspective.

This Is The Truth About Memory And Hypnosis The TV Shows Don’t Want You To Know About

First off, hypnosis of this kind sets itself up for failure.

Why?

Because you can’t improve something that mostly doesn’t exist.

Think about it. You’re walking down the street and you see a crime. You weren’t expecting anything would happen, but then something does happen. The memories you do form are based on information that you have learned incidentally.

For example, I was riding my bike last Sunday to the Mauerpark. There’s a wonderful Flea Market and I was going to look for some cool postcards to send new members of the Magnetic Memory Method Masterclass. I usually find something cool there, often old cards with interesting buildings are memorable art that helps stimulate creativity.

Anyhow, I was stopped at a light when all of a sudden two guys ran into the street in front of a car. They asked a group of maybe three people, “This one?” and the group of people said yes.

Rage-Fuelled Vengeance On The Streets Of Berlin!

Then the two guys approached the doors of the car. One went to the passenger side, the other to the driver’s side. I think the car was blue, but I don’t quite remember. It may have had four doors.

What I do remember is that the guys opened the doors and started yelling.

The driver and the passenger were clearly in shock and didn’t know what to do. Finally, the passenger pulled out a wallet and in a Russian accent, the guy standing in the street said, “Give it me!” He ripped the wallet out of the guy’s hand and slammed the door. As the other guy slammed the driver’s door, the colliding air created a puff of ash from the ashtray. After the two men got back onto the sidewalk, the light turned green and the car sped off.

Which Of These These Facts Prove That Hypnosis Has No Chance When It Comes To Improving Memory?

What I’ve done just now is to recall an event that I “learned” incidentally.

As I’m telling it to you, there are oodles of things I’m not telling you because there aren’t enough words in the universe to explain:

* The urgent voice in the back of my head telling me to get the hell out of there.

* The fact that the two guys in the car were either Turkish or Syrian.

* The hot girl on the bike in front of me with people who may or may not have been her brother and father.

* My thoughts following the event, such as the concern that someone could have been shot, questions about the crime rate in Berlin and other images and concepts rolling around in my mind.

Shortly thereafter, I forgot about the whole thing until it came time to put together this podcast. In fact, I had already outlined the entire episode before this event happen, and only when I started writing it did I remember this event.

And if I were asked to give testimony about it, my testimony would be deeply flawed because I wasn’t expecting such an event to happen. As Harry Lorayne points out in all his books, you cannot remember what you haven’t paid attention to in the first place.

That’s why I couldn’t tell you:

* Anything about the clothes any of the people were wearing (except for the clothes on the girl on the bike, because I was definitely paying attention to those).

• The hair color of the Russian guys.
• The color of the wallet.
• The exact color or make of the car.
• The exact time of day.
• The name of the intersecting street (though I could take you to it if necessary).

* … and there is probably so much more useful information that the cops might need to know if they were to put together a case.

And in this case, the large amount that I do remember possible has to do with shock, the novelty of the event, the ease with which the event could be made into a linear story and the fact that I have a trained memory. But just as each of these things could support the idea that I’ve remembered things well, each point could also prove me to be a poor witness.

Why?

Because …

Shock Must Be One Of The Most Amnesia-Inducing Conditions In The World!

In any case, if a prosecutor wanted to use hypnosis on me, he would be making a couple of assumptions about memory.

First, hypnosis for eyewitness testimony assumes that memory is like a video recorder. One of the reasons enhanced memory is not normally accepted in a court of law is that we know memory does not store information for playback.

Rather, memories are reconstructed. Not only that, but memories are a reconstructed pastiche of many things.

For example, memory takes place only the present. You can only ask a person to recall information in their present moment. They cannot recall the information the past and they cannot recall it in the future. Memory only takes place in the present.

For that reason, every time you reconstruct a memory, you are affected by context. You are also affected by language.

Remember how I said that there are too many words for the truth to exist (as such) just a few minutes ago?

It’s true. There are so many words to choose from and so many possible combinations, unless you memorized what you were saying as you said it …

You could never repeat the same memory twice. Your report would always be slightly different.

There Are More Villains Of Forgetfulness Waiting To Snatch Your Memories Away …

And each time you retold your memories, you might be:

• Tired and hungry
• Telling it to a different person
• Impatient
• Angry
• Less certain than the time before about your accuracy
• More certain than the time before
•  … and much, much more

And all this depends on how much of the target information survived your short term memory and made it into long term memory.

And as massive as long term memory is, it is useful only to the extent that you can reconstruct useful and reliable material from it.

Are you interested in diving deeper into this issue?

You are?

Good. Then let’s go.

When we talk about memories moving around in the mind and recall as something that happens only in a certain kind of time (the present), we need to look at the three stages of memory.

The People Who Understand The Following Three Phases Will End Up Having A Better Memory

These are:

1. Acquisition
2. Retention
3. Retrieval

Acquisition involves encoding information for retention. The quality of the encoding relies upon the attention you’ve paid to the information and to what extent you’ve intentionally memorized it. As I mentioned, everything I recalled from the automobile situation last Sunday was learned incidentally. I made no special attempt to memorize anything and what I do remember was selected by my long term memory from a field of other thoughts, shock and the additional thoughts I added later.

The retention stage involves storing the memories. But this isn’t like storing old baseball mits in a box at the back of your shed. As Dr. Gary Small told us in an interview with him here on the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast a few weeks back, memories move around in the brain as they age.

This movement effects the quality of recall, both positively and negatively. It also changes the context of the information and how it will be recalled in new contexts during the reconstruction phase.

We’ve gone through this a bit already with my story from last Sunday, but let’s look at how the memory of witnesses can be affected during all of these stages:

Acquisition is influenced by:

* Age
* Level of rest
* Physical fitness
* Emotional states
* Confidence
* Stress
* Mood
* Attitude

You also have the factor of expectation. Again, if you haven’t expected to remember something, the something you are able to recall will most likely be of low quality.

Another factor involves the characteristics of the material:

* Is it an object?
* Is it a person?
* How many objects or people were involved?
* Are there any moving parts?
* How big or small are these objects or people?

We also have to account for the length of exposure to the the information. Did it take place in an instant, or did the witness have more time to study the event?

Finally, we have the addition of information between the instances of the event and the instances of recall.

The Most Comforting Memories You’ll Ever Have Are The Ones You’ve Completely Bent Out Of Shape

For example, imagine that you saw The Dark Knight at the movie theatre. You tell a bunch of friends about the movie and you balance your report by giving all the characters equal time.

Then you learn that Heath Ledger died. The next time you tell someone about the film, you’re much more likely to focus on the Joker parts of the film because the additional information about the film will not only change your memory of the film, but also how you talk about it. And each time you talk about a memory, you add more information to it, which changes it even more. You are in effect playing the telephone game with yourself.

Not only that, but you may not have really thought much about Heath Ledger as an actor, but by paying attention to him differently based on the new information, you may suddenly find that you’ve become a fan.

How To Influence Someone’s Memory Simply By Choosing Your Words Carefully

To look at this differently, you’ve probably heard about the scientific studies where they show people films of car crashes.

When they ask people “how fast the cars were going before they collided,” they answer differently than when they ask people how fast the cars were going before they crashed or smashed into one another.

The way the mind hears the question conditions the answer. And questions count as new information.

So if I say to you, “How did you like the Joker in Batman,” you will select a different answer from your memory than if I ask you, “How did you like Heath Ledger’s final performance as the Joker in Batman?”

The Nearly-Miraculous Ways Interrogators Can Control Everything About Your Memory – Even If You’re The Good Guy!

So far we’ve covered some of the basic issues surrounding memory and hypnosis. Now let’s look more at the reconstruction of memories during interrogation and on the stand.

Investigators and prosecutors ask witnesses to reconstruct their memories in different ways.

The first is free narrative. The interrogator opens up free narrative by asking open-ended questions. For example, they might say, “tell me what you remember about the incident.”

The research shows that this kind of witness testimony produces surprisingly few errors. But the witnesses also often leave huge gaps.

Next we have controlled narrative. In this case, the interrogator ask for detailed descriptions of the event. They might ask, for example, “what was the assailant wearing?” to guide the witness towards specifics. This kind of testimony may indeed produce more detail, but the accuracy of the detail goes down.

Finally, we have forced choice. These are specific questions for which the witness can only give a limited number of answers. These are yes or no questions or either-or questions. “Was the car red or black?” is a question that requires a specific answer.

Although this kind of questioning provides the highest amount of detail, it produces the least amount of accuracy. When you press people to choose, you cut their ability to describe.

You Can Force Anyone To Remember Anything You Wish By Using This Memory-Shaping Technique …

Forced choice also leads people to give the answer they think the interrogator wants. And questions like these do indeed force certain assumptions. For example, a question like, “did you see the gun?” implies that there was a gun.

Moreover, the question puts the image of a gun into the imagination of the witness. As we talked about, the addition of new information can cause – and usually does cause – memories to change every time we reconstruct them.

Spell-Binding Questions That You’ll Want To Ask Yourself Before Giving Testimony Under Hypnosis In A Court Of Law

With these problems in mind, when we factor in hypnosis-aided testimony need to answer several questions. These questions include:

1) Does hypnosis create confidence? In other words, do witnesses become more convinced of the truth because hypnosis convinces them that their memories are more real.

Most of us know from our own lives how this works. Once we are convinced that we’ve experienced something a certain way, it becomes impossible to change back. We cannot go back to questioning the validity of our memory.

2) Does hypnosis help “destroy evidence?” In other words, if hypnosis makes a person more confident in their memory and the introduction of new information changes how they remember, where has the original evidence gone?

3) How to deal with the fact that the memories were not intentionally gathered. The witness was not instructed to learn it as if they were a student in school. These memories are typically the result of highly emotional conflict. And when the witness gives testimony, the future of someone’s life is at stake. If they mess up, an innocent person could wind up in the electric chair.

4) To what extent can the memories of witnesses be trusted even in the absence of hypnosis?

Over time, courts have suggested some solutions to some of these problems. These solutions include:

A) Leave it up to jury decision. The judge needs to point out that hypnosis assisted certain witness testimony and that they should place no more or less emphasis on the testimony as a result of the hypnosis.

B) Reject hypnosis-assisted testimony. Due to the lack of scientific evidence that hypnosis helps memory, some courts have barred all such testimony.

C) Use strict guidelines. In this case, hypnosis must be carried out by a licensed psychologist or psychiatrist trained in the practice.

Plus, the hypnotist must not be informed of the facts of the case before the session takes place. This measure is to ensure that the hypnotist cannot influence the testimony.

The hypnotist should also be independent, not someone chosen by either the prosecutor or the defence team.

Everything must be recorded on video, including from the beginning to the end of the meeting to capture any comments that may have influenced the testimony. This will also help reduce the chance of introducing post-hypnotic suggestions.

No one else should be present during the hypnotic session. Other people can unconsciously or inadvertently communicate what they expect to hear the witness say. They might also look startled, upset of disappointed by the testimony, shaping how the witness reconstructs their memories.

An expert in hypnosis must testify before the jury about the use of hypnosis to assist the witness in remembering more.

They must also explain that hypnosis is a suggestive procedure that does not ensure the validity of anything said during the testimony.

As you can imagine, there is a lot more to be said about this topic. But to sum up for now, we can now ask the ultimate question lurking behind this issues:

Can Hypnosis Improve Recall?

The answer is most likely no. Here’s why:

There’s no objective way to identify the accuracy or inaccuracy of any memory of an event. Memories are reconstructed, can only be delivered in the presence, and most studies show that memories are easily manipulated.

Also, there’s no way to tell if the memories were created by other means. For example, the witness could be lying. They might have heard someone else’s testimony or they saw something on TV. They may have revisited the scene of the crime. Worse, they might simply be unsure themselves of what exactly they saw.

Finally, when hypnosis takes place and memory does appear to be improved, it might not be hypnosis at all behind the improvement. Other factors might trigger recall, such as concentration, better rest, no longer being in shock, other forms of therapy, etc.

Warning!

The Secret Key To The Goldmine Of Memory Is Not Here

IF hypnosis can be said to improve recall, it may be because:

1. People lower the level of what they would normally consider a good memory.

2. People under hypnosis may be praised for any memories they give. This may cause them to give a lot more detail, but the significance of these details may be in questions. The quantity and relatedness of the memories does not necessarily amount to quality and accuracy.

3. Repeated interrogation under hypnosis may improve more recall, but this could be the result of the witness simply giving the prosecutors what they think the prosecutors want.

So with all this said, what can we learn from these issues? How can they help us improve our own memory and reach our goals?

Here Are The Real Secrets You Can Learn And Apply From The Memory And Hypnosis Fiasco

There are several lessons here:

1. Relaxation does help us produce more detail.

2. We can change our memories by adding more detail. This fact of memory need not be negative. In fact, it is helpful when it comes to using mnemonics. The more we can associate unfamiliar information with familiar information, the easier it is to memorize.

3. We know that consequences count. Just as the stress of helping shape the future of someone’s life affects eyewitness testimony, the stress of texts, exams, speaking a foreign language, etc. shapes how well we recall information. This fact takes us back to relaxation because we can indeed train ourselves to be relaxed under pressure.

4. The importance of scientific validity when it comes to memory. Although there is no real evidence that hypnosis improves memory, we have all kinds of evidence that mnemonics do.

The Only Real Secret Weapon Of Memory Improvement You’ll Ever Need

But at the end of the day, the only science that matters is based on the experiments you perform yourself. You need to learn the techniques, apply them and track your results. Only then can you make informed decisions about how to change your approach. And only you can do the work of improving your memory. No court of law can force you to it, only your interest, your passion and your need.

So what are you waiting for?

Until next time, I hope that you never have to give eyewitness testimony. I also hope you never have to bump up against the law leading to someone else giving testimony against you.

Keep safe, keep on the right side of the law and until next time, keep Magnetic.

Further Resources

10 Memorization Not So Tricky Tricks

The post The Surprising Truth About Hypnosis and Memory Improvement appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

How To Memorize Even The Most Difficult Words In The World Using World Class Memory Techniques

Hey everybody, this is Daniel Welsch.

And I’m here today as a special guest host for the Magnetic Memory Method podcast.

Anthony invited me to do the podcast today about using memory techniques for Basque and it’s a great pleasure and enormous honor for me to do so, also in Spanish in a general way:

I’ve been following Anthony’s work for about a year and I’ve been corresponding with him for nearly the same length of time and he’s been a great inspiration to me, not only in my memorizing ventures but also in my own work as a teacher and writer here in Madrid, the beautiful capital of Spain.

So when he offered me the chance to do an episode of the Magnetic Memory Method podcast on memory techniques, of course I jumped at it…

So first I’m going to tell you a bit about my language learning journey. And then I’m going to tell you how I became acquainted with Doctor Metivier and his work with memory techniques. And finally, I’m going to take you through one of my Memory Palaces to show you exactly how I memorized some very difficult material from a language that’s like no other language in existence.

Now…  A little bit about me.

Aprende Más Inglés

You probably don’t know me, because most of the work I do is in Spanish.

But I have my own website called Aprende Más Inglés, which you can find at aprendemasingles.com. There I teach English grammar, vocabulary, pronunciation—and now, learning memory techniques and how to be a more effective student and person in general.

You might want to know a bit about me. Well, I was born in the US, specifically in Phoenix, Arizona, a city in the middle of the Sonoran Desert a couple of hours from the Mexican border.

Filling In Blanks On Worksheets Has
Never Been One of My Passions

In school I learned Spanish but never took it too seriously. After that I ended up working in a kitchen with some guys from Mexico and found that speaking languages was a lot more fun than learning them in school.

Filling in blanks on worksheets has never been one of my passions.

When I was 21 I moved to Madrid, Spain, which is kind of a long story, and ended up, one way or another, teaching English.

And at the same time I was learning more and more Spanish. I was doing it organically, for the most part. I had some free Spanish classes, which I barely ever went to. And the rest of the time I was walking around, talking to people, reading the newspaper, watching TV, things like that.

At the same time, at work I was teaching English.

And I was kind of startled by how ineffective language learning in Spain was. Of course, back in the US it wasn’t any better, but in Spain learning English is just hugely important for a lot of people. Now that Spain is in the European Union and with the massive amount of international business and tourism that goes on, almost everybody needs to learn English.

It should almost be a strategic objective for all of Spain, to get the general level of English up to the level where they could compete with any country in Europe.

But unfortunately, the system wasn’t very effective at actually creating bilingual Spaniards. And after a few years I started to discover why.

But we’ll get back to that…

Couldn’t Speak, Or Even Worse, Refused To Speak

While I was teaching, I had a website where I was writing about grammar and vocabulary.

And in the meantime, my Spanish was getting better and better. I eventually got the highest level diploma in Spanish offered by the Instituto Cervantes, which is an international organization that teaches Spanish like the British Council teaches English.

And the thing about it was that I never felt like learning Spanish was a chore or an effort. I did the minimum possible in school, and later learned working in a kitchen with some guys from Mexico. And my Spanish really took off when I moved to Madrid and discovered that I could use it to meet girls.

Meanwhile, a lot of my students had studied for years and couldn’t speak, or even worse, refused to speak. They were terrified!

I decided that maybe more grammar wasn’t what people needed.

And after a couple of weeks on vacation in Italy, with my girlfriend at the time, I realized that everybody was going about it all wrong.

A Sort Of Exotic Dialect …

What happened in Italy is that I was in contact with a sort of exotic dialect of Italian that doesn’t sound anything like “standard” Italian. As far as I know there are no textbooks for this sort of thing.

They don’t even really have a literature in this dialect—it’s a small-town thing, and if you want to leave the town and do big things in Italy as a whole you need to learn proper Italian.

So I had been there surrounded by this dialect, and I had found that the book I had read to learn some Italian before going had been pretty useless too, since the pronunciation was so different than what I was hearing in small town central Italy.

In any case, by just listening and imitating and having fun with it, I was able to pick up enough of this dialect to have a sort of conversation pretty quickly.

With my knowledge of Spanish, my knowledge of standard Italian, and just listening, I was able to pick it up.

And on the way back to Spain, my flight was delayed, and I was stuck in an airport in Bologna or something similar and decided to write the outline for a book about language learning.

It took me several weeks to get it all on paper, once I was back in Spain, but I wanted to make it a sort of compendium of everything I had discovered about language learning, both as a teacher and a language learner, in my years of experience.

I called it 6 Claves para Aprender Inglés, which would translate to 6 Keys for Learning English, and I published it on Amazon, followed by a few blog posts.

In fact, I had very low expectations, but the book went to #1 in Education on Amazon in Spain, and eventually to #1 over all.

And one thing leading to another like it does, I decided to leave the grammar alone for awhile and start focusing on learning techniques and writing about how to be a more effective language learner.

So…

A Podcast About Memory

That brings me to how I met Anthony. I was in the park down the street, working out with my friend Jef. My friend Jef is a brilliant guy in his own right. And in between our sets of pullups he told me he was going to send me a link to a podcast about memory.

I had heard about memory palaces before, but it sounded sort of complicated. And I had never gotten into it. But I listened to Anthony, and his enthusiasm for the topic was so convincing that I sat down the next day and started memorizing.

I memorized, just as an exercise, the 50 provinces of Spain, from Álava to Zaragoza. It was surprisingly easy.

And I wrote an article about it for my website, which I sent to Anthony.

The next day, being the kind of guy he is (the on top of his email kind of guy, something which I aspire to imitate him in… some day…) he answered me and said we should do a podcast about it.

You can check out the podcast we did together, where we talk about imagination, pink elephants, Jimi Hendrix, and a lot of other things.

They Had All Used Memory Palaces …

I got some feedback from my readers—the doctors, especially, said that they had all used Memory Palaces to pass their exams back in the day. And that it had worked for them just as well as it had worked for me. So as a next step I decided to use the technique for language learning.

Well, in the course of 10 years teaching English I’ve come across a lot of people who say they have problems memorizing.

I’ve never had a big problem learning new words, because (as Anthony says) I think I automatically form associations. It’s just how my brain works. Maybe I learned it in elementary school and by now it’s just automatic.

This became especially clear when I started learning Italian—I could associate with English and Spanish and it was pretty easy, one way or another.

But I thought, I should do the experiment. For all my students who have difficulty memorizing, why not try the memory palace with some vocabulary?

And to make it more difficult, I decided to try with a language that had no associations at all.

No Associations At All

It’s easy to associate something like “estación” in Spanish with “stazione” in Italian and “station” in English because they’re all very similar words.

I wanted to test the method in a new way, on some truly difficult material.

The language I ended up choosing is Basque. If you don’t know about it, Basque is a language that’s spoken in a small area of the north of Spain and the south of France. Basque sounds like this:

The fact is that Basque is apparently unrelated to any of the other European languages. You can take a look on Wikipedia for some of the theories (and use memory techniques and How to Memorize a Textbook to absorb the info), but the one I like best is that the Basque people are the original barbarians who lived on the Iberian Peninsula before anyone else, and who managed to hang on to their mountainsides and their valleys through 2000 years of invasions by a long series of other civilizations.

You really have to admire the Basques, whatever the explanation is, because while virtually all the rest of Western Europe is speaking some dialect of German (English, Dutch, and the other languages of the North) or a dialect of Latin (Spanish, French, Italian, etc) the Basques are still speaking Basque… Or as they call it, Euskera.

They’ve defended their language and identity for, like I said, 2000 years of European history, which I’m sure has been difficult at times.

An Arbitrary Sequence Of A Lot Of Ks And Xs And Ts

And it’s a language with no association to anything else. To me most Basque words just look like an arbitrary sequence of a lot of Ks and Xs and Ts, without any way to make a guess at what they mean.

Nothing like Italian or French or German or Dutch, which you can often get the gist of, either if you see it in writing or if you hear it.

So I asked a Basque friend to make up a list of words, and she gave me 30 words. And I decided on a place to build my Memory Palace: the United Nations building where I give English classes every day here in Madrid.

And I sat down to do the method. I guess you’ve heard Anthony explain the guidelines for using Magnetic Memory Method memory techniques here on the podcast, so I’ll just take you through my Memory Palace, and some of the things I took into account while constructing it.

Using Anthony’s instructions for using memory techniques:

I started in a terminal location. Actually the UN building has 9 stories, but as a teacher I never have to go higher than the second floor. So I started in the Human Resources office on the second floor and went down from there. I put a mental image that reminded me of both the sound and the meaning of the word in each station I created along the way.

I created a mental path through the building all the way out to the streetcorner outside the door, putting mental images all along the path. From Human Resources, I went down the hall, past the other offices I’ve been in, the photocopiers, down the stairs, to the classroom where I teach, and then out again and further downstairs and out the door.

And finally, I practiced. A few times the first day, a few times the second, and a few times a few days after. And after that I generally had it.

The Most Difficult Thing Was The Set-Up

As I had found in previous experiences with the Magnetic Memory Method, the most difficult thing about using these memory techniques was the set-up. Once I had organized my list of words, list of stations, and thought of appropriate images, it was easy. I took Anthony’s advice and actually wrote it down, but it’s also possible to do it in your head, at least for me. Whatever works for you!

Now you may be wondering what sort of images I would use for a language with no associations—well, it turns out that the syllables can be associated with one thing or another. And I was able to mix English and Spanish associations with no problem.

For example: the word Entzun, which means listen. I had one of the Ents (those magical talking tree-people from Lord of the Rings). That was the first syllable. And for the second I had Kim Jong-Un, the young dictator of North Korea, who’s pretty memorable with his chubby cheeks and his military uniform and the fact that he’s supreme leader of a whole country despite being in his early 20s. So he was Un.

So I had him climbing up the tree, the Ent, and holding a hand up to his ear to listen for something in the distance. So I had Ents, I had Un, and I had the fact that he was listening to remind me of the meaning.

Another example using these memory techniques: Eskerrik asko, which means thank you. I separated that into “scary” and “casco” (which in Spanish means helmet) and I had something like a bicycle helmet with fangs and claws flying onto a girl’s head. The girl was down on her knees praying and giving thanks for something, it doesn’t really matter what, and so I was able to remember: scary casco, eskerrik asko, thank you.

A third example with these “Magnetic” memory techniques: garagardoa, which is beer. For this one, I had a doe (like a female deer) gargling a glass of beer. Gargle + doe = beer.

Forget The Association And Just Remember The Word

What I found on my journeys through the Memory Palace is another thing that Anthony suggested: Once you make the association and practice a few times, you can really forget the association and you just remember the word. You walk through the Memory Palace in your mind and the word is just there. It pops into your head.

Also, keep in mind I was following Anthony’s recommendation to make things violent, ridiculous, or offensive—in this case not too offensive, but I had violence in the scary bicycle helmet, and ridiculous in the gargling does, and Kim Jong-un climbing a talking tree—all things you don’t see every day, and things you’d definitely remember if you saw them.

I think that’s one of the strengths of how the Memory Palace works in the end—rather than spending a lot of time creating associations organically (through living in contact with the language) you create an artificial association. And then you can use the memory techniques to repeat as much as you want until you remember the word.

Rather than spending a few weeks or months bumping into a word before you’ve created enough associations, you can do it all in a day or two if you want.

My language learning really took off when I realized I could use languages to meet girls—later I found out that there are really only two ways to get things into long term memory: with repetition and with emotion.

And the Memory Palace works on both of those shortcuts to memory. Thank goodness for memory techniques!

Create Emotion In Your Head

As Anthony is always saying: make your images big, colorful, sexy or violent and you’ll remember them a lot easier. It’s just a way of creating emotion in your head, rather than going out and finding it externally.

Of course, finding native speakers to cause strong emotions in you can also be a lot of fun and extremely educational. But the key is balancing your study on the one hand with your contact with the language on the other.

Learning vocabulary is one thing, acquiring fluency is another. As I have said in my books many times, the only way to learn how to speak a language is to go out and speak that language.

I’ve Spent A Large Portion Of My Adult Life
Butchering One Language Or Another

And that’s the last thing I’d like to leave you with here.

A lot of people have this unnecessary fear of going out and speaking. They think they’re going to make mistakes and be embarrassed and have to go live in a cave somewhere due to the shame of conjugating some verbs badly.

In reality, I’ve spent a large portion of my adult life butchering one language or another, and I’ve really never had a bad experience because of it. Most people are happy that you’re just trying.

And most native speakers aren’t even aware of their own grammar. I learned years ago that it’s perfectly useless to ask anyone other than a Spanish teacher “Why did you use the subjunctive in that sentence, rather than the indicative?”

Generally, they have no idea—they may not even be aware that they even used the subjunctive.

So when you’re speaking to a person in imperfect Spanish or German or Italian or Mandarin, chances are very good that they’re not mentally giving you a score, like it’s some sort of test.

They’re probably only aware that you’re making a valiant attempt, and they’re trying to communicate the best they can with you.

So…

Make All The Mistakes You Can

Where I’m going with this is that it’s important to go out and make all the mistakes you can. In the worst case, people will laugh at you butchering their language. And you can laugh back. And learn something from the experience.

I don’t know anybody who’s learned a language just by studying grammar until they “knew everything” and were then able to go out immediately and start speaking with no errors.

It never happens. You’ll always make mistakes—you probably even make mistakes in your native language, even if you’re using memory techniques.

The key in my mind is having an objective for your conversations besides the conversation itself—and making your success criteria reflect that goal.

Just as an example, if you’re in Korea and you’re going to the market to buy vegetables, your goal can be to buy your vegetables—not to speak perfect Korean the whole time.

That takes the pressure off… You don’t need your level to be perfect, you just need it to get the job done.

Go Out And Use Memory Techniques!

So, go out there and memorize something! At the very least, you’ll have an interesting experience of what’s possible in your imagination… Whenever I use the Magnetic Memory Method and other memory techniques, I feel almost like I’m going on an adventure, inside my head, because I’m just so focused and I’m able to forget the outside world for a while and just live in imagination.

Nothing more to say today. I’d like to thank Anthony for handing the podcast over to me for the day to talk about memory techniques. Stay magnetic! as the doctor would say.

You can find more from me at the site I linked to above if your Spanish is good enough, or you can see all my other projects at danielwelsch.com. I write about Spanish culture, American culture, food, politics, and more, on a variety of websites out there.

And if there’s one thing I’d like to leave you with today it’s this: don’t be afraid to communicate—just say what you think and what you feel you need to say, in any language. Life is short, and as Mark Twain said, “Twenty years from now you’ll be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do.”

So go out there! Speak languages, and be awesome. Life is short to do anything besides live up to your full potential. So, enjoy it.

This is Daniel Welsch, and I hope you have a great day. Goodbye.

Further Resources

How To Train Your Memory To Memorize Any Word

Memory Strategies Of The World’s Top Language Learners

Gabriel Chats With Language Trainer Daniel Welsch

The post Memory Techniques For Learning A Hard Language Like Basque appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

Sometimes Learning Is As Simple As Asking The Right Questions

Were you one of those students?

You know the kind I’m talking about.

The kind of student whose mind is brimming with questions.

And yet …

You never asked any of them.

Instead, you sat behind your desk, gripped by curiosity, but forever reason, kept quiet.

How To Train Your Memory To Memorize Any Word

It all begins with getting out of your comfort zone and asking those questions.

But before that, you’ll need to read and test how well you’ve understood something on your own.

And that’s what I admire so much about Jordan.

He sent in this question and really took his time to think things through.

Because here’s a little-known secret for you …

The Answer Is Almost Always In The Question!

To prove this point, take a moment to go through the following question. Note just how many times Jordan’s fantastic questions create the basis for a powerful answer.

You should do the same whenever you have questions. Write to explore and you’ll find that you know so much more than it might at first seem.

Hi Anthony,

Everything about your associative memory methods is exceptionally clear. I actually developed a near-identical memory system for myself to learn basic Hebrew and Farsi, years ago … 

However, what I didn’t include at the time was my own “spatial / palace” dimension. My images were going ‘into the void.’

For that reason, I’m having a bit of trouble understanding just how it is you use your Memory Palace – in combination with your Excel sheets etc. – when learning a new language.

I’m now learning Russian, so let’s use that as an example here. Sorry for the questions to follow. Just bear with me a moment, and maybe this can help you clarify your method to other future learners.

I’m curious how it is you build your palatial repository, sequentially speaking. Here’s how i understand it… please let me know if I’m getting any of these steps wrong or missing out something crucial.

1) Create one Memory Palace for your new target language (e.g., Russian), and begin by subdividing into 33 ‘locations’ within that Memory Palace (i.e., one location per letter of the alphabet).

The path you walk through the palace at any point in the future will now be by location, by alphabetical order. (I.e., start with ‘A’ location, then ‘Б’ location, then ‘B’ location, etc., linearly, without crossing or doubling back or boxing yourself in)

2) For each ‘location’, identify at least 10 ‘stations’ (i.e., sub-locations?) … These stations are where you’re going to store the associative images for your first 10+ vocabulary words. Respectively, each of which starts with the respective letter of the alphabet corresponding to the location. For instance, in my ‘A’ location I have 10 stations, where I store the words ‘арка,’ ‘афиша,’ ‘аптека,’ etc. (i.e., one word/associative image combo per station).

3) I continue to populate all my locations and stations this way, i.e., organized by initial letter.

4) I write each of my vocab words down in an Excel file, noting the words itself. Plus, the location, the station and/or the image … ? (please advise if I understand this correctly)…

5) Continue ad infinitum and practice my walk through regularly… 

Assuming I have that right, above (please correct me if not), I have a few questions:
i) As you learn any new word, you must create a new station within the appropriate location, and store it there for organizational purposes and ease of access … correct? … So, theoretically, each ‘location’ grows in terms of volume of ‘stations’, infinitely (i.e., it grows by one newly invented station every time you add a new word that begins with the location-relevant letter). 

ii) Assuming what I just said in (i) above is correct, do you subdivide the ‘location’ into ever-smaller, more specific ‘stations’, as your vocabulary grows? Does this result in a sort of infinitesimally divided ‘location’ …

If so, do you have any tricks or techniques for finding ever more, or increasingly small/minute, stations to create and use within your locations as your vocabulary grows? … If not, and I have this wrong, please correct me. 

iii) Assuming (i) and (ii) are mostly correct, what do you do to memorize key phrases, as opposed to just words? Do you store each one in a new station, within a location that corresponds to the first letter of the first word of the phrase (e.g., ‘Что нового’ gets its own new station within the ‘Ч’ location)? I realize this may be different for everybody, but I’m curious how you do it, particularly in terms of Russian, but also for any language, generally. 

iv) Assuming i have the general storage hierarchy system understood correctly, do you tend to store new words/phrases in new stations in alphabetical order within your locations? E.g., if you already know and have stations for ‘аптека’ and ‘афиша’, but then you learn the new word ‘арка,’ do you create a new station for ‘арка’ in-between the stations for  ‘аптека’ and ‘афиша’? (I.e. because the letter ‘р’ comes after the the letter ‘п’ but before the letter ‘ф’ in the Russian alphabet.) .

Or do you just add a new station at the end of all your other ‘A’ stations each time you learn a new ‘a’ word (i.e., within each location, new words get stores in stations ordered sequentially by when you learned them). … Please let me know which system you use/have had the most success with. 

v) Assuming most (i) to (iv) is correct in spirit if not in detail, each time you do a mental walk-through of your Mind Palace, are you actually revisiting *every single station* within *every single location* in your palace? If I understand correctly, this is basically like walking through a dictionary from front to back, in your mind, with each word represented by its own station, nested within one of 33 (e.g., in the case of Russian) sequential locations. … That seems like a lot of walking/remembering!! … maybe I’m missing something here (or maybe its just not as daunting as it sounds) … Do I have this right? 

Generally, I’d just like to know if I have this all understood correctly. I do realize everyone can and will make their own personalized modifications to the system/principles based on how their own minds work, and on their specific target material. That said, I’m very curious to know how you, specifically, structure your Mind Palaces for language acquisition, and–to the degree relevant–specifically in the case of Russian. 

Apologies for the epic email, but I want to make sure I’m building this palace–and these habits–the most effective and adaptable way possible, from the ground up.

Thanks for any insight!!

Cheers,

Jordan

How To Avoid Disaster, Make Your Own Discoveries And Find All The Memory Palaces You’ll Ever Need

Hi Jordan,

Thanks for your note.

Yes, you’ve understood everything more or less. I think a re-read of the book will cement things further.

On to your questions:

1) I do not recommend that you create your stations as you go along. This is a recipe for disaster.

Instead, go in with your Memory Palaces prepared in advance. If you want to memorize ten new words, have a Memory Palace with ten stations. If you have to build it as you go along, then you’re going to create cognitive load. Dig your wells before you get thirsty.

2) Subdivision is possible, but you shouldn’t need it because proper use of the MMM will get the words into long-term memory. You can then reuse the Memory Palaces. If you want to hold onto them, which is often the case and perfectly okay, then you can create new Memory Palaces per letter. Easy-peasy.

There’s more help here:

How To Find Memory Palaces

3) Phrases are best memorized by attaching them to words you’ve already got reliably stationed. If you’ve memorized the word for “first,” then later, go back and memorize the equivalent of a phrase like, “first things first,” or “in the first place,” or “first of all.” You can often memorize a number of phrases, assuming the word is actually in the equivalent phrasing of the target language (it isn’t always, but often enough it is).

4) See 3

5) If your Memory Palace is built correctly, you’re not revising every station. You just go there. It’s the same thing as walking from your bedroom to the kitchen. You don’t revise that journey. You simply move to it on autopilot.

Sure, there’s some part of your mind responsible for moving you from place to place and observing everything. But good Memory Palace construction reduces the effort.

As for this being a lot of memorizing and revising, I suggest that anyone time their effort, time spent and results in comparison with rote learning. I doubt that anyone seriously using the Magnetic Memory Method in the right way will be able to say that spaced-repetition software or any other form of rote learning will be faster or easier.

And you don’t have to take my word for it. Check out Noel Van Vliet’s results using the Magnetic Memory Method. He was very skeptical, and yet it worked gangbusters for him:

Judgment Day

As for whether you understood everything correctly or not, here’s the thing:

Go in with the spirit of experimentation using the understanding that you already had and some of my clarifications. If you get results based on that understanding, awesome.

If you don’t get the results you’re looking for, go back to the book for more study and analysis of what you’ve been doing and make changes based on your needs and preferences. When you get results, awesome.

Since this is a method that teaches you how to build your own systems, then it’s really not about how I use the MMM. It’s about how you use the MMM.

The books and video courses already tell you how I use it. I’ve never made any significant changes to how I use it and I doubt I ever well. The basic nature of memory, the nature of the techniques and the nature of language will never change – at least not much. These features of reality really are one of the few things that are impervious to the old rule that change is the only constant. Not memory techniques nor the basic rules of language (words and grammar “rules” might transform over time, but the fact of words and grammar as such most likely never will).

The only thing that ever changes is the extent to which people get busy using these techniques. And I’m very pleased to see that you’re poised to do just that.

And it truly is the best of all worlds because as you learn Russian with the MMM, you learn about your memory and how to use it. As you learn about your memory and how to use it, you learn Russian.

Just make sure that you also read, write, speak and listen to Russian everyday. Otherwise, all the Memory Palaces and memory techniques in the world won’t help you get fluent. Memory techniques are a tool of fluency and the MMM is an imaginative and organic alternative to the old school hammer of rote learning. But both require the same level of daily reading, writing, speaking and listening.

So memorize forth and prosper with this in mind.

Thanks again for your note – hope to correspond again soon!

Further Resources

Download the above as a printable PDF

Memorize Foreign Language Vocabulary With Big Box Stores

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How To Become More Creative And Remember The Information That Matters In Your Life

Would you like to be more creative?

How about in a way that makes you more visual so you can memorize more information faster and with greater accuracy?

You would?

Great. Then this may be the most important episode of the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast you’ll ever experience.

Here’s why:

I’m going to give you two simple ways to become more visually creative so you can use your imagination to memorize anything. Of course, you’ll need to use a Memory Palace. Ideally you’ve already created several.

If not, you can listen to previous episodes of this podcast for help. These include How to Find Memory Palaces and movie and How to Enhance Your Memory With Virtual Memory Palaces. There’s also a full memory improvement course for improving memory in all areas of your life.

But for now, here’s …

How To Improve Your Memory By Legally Stealing Information That Already Exists Using Direct Analogy

The first way to become more visually creative involves creating “direct analogies.”

To use direct analogy, you need only follow five fun steps.

1. Identify an issue or problem. For people interested in using memory techniques for accelerated learning, this step should present no problems.

Chances are that you need to memorize:

• Facts for school
• Mathematical equations and other number-based information (link to math book)
• Information about historical figures
• Professional terminology in fields like medicine or law (am links)
• Music
• Names and faces
• Poetry and speeches
• Foreign language vocabulary and grammar rules

And this list is just for starters. Pilots, teachers, restaurant staff, police officers and a whole host of other people need memory techniques to make them better professionals.

The more specific you are about the problem you need to solve, the more dedicated you can be about shaping memory techniques as your go-to solution.

2. Find similar problems.

You might think it’s crazy to leap from your problem to other problems that only tangentially relate, but trust me. This second step is critical for developing your visual imagination. We’ll explore this point more completely in the next section.

3. Explore the analogy.

Once you’ve picked an example, dive in and start charting out the territory.

For example, doctors need to memorize a lot of terminology relating to the body, diseases, medicines and the cruel instruments related to their trade. How to get that large variety of terms and definitions into long term memory can be hard to visualize.

A similar problem that might come to mind could involve computer programmers. They need to teach computers to store terminology and make it accessible to users with intuitive ease.

You could then create a picture in your imagination of a doctor programming his mind as if it were a computer. Maybe he’s opened his skull and attached some wiring to his brain. And maybe the wires run into a keyboard so he can type the words and definitions, sending them exactly where they need to go.

Every Cell In Your Brain Has The Power To Help You Create Powerful Memories

By finding an analogy, you help yourself create an image. It’s great exercise and simply achieved.

To take another example, you could think of a painter who needs to place shapes and colors in just the right places. For example, you could see a doctor painting terminology onto a patient.

Or you could think about how novelists observe people in cafes to create portraits of them in prose. How could you use the needs of a doctor to create a visual analogy for comparison with the observation process of a novelist?

Whatever you choose for this part of the exercise, see the computer programmer-doctor or the painter-doctor or the writer-doctor in your mind. Focus intensely on creating that visual image.

If you can’t see a picture using your mind’s eye, take a few seconds to write out a description in words. Or access your other senses. What would it feel like to paint terminology on to a canvas, for example?

Whatever you do, don’t overthink the exercise. Just get started. You’ll learn by doing.

4. Repeat the process and prime yourself for better results

Now that you’ve found and explored an analogy, it’s time to start all over. Do it again. Just do it again.

And up the ante. Here’s how:

Keep giving your mind material that will make you more creative. To become more visual, use the material as a kind of “paint” to spread on the canvas of your mind.

In sum, you need to feed your mind the materials that make up paint.

The good news is that filling your paint factory with raw materials is easy and fun. You can:

• Read novels and poetry
• Look at art
• Go to a museum
• Watch movies
• Sit in a park and study nature
• Blind contour drawing

Why engage in any of these activities?

The Springtime Of Your Imagination Is Just Waiting To Explode With Insane Growth

Because when you feed your mind with images, you’re giving yourself more material to process than you consciously realize.

Think of your unconscious mind as a kind of Grand Central Station. Except in this station, only one train comes and goes.

The doors to this Grand Central Station are your eyes, ears, sense of touch, smell, etc.

Every piece of information you encounter enters Grand Central Station. If the individual bits of information were people, they would be bustling around and bumping shoulders.

Some of them would be pregnant, some may even be giving birth. Some would have already had children and be pushing baby carriages. Some would be flirting and some would be pickpockets.

Yet other people would be police. Perhaps there are some Secret Service agents lurking around in your Grand Central Station too.

The Agents Of Forgetfulness Are Even More Evil Than You Think!

These are the agents of judgment and disapproval. They try to stop babies from being born. They prevent babies growing up, and worse, from getting on the train at any age.

If there is an upside, it’s that they sometimes stop the pickpockets from thieving booty from unsuspecting passengers. But it’s mostly downside. These agents will stop at nothing to prevent certain people from getting on the train of your conscious mind. Usually, they hinder the most important people that you need to be the most creative at the most important times.

But even with all these agents around, every once in a while, the train of your unconscious mind pulls into the station. Sometimes it stays for awhile. Other times it’s just a short stop. Sometimes it picks up a ton of passengers. Sometimes very few, perhaps even none.

And when it rolls in, there may be few thoughts and perceptions still on the train. But many have left, getting off at various stations along the tracks of your life. This emptiness means that your train is usually in desperate need of new passengers if it’s going to travel anywhere.

Thus, the more information you get into your Grand Central Station, the more of that information can get onto the train of your conscious mind and then step out exactly where you need it in life.

Never Let A Good Idea Stand Alone

And the more information you’ve got milling around, the more the people in the Grand Central Station can work together to overcome the police and secret agents so they can board the train in the first place.

And the more people on the train – yes, even the pickpockets – the more these people can interact with another and arrive at the right places when you need them. And the more interactions you have on the train, the more these people will be able to spot the pickpockets and shake out their plunder.

And should a police officer or Secret Agent ever make it onto the train, the others will have no problem exposing them and turning them out with the thieves.

In sum, to be more visually creative, you’ve got to feed your mind visual information so that you can create more analogies.

And if you don’t believe me, just think about what I’ve just done. The picture I’ve given you of the unconscious mind as a train station and the conscious mind as a train is an analogy.

It’s a powerful one too.

Like King Lear Said:

Nothing Can Come Of Nothing

But it didn’t come out of nowhere, even though it felt like it had as I was writing it just now.

As I sit and write out this part of the podcast, I become aware of the movies and series I’ve been watching over the past few days. In an episode of Prison Break, for example, Michael Scofield and his brother are in a train station. A fellow escapee – an expert pickpocket – has recently died. There are cops everywhere and secret agents are chasing them.

Plus, I’ve been reading a John Grisham novel. It features a bus station in it. And I had recently watched Jackie Brown, which involves crowds milling in an airport and a shopping mall.

It’s clear to me now that these viewing experiences have influenced what seemed to be a spontaneously produced analogy. But it wasn’t spontaneously produced. It’s the result of the mixture churning in my unconscious mind and getting pumped out into my conscious mind.

And it every element has filtered through my studies of Freud from years ago. Freud, who talked about the “police” who stand between the conscious and unconscious mind. The repressive gatekeepers who prevent our powers of creativity from helping us create the lives we want.

So there are reasons why my unconscious mind is brimming with info. I feed it every day. I read novels, I look at art, I watch movies, I play music and sing.

Like Wyndham Lewis said:

If You’re Going To Be An Island, Might As Well Be A Volcanic Island!

And when I need analogies to help me teach or memorize new information, I never have to stretch. The volcano of raw material raging within never fails to spurt out material that I shape and form into rock hard analogies that do the trick.

And the force of the blast is so hot and so strong, no police officer or Secret Agent standing between my unconscious mind can survive the heat of the blast, let alone prevent it.

And the good news is that you can develop these superpowers of creativity too.

You now have the keys. You now know how to use direct analogies to become more visually imaginative. You now know how to fuel your Grand Central Station. You know how to fill up that train with all the best ideas. You know how to deliver whatever you need at any time, any place and under any conditions.

But let’s not stop with direct analogies.

Next time we’ll talk about how to become more visually imaginative so you can remember even more using personal analogies.

Stay tuned for that on the next episode of the Magnetic Memory Method, and as always, Keep Magnetic!

More Resources

Download this episode transcript as a PDF

Seven Ways To Make Your Memory Swiss Army Knife Sharp

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How To Win Any Language Learning Contest

On this week’s episode of The Magnetic Memory Method Podcast, Sam Gendreau talks about what it takes to develop the right mindset for learning a language, developing solid pronunciation and using mnemonics the right way.

You’ll find the full transcript of the interview below or download the full PDF to your desktop for easy reference. And check out part of Sam’s award-winning entry to the KBS World Korean Speaking Contest.

Transcript

Anthony: Sam, thank you for being on the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast a second time. It was really great the first time. I am grateful for the opportunity to catch up with you again. Not so long ago you won something called the KBS World Korean Speaking Contest. What is the story behind how you got involved with that?

Sam: Well first of all, thanks Anthony. It is a pleasure to be here for a second time. Indeed, I won the KBS World Korean Speaking Contest in 2014 so it’s been a couple months now. The reason why I got involved in the first place is in fact I was just following an organization on Facebook.

I saw that they were advertising this new contest organized by KBS. For those of you who might not know, KBS is the largest broadcasting corporation in Korea. It’s the equivalent of CBC in Canada or the BBC in the UK. I just looked at that, and I thought that maybe I could have a good chance of winning if I were to apply to that contest.

The contest was split into three different parts. The first stage was essentially all of the applicants were submitting a video of themselves speaking in Korean for about three minutes and you had a particular theme around which you had to structure your video.

Following this phase, I essentially made it to the top ten. The second phase entailed the ten participants having separate interviews with a professional Korean radio announcer. You essentially had to talk over Skype with this announcer in Korean. They were testing your speaking abilities just to see whether, as opposed to just recording yourself, in a more natural setting you are able to hold a conversation. I made it to the top three.

The third phase was to submit another video in Korean. I finally made it to the first prize. I was invited to spend a week in Seoul, Korea. I was on the national radio. I visited the KBS headquarters. It was quite an experience and certainly a memorable one.

This year there is going to be a second KBS World Korean Speaking Contest so I encourage people who might be interested in participating this year to certainly register. There is a Facebook page so you can have a look at it and it should be a popular contest this year.

Anthony: What interests you in Korean in particular, and at what stage were you already when you entered the contest?

Sam: My interest in Korean was sparked when I was living in Australia over 7 years ago because I met some Koreans there for the first time actually. I really had never had any interest in Korean in particular, but then I made a couple of friends there in Australia.

That is basically just how it got started. I got to know about Korean food, about some Korean culture and eventually I started to learn the language very gradually. I just purchased one of these little phrase books that you find on the shelves of bookstores. Slowly I started to learn the language, the script Hangul and after a couple of years, I registered in classes in university. For the most part, I really just learned on my own. When I applied to the contest last year, I mean it is always a subjective thing to gauge your own level, but I guess I was probably at a C1 level, so a fairly advanced level at least in terms of speaking abilities.

How To Use The Key Learning Strategies To Develop Fluency In Any Language

Anthony: Given that level you reached primarily on your own, what have been some of the key learning strategies that you have used with Korean and specifically with respect to speaking at that level?

Sam: That is a very good question. I think, first of all, what is more important even than any strategy or technique is really to keep yourself motivated. I think the primary reason why most language learners do not reach an advanced level of proficiency in a foreign language is usually just because they just give up after a few months or years.

The question is how can you keep yourself motivated and I think it boils down to curiosity, pure interest and really being curious about the culture and about the people who speak your target language. That is what has really been able to keep me going for that many years. I have been really fascinated by the culture. I have been really interested in movies and music, and the history of the country. I am also a fan of international affairs and international relations. That is my major. I am also very much interested in the international relations of Northeast Asia.

The Secret Of Using “Massive Input” To Build Build A “Self-Propelling Language Learning Engine

Studying about Korea and about the region, learning more about it has acted essentially like a self-propelling engine if you want to put it that way. The more I got to know about the region and about the country and the culture the more I wanted to learn the language. That is the first thing I would want to emphasize is the importance of keeping yourself motivated.

The second thing, in terms of reaching this level of speaking ability, in my case it has been really about the massive amount of input. I have watched a huge amount of movies in Korean, a huge amount of TV series, dramas as they call them in Korea, lots of music as well.

To be frank, I had not had the chance to speak Korean a lot throughout the years because I lived for the most part either in Australia or Canada and so the only time I really got to practice my speaking skills was when I lived in Korea for about a year. Even then it was not like I was speaking all the time but it certainly helped.

I think having this massive input like really listening to the language all the time has helped a lot and reading the news. I really tried to make the language a part of my life so I tried to use read the news every day in the language, read blogs in the language. Whatever kind of interests me in English or in other foreign languages, I can also do it in Korean. I have tried to make the language part of my life and just as an interesting experience overall.

The Exact Definition Of Fluency According To …

Anthony: Wow, well that is an amazing accomplishment. Real quick, just for people who may not be familiar with what C1 is, maybe you can just explain that and put it into context with the different levels that are B1 and B2 and so forth.

Sam: Certainly. I think that is the European framework of language proficiency. I am not sure if that is the exact term. Essentially, you have six different levels. You have A1, A2, B1, B2, C1, C2, the A’s being either low beginner or high beginner and B1 being a low intermediate, B2 high intermediate and so forth. A C1 level is typically what would be considered as a low advanced or advanced level. C2 would be native proficiency.

Obviously, before you can reach any type of C2 in a foreign language it’s really many, many years of study. It’s typically a level that’s fairly hard to reach. C1 is obviously below a native proficiency but it is still an advanced what you could call a professional proficiency in the language.

Obviously, this also depends. You have different skills in the language. You have writing skills, you have reading skills, and speaking skills. You might be C1 in writing, for example, but you might not be C1 in speaking. These blanket statements like, “Oh, I’m C1 in that language,” it always depends on which skills you are looking at, but certainly, if you pass an actual exam, that might help you to determine whether you are a C1 or a B2 or whatever if that is what you really want to know.

How To Speaking And Reading Skills – Even If The Language Uses Crazy Characters

Anthony: I think it is good to have a framework if people aren’t familiar with that, so that’s great. I’m curious, what is the relationship between being able to speak and being able to write and read the character set?

Sam: In Korean they use an alphabet just like in English we do or most European languages. That’s certainly very easy to learn. Hangul I think if you study for a few days you can certainly learn it. In that respect, Korean is very easy to learn to read and write. The complicated part is really to understand what you are actually reading.

The relationship between writing and speaking or reading I think obviously the more reading and listening you do the better you will be able to structure your own sentences and so forth.

When it comes down to speaking, I think practice is definitely central to gaining improvements in proficiency. Things such as even reading aloud I think can help a lot. I’ve done that certainly at many instances. Practicing over Skype with native speakers, having language exchange partners, or if you can afford it or you have the opportunity, just going to the country and actually living the language and speaking with natives on a day-to-day basis I think that can definitely help.

The Practice Of Pronunciation 101

Anthony: A lot of this has to do with pronunciation, and I’m curious to what extent you have just learned pronunciation from hearing and speaking or if you ever used any sort of memory techniques or mnemonics to help with pronunciation as a kind of guide from inside your mind?

Sam: In terms of pronunciation, for Korean it has been mostly just about exposure to the language. The way I see it, pronunciation is really more of something you need to practice rather than memorize, and so in that respect I’ve never really approached it from a mnemonics prospective.

I’m not sure in what way it might help. Maybe you could clarify that with our listeners, but I mean I see the use of mnemonics more for actually memorizing words or characters in the case of Chinese for example. In terms of pronunciation, my personal experience has been just to really listen, pay attention and try to imitate the native speakers.

I think pronunciation is not just about the physical. It’s not just about the way your mouth moves and so forth. A lot of people recommend that you learn the International Phonetic Alphabet also known as the IPA. They recommend that you kind of map your mouth and you really understand which part of your mouth is being used for which consonant and vowels. I think that can be very helpful.

Another aspect that is often not as much talked about, about pronunciation is that of the psychological side of it. I think a lot of people fail to really gain a very good accent in a foreign language because they don’t like to hear themselves sound foreign. There have been a couple of studies done about that.

The studies show that some language learners are essentially scared to sound funny. They don’t want to sound foreign to themselves. It also has to do with your own identity and the groups to whom you belong. It is fairly complicated, but in my case I really tried to imitate how native speakers speak and I’ve really tried to immerse myself in the culture and haven’t been scared to sound foreign or what not so I think that helped. Certainly looking into the psychological aspects of pronunciation I think can be a good way maybe to clear some roadblocks.

Anthony: That is interesting what you say about being afraid to hear yourself with an accent or with poor pronunciation that certainly has been something with my girlfriend where she can’t stand the sound of her German accent in her English and that makes her not want to speak it.

Sam: That’s interesting.

Anthony: It’s a shame because she speaks very well. I had never heard anybody phrase it like that, the way that you mentioned it so that just came to mind. You were talking about how that there’s a psychological element to it and that gets mapped onto the actual biological requirements of the body or the mouth and things of this nature. What I am curious about, is if you think there’s an overall relationship between learning a language and getting fluent and memory at all or is it just a sort of organic thing that grows and doesn’t really have that much to do with memory in your experience and opinion.

How To Memorize Thousands And Thousands Of Words By Using Mnemonics And Context

Sam: Well, I mean language learning is primarily about memorizing a lot of words. I think that’s for sure. Especially the case of a language that’s far away from your own, that’s in a different language family for example, you really have to start from a blank slate. In the case of Korean, I mean there are very, very few words that sound similar to English and these few words happen to be English loan words.

In every other case it’s really about learning a totally different word than what you are used to in English. Whereas, the case of Spanish or French, a lot of words are actually very similar because they come from the same Latin root.

In that respect yes, language learning is about memorizing a huge amount of words. Native speakers use on average, I think it is at least 3,000 words a day in their day-to-day vocabulary. However, if you are looking at their entire vocabulary of an educated native speaker, the active vocabulary it’s usually around the amount of 20,000 words depending on the languages. A passive vocabulary, which means the vocabulary that you can recognize but not necessarily produce yourself is typically double that, so 40,000 words.

Obviously, if you do want to reach a very high level of proficiency in a language, you need to memorize a huge amount of words. I think looking at it from that perspective, mnemonics and memory techniques can certainly really help to make that process easier.

That being said, I think there a lot of different ways that you can manage to increase your retention, context being one of them. Reading and learning words through context and not just using lists of words that are decontextualized. I think it is very important to learn new words as you come across them as they are used in sentences and not individually.

Other techniques involved, for example, memorizing sentences rather than words. Rather than sentences, you have groups of words that typically go well together. These are techniques you can use to facilitate the acquisition and retention of words. To answer your question, definitely, I think memorization and memory plays a huge role in acquiring a foreign language.

Anthony: Do you have one go-to method for memorizing words that you find very, very reliable and rarely fails you?

Sam: You know, I would say the short answer to your question is no, because I think every language is different.

Again, it depends on your target language. If your target language is from the same language family as your native tongue, then I think you don’t necessarily have to put as much effort into really consciously memorizing the words and I think you could very well do with learning through context and through massive exposure. So reading the news, listening to movies, I think that is certainly something that can work.

If you are learning a language that is very far away from your own native language, for example, if you’re a speaker of a European language and you want to learn an Asian language, then you are going to find it a lot harder to memorize words because they sound totally different. In these instances, I think using memory techniques can be very valuable because it’s going to make the process of memorizing all of this new vocabulary a lot easier.

The Short Term And The Long Term Game Plan Of Using Mnemonics As Part Of Learning A Language

Just a caveat here. I think of people are reluctant to invest the time necessary to essentially learn about memory techniques and mnemonics. Obviously, it is an investment that you have to make because it is not something that is going to come right away. You have to invest in coming up with these mnemonics, and it can seem like a large investment in time or something that is a little bit cumbersome, but it certainly is something that pays off I think over time. While you are not likely to see the return on your investment, put it that way, very quickly, over the long-term it’s certainly going to be a huge return.

Just to put that in perspective, I think a lot of people say, “Well I don’t want to learn all of these mnemonics and make a story for each word I’m learning. It’s going to take me too much time.” However, if you look at it from a longer-term perspective, I think it is certainly worth it.

Anthony: One thing that really fascinated me that I was reading on your website is something you wrote about the Hedwig von Restorff, and I wonder if you could just go into that a little bit and what she concluded in that topic you were writing about.

Sam: Yes, I think if I remember correctly in that article I mentioned the so called von Restorff effect and so that’s the isolation effect that essentially she discovered through some of her research. I believe she is a German psychiatrist who did a number of studies on memory and these kinds of things.

What she found was that it’s kind of a standout effect. Things that really stand out from others, they’re typically going to be a lot easier to remember.

How To Make Words Stick Out Like A Sore Thumb

This can come in the form of humor, for example. When you go and you listen to somebody talk (maybe it’s a TED talk, maybe it’s just professor at school), if that person suddenly in the middle of his or her talk makes a huge joke, then everybody starts laughing and the joke is related to some material being covered in that talk, then you are more likely to remember that particular episode in the talk. Whereas, the rest is more monotone and everything, but if something really stands out, then you are more likely to remember it.

That applies to a lot of different areas or contexts. For example, even if you have a grocery list of things that you want to buy and one of them is highlighted in green or in pink or whatever, then because this, by its nature, will stand out to you, then you are more likely to remember it.

I think that it can help when you are creating mnemonics for yourself to create stories that really stand out that are really different. You have to be creative. When you are imagining a mnemonic of a kick, you can imagine it the size of your cell phone or really make it stand out so that you remember it and that really actually works, trying to make things stand out.

When you are creating your own mnemonics, just play with your imagination and don’t bind yourself to existing sizes and shapes as you see them, or even flavors or smells. You can just experiment with your imagination and throw in some stuff in there so that it really stands out and that should make it easier for you to remember whatever it is you’re trying to memorize.

Can Grammar Be Memorized?

Anthony: That is a great principle. Using these sorts of strategies to memorize individual words is one thing and I think we can see how that all that works. Certainly many of us have had that experience, but I’m curious if you can think of any ways to apply mnemonics and this kind of principle from von Restorff to memorizing grammar rules, something so abstract that it’s almost like a mathematical formula. Do you have any idea how we get those principles to stick out in our mind as if we had marked them with a green highlighter?

Sam:  That’s a good question. I mean typically, from my own experience, I have been using mnemonics fairly lightly, but mostly for vocabulary or memorizing things like Chinese characters. In terms of actual grammar rules, I’ve never really felt the need to use mnemonics in that case. As you say, it’s a little bit more abstract. It’s more like a formula.

For example, I don’t know, in French maybe you’re going to have feminine words, which end with a certain vowel and plural words are going to end with an “x” or an “s”. I mean, these are the kind of rules that, frankly, I think would be more easily assimilated through exposure, through just going through texts and assimilating the grammar rather than just memorizing it. I think that would be the best.

From my own experience, I found that when you’re learning grammar, a winning strategy is to be exposed to the language first. This is going to bring you a couple of questions. You’re going to be wondering, “Okay, why is this word coming there? Why is this word ending in such consonant?” When you’re actually going back and you’re learning about the grammar, you’re going to have these “aha” moments, because you are finally going to figure out, okay now I understand why what I read was like that.

Most people essentially do it the bottom up approach. They learn the grammar rules first before being exposed to the language. I think that is a mistake because unless you are exposed to the rules and to the language, even if you tried to remember these grammar rules, you’re not going to have any context to put them in, and it is not going to be very meaningful.

Once again, I would like to emphasize that personally I found it works a lot better if you get exposed to the language first and then you go and try to understand the grammar rules. You read about them and then you are going to be able to memorize them a lot easier.

Anthony: Basically back to context.

Sam: Exactly. I think context is really king in language learning. You definitely have to make good use of it. I think it’s a good strategy.

How To Develop A Mindset That Matters

Anthony: One thing that I really like on your website, and just talking to you, and the previous interview that we did and this great achievement with the world Korean speaking contest, is that everything seems a lot to have to do with mindset. The success that you’ve had comes from a way that you think about language learning and you think about languages themselves.

I wonder if you have any advice for people who don’t have the – well right or wrong is not really the answer – but they don’t have an optimal mindset. How do you go about developing that and keeping yourself motivated as you earlier suggested is such a key critical component of language learning?

Sam: That’s a very good question. I definitely agree that mindset is really going to set the foundation for success in language learning and in fact in many other areas of your life. I think, first of all as I was mentioning before, it boils down to curiosity and that’s something that you can cultivate, but it’s not necessarily going to come naturally but you have to – it depends I guess from people to people – but it’s about really getting interested in learning, in knowledge and in new things. Seeing things from a different perspective and learning about a different culture.

A lot of language learners see language learning as a very mechanical exercise where they are just learning grammar tables and lists of vocabulary and they see it as a chore. They forget that learning a language is about having fun and really discovering something absolutely new.

I always like to remind myself that it’s an exercise that is really mind opening and that really brings a lot of different opportunities. It’s an opportunity to learn about new things and to enlarge your vision, to enlarge your world, to expand your comfort zone.

One thing that I’ve been using often to motivate myself has been listening to other successful language learners and motivational speakers. One thing that I like is listening to TED talks for example. That has been a strong motivator not only for language learning, but also for a host of other things, but essentially listening to successful people who have gone through the process and who speak many languages I think can be certainly a strong motivator.

The Only Person On The Planet You Should Compete With When Learning A Language

Ultimately, what you have to do is to challenge yourself and compete with yourself rather than with other people. I think that’s important because there’s always going to be people who are better than yourself. The question is can you be better than yourself the next day, the next month, and the next year. It is about competing with yourself and trying to push your own boundaries rather than pushing somebody else’s boundaries, because if that is what you are trying to do then you’re obviously going to be failing and that can be a demotivation certainly.

Another thing, as I say, I think it boils down also to the culture and having this interest in learning more about the people. What is their mindset? What is their world? Everybody sees the world from a different perspective. I think different cultures and different nations also see the world from a different perspective based on their own historical understanding of the world and based on the way they’ve been brought up by their parents and by the society in which they live in. Trying to understand these things, I think, can really bring an interesting ingredient into language learning.

You can watch documentaries about the language that the people speak. You learn about the history. You can purchase books about history. There are so many thing on the Internet available these days that it’s just amazing. Just be curious. Learn about the culture, learn about the people who speak your target language, keep an open mind and just see it as an enjoyable process rather than as a chore. I think this is going to go a long way in keeping you motivated.

Dealing With Frustration, Demotivation And Irritants When Learning A Language

Anthony: I wonder, given all you have said and the powerful advice that you have given and insight, what is something that has frustrated you with language learning that you’ve been able to overcome and maybe it still frustrates you when you are studying the language that you have a tool for overcoming when it arrives?

Sam: That’s a good question. One of the things I’ve come across in Korean, and I haven’t come across this in any other languages so far is, well first of all Korean uses two types of words. One is pure Korean words and one is Sino-Korean vocabulary, words that are rooted in Chinese. Essentially, you have two different words for almost everything. Whether it’s a chair, whether it’s a collar you will have the Chinese-rooted word version of it and you are going to have the pure Korean word version of it.

That’s quite interesting because in more casual and everyday conversations most people will use the native Korean words, the pure Korean words. Whereas when you read the news and more technical material, they use the words that are rooted in Chinese.

I was even speaking to a Foreign Service officer who had been through extensive language training in Korean and what she told me was that even after these years of study and she had been working at an Embassy in Seoul for many years, she told me that she had these black holes. In everyday conversation, she could understand everything, but then suddenly she could be reading the news or maybe she could go to a talk that was a little more technical topic and suddenly she would not understand anything. That is something I have come across in a number of instances in Korean. That’s been quite frustrating.

It’s a constant reminder that you have so much more to go. The road ahead of you is infinite essentially because language learning is not something that is finite and there’s no goal to reach that one day you’re going to say, “Oh, I’m fluent and now let’s forget about it.” It’s really a lifelong process.

You can always become more proficient even in your own native language. I mean if you compare yourself to Shakespeare, obviously I think all of us have a long way to go if we want to create this kind of work or be as proficient as this kind of artist. The question is where do you want to stop or do you want to keep going? That’s been a reminder to me that I still have a long way to go.

At first, I think it was a strong irritant or demotivation because I could sometimes read through an article and I could not understand anything. It’s a little bit demotivating, but the way I’ve tried to overcome this is essentially about finding material that is suitable to your level.

Avoid This Seductive Mistake When Learning A Language

I think some people will try and jump ahead too quickly. They are going to try and read articles maybe about international affairs or things that are, even for an educated native speaker might be hard to talk about. Then if you are trying to read this and then you don’t understand 50 percent of the words that are in there, obviously it’s going to be very tedious to go over single word and try to understand every single sentence.

To proceed step by step and try to find material that is really suitable to your current level but not too easy because then you get bored, but not too hard because you then you get demotivated. It’s about finding this right middle so that you consistently push yourself, but at the same time you remain interested and you keep learning new words and you keep learning about new things. I think that’s a winning strategy. Just remembering that finding material that is suitable to your level I think is important.

The Road From Here

Anthony: Is there a language that you’re in love with so much you think you’re going to stick with for the rest of your life, for instance Korean?

Sam: Yes, I think Korean is definitely one of those languages I will definitely keep learning it for my entire life, at least for the foreseeable future. It’s not something I really see about studying. Some people really see language as studying, but once you reach a certain level I think it’s just about making it a part of your life. I don’t think about it as study in any kind of way. It’s really just about being exposed to the material and content that I like. That can be the news or it can be movies but certainly, I don’t plan on stopping to get exposed to Korean language material.

Other languages, I mean Spanish is an interesting language and it’s spoken by so many people around the world that obviously I think I’m going to continue to use it and learn it in the future, but I’m very drawn to Asian, Southeast and East Asian cultures and languages. In the future, I’m looking forward to learning additional languages that are spoken in that region.

Anthony: So what’s coming up next for you on with your language learning adventure?

Sam: In terms of Lingholic.com, I have been running the website now for over two years. It’s been doing fairly well. I am going to continue to be active on social media. In fact, you can find me on Twitter or Facebook, and I will continue posting articles as regularly as I can handle. As of recently, I have been very busy so some of you might have noticed that I haven’t able to post articles as often as I would have liked, but I’m going to keep having interviews such as with you, with other polyglots and language learners. I’m going to share my stories and the stories of other people who are interested about language learning, and hopefully, that is going to keep people interested about language learning and that may serve as a source of inspiration.

In terms of what’s ahead of me, in terms of languages I’m currently working at the Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development here in Canada. In the future, I would love to get posted in a country in Asia abroad. Certainly as I was saying, I’m very much interested in Southeast Asian and East Asian cultures and languages. That would certainly be a good opportunity to essentially immerse myself into a new language and a new culture. However, for the time being I’m going to keep learning Chinese, Mandarin Chinese, it’s a very interesting language and obviously a very rich culture.

In the future, I am looking forward to learning other languages. It’s definitely something that I think is going to be following me for my whole life. I think language learning is just such an enriching experience that I would recommend it to everybody.

Anthony: Thank you so much for all of this, for your great insights and for being here. I really am grateful that you could share these ideas with the listeners of this podcast, and I hope everyone goes and visits you on your site and follows you on all social media. I look forward to speaking the next time.

Sam: Thanks Anthony, it’s been a pleasure to speak with you, and hopefully this has been interesting to our listeners. Once again, I’m happy to come back on the show anytime. It’s always a pleasure to talk with you.

Further Resources

Lingholic on Twitter

Lingholic on Facebook

Sam Gendreau Talks About How To Get Addicted To Language Learning

Sam Gendreau on Backpacking Diplomacy

Sam Gendreau on The Laziness Paradox

The post Mindset, Memory And Motivation With Sam Gendreau appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

Who Else Wants To Get Rid Of Stress-Induced Memory Loss Forever?

Have you felt stressed out lately?

I’ll bet you have.

Me too.

Stress sucks, and worse than being a drag, it’s a memory killer too.

But not always.

On occasion, stress can make certain things memorable. Car accidents, terrorist attacks and riots can make many things impossible to forget. Such events can can even lead to post-traumatic stress disorder.

Usually, though, stress punishes our bodies and minds without the need of catastrophe. Work, relationship problems and health can all create stress.

How Safe Are Your Goals And Dreams From The Destructive Powers Of Everyday Stress?

Stress gets in the way of goals and dreams. Important professional missions like:

• Studying for exams and professional certifications.
• Learning a language.
• Remembering the names of the important people you meet.

But stress distracts from these activities. Stress makes paying attention difficult and learning new information becomes almost impossible.

If anything, all you learn is how to be more stressed out.

How To Increase Your Chances Of Getting Dementia or Alzheimer’s

So we’ve established that stress can create memory loss by making it impossible to pay attention. In other words, you’ve lost what you wanted to remember because you couldn’t pay attention to it in the first place.

But isn’t it strange that memory loss is one of the symptoms of stress that far too many don’t know about?

How about these symptoms that also seem to have fallen off the radar:

• Anxiety
• Fear
• Tension
• Panic
• Anger
• Confusion
• Depression
• Impatience
• Irritability

Worse, you might experience pain, insomnia, develop heart disease, and elevated blood pressure.

Even just one of these can lead to diseases like dementia or Alzheimer’s.

8 Signs That You’re WAY Too Stressed

So how do you know if you’re stressed?

Chances are you already know when you’re stressed. You don’t need a checklist.

But just in case, here are some of the symptoms so you can see how to improve memory and concentration power starting today.

Loss of appetite

More than just losing the desire to eat, stress can make it impossible to eat. Swallowing even a mouthful can become difficult.

Overeating

On the other hand, stress can make you eat too much. Some people use food as a coping mechanism, something that places even more stress on your system. The heavier you are, the harder your bones and organs have to work. Plus, not feeling positive about how you look is psychologically draining.

Headaches and Backaches

Think that pain in your head or at the base of your spine is just part of life?

Maybe, but it could also be the symptom of stress.

Indecision

Having a hard time making decisions? It’s not necessarily just part of your personality. People who can’t define a clear path and follow it could be experiencing stress.

Pessimism

It’s little wonder that stress makes it hard to see the cup half full. If you’re doubtful that your current situation will ever improve, it’s not necessarily depression. Stress could be at the core of your dark thinking.

Obsessing Over the Nuts and Bolts of Life

It’s good to pay attention to detail. But it can also be a symptom of stress. If your perfectionism is getting in the way of your ability to contribute to your family and society at large, you might want to check in with your stress meter.

Impatience and Irritability

Have you flipped out and chewed someone’s head off lately? Such bursts of irritation rarely come from nowhere, so be sure that you aren’t acting out based on stress. You probably have other solutions.

Muscle Tension

Are your shoulders all bunched up? Do you have pain in your neck? Do you slouch when you walk?

If so, you’re probably holding stress in your body.

And along with muscle tension comes shortness of breath, cramps and even nervous twitching. Even your eyebrows can show signs of muscle tension. Having your face twisted and scrunched up can lead to others thinking that you’re grumpy or angry, stressing you out even further.

Horrible, right?

You betcha.

5 Simple Ways To Reduce Stress From Your Life And Improve Your Memory

The good news is that solutions exist for each of these stress symptoms. Let’s look at some of them.

1. The first step is to learn the signs of stress and look for them in your life.

2. Next, train yourself to tune into your emotional state. You can best accomplish this awareness through meditation and journaling.

3. Seek out an accountability partner. An accountability is someone you contact daily or nearly every day to talk about your commitments, proclaim victory when you’ve accomplished something and admit your guilt when you’ve fallen short.

At first, accountability might sound more stress inducing, but it isn’t. Your accountability partner will encourage you and act as a kind of coach. They’ll notice when you’re pushing too hard, criticizing yourself too much, need to take a break and help you recognize just how well you’re doing. You simply cannot have a bad day when you’re being held accountable and committed to holding your partner accountable too.

The Truth Really Will Set Your Free!

It’s also freeing to be able to say that you haven’t completed something. It’s off your chest and you’ll hear similar stories from your partner. In other words, you both grow stronger because you report on your efforts to succeed, and together the successes grow while the failures diminish.

Plus, you help each other see that you’re never failing at all. Every action and every lack of action that you’ve observed and labeled (which is itself a form of taking action) lays another brick along the wall of your accomplishment.

I interact with my accountability partner by email because we’re thousands of miles apart. But you might be able to meet with yours in person a few times a week.

And meeting with people is another way of alleviating stress. These people need to be positive, fun and bring different ideas and perspectives into your life.

Such interactions sharpen your brain, help eliminate stress and create future-minded thinking. Whenever you learn new things, you create a new future that was not possible before. And the more positive the people you hang out with, the more positive a future you can create.

The Zen of Giving Up Freaking Out (Over Nothing)

4. Practice breathing and meditate. I’ve talked with you before about pendulum breathing, reverse psychic nostril breathing and progressive muscle relaxation.

You can practice better breathing while meditating. Meditation is a powerful activity because it improves neural connections, preventing the degeneration of your neurons and protects your hippocampus. Some scientists believe that the hippocampus is a kind of memory central command centre, but even if not, it’s worth protecting this part of your brain in addition to all the rest.

And meditation is easy to do. You don’t need anything fancy. Just your body and a floor to sit on.

Contrary to popular belief, you also don’t need to try and control your thoughts. As Alan Watts once pointed out, sitting without thoughts amounts to being a stone. Wouldn’t you agree that turning yourself into a mindless stone is a useless goal?

Instead, focus on using the breathing and muscle relaxation exercises to become aware of your body and the flow of your thoughts.

Don’t try to control your thoughts. As William S. Burroughs once said, “control seeks to control control,” which means that you only give your thoughts more power by trying to force them into shape.

You’ll get more from your meditation practice by simply breathing. The distance this creates between your physical awareness and your thoughts will let you realize that the flow of ideas differs little from the beating of your heart. It just happens.

How To Use The Immutable Power Of The Memory Palace For Reducing Stress

5. Chill out. Just as you can influence the speed of your heart with exercise, you can exercise the speed of your thoughts. For this reason, I recommend that you wander your favorite Memory Palace as you meditate and improve concentration Buddha-style.

You needn’t practice recall during these sessions though you certainly can. The point is to simply give your thoughts a point of focus. In this case that point of focus is a mentally constructed journey through a familiar location.

And if your mind wanders to some other line of thinking, no worries. Let it go and soon you’ll become aware of the fact that you’re sitting on the floor and realize that you’ve been lost in thought.

These moments of realization will amaze you with their power. Soon you will find similar moments taking place throughout the day.

How To Make The Most Frustrating Taxi Ride In The World A Path To Stress-Free Enlightenment

For example, I was sitting in a taxi earlier today and found myself irritated with the traffic. On top of that, it was irritating that the current transit strike had forced me to get into a taxi in the first place. Stress ha started building within me.

But then suddenly a moment of awareness washed over me. I realized that I am nothing more than a body – an animated object sitting inside of another moving object commanded by another being. Looking out the window, I saw only other objects moving through space at various rates of speed. In some cases, they weren’t moving at all.

There was no point in forming an opinion about these objects. No amount of thought or stress could change the situation. Frustration could only make it worse. As the moment of realization grew in strength and duration, my stress and irritation dissipated.

And I’m confident that you’ll experience the same reductions in stress and useless anger when you make meditation a part of your life too.

How To Walk, Talk And Eliminate

The Stress Of Multi-tasking

To sweeten the deal, add exercise to your life. It can be simple stretching every morning or daily pushups or elaborate sports like martial arts.

They say that walking with a friend a few times a week is one of the healthiest things you can do, especially if you make sure to walk rigorously enough to make talking difficult and do it long enough to break a sweat.

You can also reduce stress by eliminating multi-tasking. You’ll make fewer errors by focusing on one task at a time. And focusing on one thing instead of many will help stabilize your mood and improves your memory because you pay more attention to that singular activity.

Completing one task at a time also promotes organization. Being organized reduces stress, and if you throw removing clutter into the mix, stress goes down even further. You should check out my friend The Declutter Lady for more help with that.

And there’s so much more you can do:

• Laugh often
• Practice forgiveness
• Ask for help when you need it instead of struggling on your own
• Talk positively to yourself.

If all of this sounds complex, here’s the reality:

If you can meditate just five minutes a day, stretch for just five minutes a day and walk for about twenty minutes a day three or four times a week, you’re looking at next to nothing in terms of time commitment. You need only build consistency with these activities and you’ll make a huge impact on the quality of your life.

You’ll reduce stress, create a better future and a better memory. And when you can create a better memory, you can learn more. And the more you learn, the more you can learn. Due to the associative way that memory techniques work, the more you memorize, the more you can learn and thereby the more you can memorize.

Begin Anywhere

It’s a perfect circle.

All you have to do is begin anywhere to enter the dance. And the dance is so easy, so elegant, so effective and so much fun.

So pick just one stress-relieving activity from this list and just do it. Then add another, and another and another. Until you’re satisfied that you couldn’t be freer from stress if you tried.

And memorize information as you go along.

Track the results.

You’ll be amazed by how your memory improves.

And I hope you’ll get in touch and let everyone in the Magnetic Memory Method know all about it.

Further Resources

17 Student Fails (And What To Do Instead)

The post How To Improve Memory Power And Concentration By Eliminating Stress appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

Can You Really Trust Memory Palaces You’ve Made Up Entirely With Your Mind?

Remember Dorothy?

Of course you do.

That innocent young woman. Skipping through the Land of Oz. Meeting new friends. Tackling Wicked Witch. Reigning forever as the most beautiful Queen with Ruby Slippers who ever lived …

Oh no wait … that’s not the way it went.

And that’s exactly the point. When we use our imagination, we can change anything. We can invent things too.

Including Memory Palaces.

So if you want to know how to enhance your memory using a very special kind of Memory Palace, download the MP3 and keep reading this post all the way to the end.

3 Kinds Of Virtual Memory Palaces And The Little Known Factors That Affect Your Success

Let’s kick this discussion off with a question I recently received:

Hi Sir,

Could you give me an example of how to create an artificial memory palace?

Thanks.

Thanks for this question!

There are many, many ways to create artificial Memory Palaces.

What Do We Mean When We Call A Memory Palace “Virtual”?

First off, by “artificial” we are talking about either Memory Palaces built from scratch or based on fantasy locations.

To begin with the latter, you could use the layout of Homer Simpson’s house or the house of any sitcom. Fantasy layouts like these are great because we can quickly become familiar with the living room, kitchen, dining area and the bedrooms of each character. We can then simply study the layout of these rooms with great intensity the next time we are watching the show and create a journey throughout the house.

Some people have used video games too. When I use them, I prefer simple platform games like Donkey Kong.

I find these best because you can see the entire journey and all of its stations at a single glance. You can also set rules much easier, such as that there will always be three stations per ramp, etc.

Experiment, Experiment, Experiment

However, if you’re keen on first-person shooter games or games that use vast expanses of space and can remember these journeys, I encourage you by all means to experiment with them.

You might also want to check out this interview. Ten years old at the time we spoke, Alicia Crosby talked about using Minecraft for building Memory Palaces.  Here’s a video showing how that might work for you:

Is Hollywood The Ultimate Untapped Resource For Foolproof Memory Palaces?

Movies sometimes have good potential for creating stations, but not always. I’ve talked about how to enhance your memory using movies before on this podcast called How to Increase Memory By Watching Movies and TV Series.

On the main, movie and TV scenes are usually too broad. Not only that, but characters constantly cross their own paths. Plus, you have to hold large parts of the narrative in your mind as part of the journey.

That said, you can experiment with a “then this happens and then this happens” structure to build a journey. For example:

Dorothy meets the Scarecrow, then …

Dorothy meets the Tin Man, then …

Dorothy meets the Lion, then …

Dorothy meets the big green head of Oz, then …

Dorothy battles the witch, then …

Dorothy meets the real Wizard of Oz, then …

Dorothy goes home.

These meeting points all serve as pseudo-stations. They might work well because the Scarecrow, Tin Man, Lion, Oz, the Witch and even Dorothy herself can easily be combined with other associative-imagery elements. Plus, Dorothy meets them at specific locations in the movie that are easy to visualize.

I’ve done a bit of experimentation with this method and for short lists of information, it works gangbusters. However, I wouldn’t expect to amass huge amounts of information using movies unless you are very, very familiar with the journey the characters take throughout the story. Again, characters often cross their own paths, or, as in the Wizard of Oz, completely double back.

Is It Worth It To Build A Mega-Memory Palace From Scratch?

Moving from Memory Palaces based on pre-made fantasy locations, you can build virtual Memory Palaces from nothing. In fact, the classic Memory Palace method, which I do not endorse, involves creating a single Memory Palace with multiple doors that lead into multiple rooms or buildings.

Using this approach, you build a Memory Palace and a long corridor with many doors. When you go through the first door, you find yourself in your childhood home. When you go through the second, you find yourself in your first school. The next door opens onto your high school, then your workplace, your sports club, etc.

I can’t fully enunciate why I don’t like this idea, but it’s never worked for me.

The Alphabetical School Of Memory Palaces 101

As readers of my books and participants in my video courses know, I prefer structuring my Memory Palaces around the alphabet. The alphabet is somewhat like a conceptual corridor in the Memory Palace of my skull, and it’s both pre-built and built by the user using the Magnetic Memory Method principles.

Because we know the alphabet so well from a young age, we don’t have to think about what comes next. We can easily know what comes before and after each and every letter of the alphabet. Therefore, if we want to leap to words that we’ve memorized that start with the letter K …

Boom! We’re There …

… and zooming along to the station where the letter K resides.

In other words, if you’re going to build virtual or imaginary Memory Palaces, I encourage you to think in advance of how you’re going to bind them together.

In the first example, I was already suggesting a chronological rather than an alphabetical spine, and that can work well depending on how long you’ve lived and how many buildings you’re familiar with. With the alphabet, you can reuse it again and again by differentiating each alphabet from the other (A1, A2, A3, etc.)

But when it comes to having an invented room behind one of those doors, be it linked by Grand Memory Palace Central or an alphabetized list, it’s really up to the user to experiment.

The Little Memory Palace Engine That Could

My greatest success with Virtual Memory Palaces has been what I call “The Locomotive Method.” I use the technique exclusively for memorizing poetry.

The Locomotive Method involves creating a train car that is linked to another train car. You add as many train cars as you need. The stations in each car are fixed. They are:

Entrance to car
Left corner
Right corner
Middle
Front right corner
Front left corner
Exit
Coupling

Followed by

Entrance to car, etc.

This works very good for poetry on a perfectly conceptual level because you don’t need a real journey for poetry in the way that you need for other kinds of information. The poetry is the journey.

This also works for song lyrics. For actors, however, I think a traditional journey through a Memory Palace based on a real location is best for remembering plays and movie scripts if you are an actor.

Plus, an actor can always use the stage or studio where the acting takes place. If that doesn’t present the perfect combination of real and invented space for figuring out how to enhance your memory with virtual Memory Palaces, I don’t know what would.

If even with all of this info tugging your train you’re still stuck in the Kansas of forgetfulness and want a Magnetic Wizard to show you the ropes, feel to join the Magnetic Memory Method Masterclass.

Until next time, keep those Ruby Slippers and then teach someone else what you’ve learned about Memory Palaces. Teaching a skill is one of the best ways to learn it and helping people improve their memory is one of the best ways we can make the world a better place. The more we remember, the more we can remember. And the more we learn, the more we can learn.

Further Resources

How To Find Memory Palaces

The Memory Palace of Matteo Ricci (Inspiring!)

13 Reasons You Should Take ThinkBuzan Memory Training

The post How To Enhance Your Memory With Virtual Memory Palaces appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

These Memory Strategies Can Quickly Boost Your Foreign Language Fluency … Even If You Wind Up Throwing The Mnemonics Away!

Have you ever wished someone would just inspire you and give you exactly the tools you need to succeed in one blast of self-empowerment at the same time?

Well, if you’re into language learning, what I’m about to tell you may be the most important episode of this podcast you’ll ever hear. And of course if you’d like the transcripts in handsome PDF form, you can download them here.

You can also scroll all the way to the end for the links mentioned in the podcast for a power-packed injection of inspiration and practical guidance. Plus, I’ve got something cool to teach you at the very end about using hats to increase your productivity, so go all the way through for that.

Here’s How Philosophy Can Double Your Fluency When All Other Techniques Fail …

Last week I attended the Polyglot Gathering in Berlin.

Of the many talks, Christopher Huff’s struck me the most. All of the other presentations were great, of course, but… because Christopher drew some language learning ideas from philosophers I know very well, I was struck by the connections I’d never noticed before.

He also had some great ideas about memory techniques and more importantly, memory strategies. Taken in the context of philosophy, Christopher presented some exciting ideas you can start applying to your language learning and overall life right away. You may even experience results overnight.

Here’s why:

The Undercover Secrets Of Minimalism And Hedonism

Christopher talked about two kinds of philosophers, which we could call the minimalists and the Epicureans. The first group like to toss out everything unnecessary and the Epicureans fill everything to excess. What they share in common is that only the now exists.

You might want to check out philosophers like Plato and Aristotle for more info on this matter. For example, Plato’s Republic has many passages on frugality in many aspects of life (including thought). Aristotle talked about minimalism in terms of the Golden Mean and eudaimonia, a special definition of happiness.

When it comes to learning a language, minimalism helps you concentrate on the essentials by using only the essentials.

Sell Everything!

Being minimalist also helps you identify what is essential. If you’re only working on mastering one language learning book, after all, you’re more likely to discover what’s essential in that book in a meaningful way than if you try to find out what’s essential in twelve books. You can learn more about this powerful form of whittling down in How to Memorize a Textbook.

By focusing on just one thing, you’re more likely to get a concentrated vision of what you’re lacking. So minimalism creates focus, understanding and diamond-hard clarity about what you don’t know yet. You can make much more powerful decisions because you’re a minimalist. You’re only going to acquire one more book, one that you select well based on your well-developed knowledge of what you need.

Epicureanism, on the other hand, allows for excess. So long as it’s linked to pleasure, epicureanism happily encourages maximalism.

How to Over-Exaggerate Everything And Still Get Results

Although it might sound wild, excess can be done intelligently. Christopher pointed out the value in giving yourself rewards of excess (which is different than giving yourself an excess of rewards).

Christopher also implied that having a library of special books you’ve collected, even ones you’re never going to read, is not really clutter. Each book is a memory of the passion behind why you got the book in the first place.

So even though Christopher (and probably you) may never study some of the language learning books in his collection, they serve as part of a language learning whole. It is a specific library, one that contains many touchstones that point to the larger goal of gaining fluency in many languages.

In other words, overkill can be an effective memory strategy.

So there is a sense that bigger is better, especially if people who amass such enormous collections of language learning materials also practice minimalism.

The “Stubborn” Principle That Can Make Your Language Learning Soar

When people select just one book from that collection and work through it in a dedicated manner, they may need to buy a new book thereafter. But they are strengthening the collection as a whole by adding material that is now much more targeted. It’s kind of like growing as a content specialist as you allow the maximalism to inform your minimalism and vice versa.

The Golden Mean between these two extremes is what Christopher called the “Stubborn Quintile.” It basically refers to the percentage of words that language leaners struggle with no matter what.

This concept allows you to identify the material that eludes you and figure out what techniques will best help. Be it certain difficult words, phrases, grammar concepts or other issues, by identifying this 20%, you can approach getting them into memory minimalistically.

And That’s When Things Got REALLY Interesting!

Christopher talked about certain memory techniques and gave some mind-boggling demonstrations. He sang, for example, the names of the American presidents in historical order. He also showed how he used some of those presidents to remember tones in Chinese.

It was brilliant because he was following one of the fundamental rules of memory: rest new information on information you already know.

For example, he used a very familiar song to assist the recall of all the presidents.

With the presidents in tow, he used them to help memorize tones.

Were he to push the technique further, he might find a way to use the memorized tones to memorize something else. For example, a set of tones might be used as an anchor point for developing perfect pitch. Or it could be used to find a note in a song to help with transcription study.

For example, Scott Devine has talked about memorizing the notes of Stand By Me so well that you can see them on the fretboard of your bass. Then, when you hear a song on the radio you want to learn, you can use that anchor point to figure out a great deal of how other songs might be played.

In other words, by having an Epicurean mass of information in our minds, we have many more opportunities to use that info in explosively minimalist ways.

I loved Christopher’s talk very much and was grateful that he attended my own. He’s going to be a guest on the MMM Podcast in the near future, and I hope our conversations about memory will continue.

About the 20% concept, I was pleased to dine with Richard Simcott and Lea Tirard-Hersant.

Richard echoed Christopher’s great point that for people who don’t have a difficult time remembering words and other aspects of language learning, memory techniques still have a place. There is always an elusive number of words that don’t seem to stick in the mind no matter what one does. At least not without the ease that these words could have.

Richard seemed very interested to give Memory Palaces a closer look with the Magnetic Memory Method principles in mind. This is a huge treat for me because he is one of the most respected polyglots in the world and I think he’s going to bring insights back to the Magnetic Memory Method headquarters that’s going to help us all.

Fill Your Vocabulary Coffers With This Special One-Syllable Memory Strategy

Léa Tirard-Hersant had some exciting ideas too. As she shared at the end of my talk, you can leverage the power of rhyme.

Take a one-syllable word like loon, for example. Loon in English is a one-syllable word that can be rhymed with a one syllable word in French, like une.

To get started with minimal pairs for this exercise, you can find a pile of one-syllable words that rhyme within your own language. The example she and I played around with were “ache” sounding one-syllable words, words like:

Lake

Break

Bake

Cake

Snake

Rake

Flake

Take

Make

Jake

Fake

Sake

Blake

You could compile a list like this and then ask your language learning partner or teacher to help you find words in your target language to pair these with. I really appreciate Léa’s idea and am looking forward to exploring it further.

Until I have her on the podcast, you should check out a book she worked on with Benny Lewis called Why French Is Easy.

Sticking With The Program May Be The Best Memory Strategy You Ever Use …

Finally, I had some very nice talks with Olly Richards from I Will Teach You A Language. He’s been on the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast before and we’ve since developed a great friendship. We’re in fact now officially collaborating on a Magnetic Memory Live event to take place in London, so stay tuned for news about that.

Anyhow, in talking with Olly about some of my language learning plans and memory experiments for the rest of the year he made a great point. What he suggested is that instead of leaping all over the place, I might do more experiments with languages I’m already fluent in. He suggested that I work with our mutual friend Kerstin Hammes to act as an analyst and coach.

So that’s what I decided to do. I emailed her and explained that I want Magnetic Memory Method 2.0 to address more intermediate and advanced issues.

But in order to do that, I need help from an expert German native speaker to help me get a precise picture of where I need to improve and how I should approach it. From there, it’s my job to figure out how to make Memory Palaces an advantage, track the processes and share the results.

And since she’s in …

It’s going to be great!

But Wait! There’s More!

You might be thinking … hold on there Magnetic Cowboy. That sounds like a lot of hard work. How are you going to manage all of this with the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast, new books and all that other things you do?

The answer is …

It’s actually pretty easy. In addition to Christopher’s minimalism, maximalism and his ideas about The Stubborn Quintile, I’m going to use de Bono’s six hats.

In case you’ve never heard of them, here’s a brief overview and how I aim to make these hats work.

The Amazing Learning Secrets Of A Hat Fetishist From Malta

De Bono talks about six hats, each of a different color. Each color denotes a different function. Like this:

• White = Objectivity
• Red = Emotions
• Black = Critical thinking
• Yellow = The sunny positivity huge projects require
• Green = Growth through creativity and the generation of new ideas
• Blue = Organization

To apply these principles, I’ll spend about 15 minutes on all of these at the beginning of each week.

White Hat: For me, being objective means looking at things realistically. Do I have too much on my plate? Do I really need to be doing x when I would be better off doing y. For example, I’ve got:

A weekly podcast to write, record and release …

Books to write and others to edit …

YouTube videos to create, cut and upload …

Emails to answer …

So wearing the what is all about seeing things for how they really are.

It’s not about judging them or making changes. It’s just about assessing the status quo and creating a solid picture.

Red Hat: The red hat is all about checking in with the emotions. As someone with Manic Depression, I feel everything in extremes and I need to be aware of that.

The white hat helps here, but the main goal is to be aware of the emotions and shape them. I use this hat to make sure I’m getting enough rest, nutrition, exercise and meditation and time to memorize. These are the key factors that have kept me alive during some insane times.

When it comes to critical thinking, I wear the …

Black Hat: This hat is about critical thinking, which means creating strategies. You can only do this when you’ve got all the other hats along for the ride.

Yellow Hat: For sunny positivity, meditating and thinking happy thoughts isn’t enough. I need to gratitude journal, do my daydream journaling with the non-dominant hand, make sure I’m spending time with my bass and Bach and with friends. The Polyglot Gathering reminded me of just how isolated I am so much of the time and just how much better things would be if I socialized more.

Gross … But True!

Green Hat: In many ways, I’ve got the green hat on 24/7. I write thousands and thousands of words every day and almost exclusively either from bed or in cafes between walking. I call this Magnetic Roadwork: writing until I have to pee and then moving on.

Finally, the …

Blue Hat is all about organizing. I could use this hat to free up space on my phone, for example.

I have one organizational tip to mention here. The other I talk about on the podcast. These are having an accountability partner and time-tracking.

The Number One Way To Make Sure You Get Everything Done

My accountability partner is Sarah Peterson from Unsettle.org. What we do is email a report of what we’ve worked on throughout the day. Because we’re 9 hours apart, she often gets my report in the afternoon and I get hers in the morning.

No matter when they arrive, the timing is always perfect. And we almost always say exactly what the other needs to hear in terms of encouragement and the like.

And it’s addicting, so much fun to work and look forward to that email at the end of the day that summarizes what happened and makes a statement about what’s going to happen the next day. The productivity benefits have been very rewarding.

Then there is time-tracking. Listen to the podcast for the full description of how that works.

Finally, I’m officially adding a new hat to the color spectrum …

Transparent hat: Transparent is the day of rest, a regular occurrence that is somewhat foreign to me. I’m not sure if I’ll be able to do it, but I’ll give it a try.

And of course I’ll let you know all about how it goes.

So until then, dear Memorizers, grab the PDF version of this episode, and, as ever, keep Magnetic!

Further Resources Mentioned Throughout The Podcast

Last week’s episode of the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast, Memory Improvement Tips From Dr. Gary Small

The Accursed Share by George Bataille

Dan Sullivan talking about Speed of Implementation

7 Killer Memory Improvement Tips From The World Of Conference Interpreting

The post Memory Strategies Of The World’s Top Language Learners appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

Have you ever wanted simple memory improvement tips that you can use straight out of the box?

If so, then you’re in full a real treat. On this episode of the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast, Dr. Gary Small offers you some of the best ideas from his book, 2 Weeks to a Younger Brain.

It was such a pleasure speaking with memory training and brain health fitness expert Dr. Small that I’ve had the interview transcribed. You can read it below or download a PDF version of the interview using the link at the bottom of the transcription.

Enjoy!

Why Even The Young Can’t Avoid Memory Loss

Anthony: Dr. Small, what is your first memory of being interested in the subject of memory?

Dr. Small: Well, I think I got interested in it when I started studying Alzheimer’s disease and geriatrics. When I got into the field of gerontology, I realized that one of the biggest problems we face is cognitive decline as we age. Alzheimer’s is the most common cause of that decline. It turns out, before people get Alzheimer’s disease, they have milder memory complaints. There is just so much worry and concern among millions of people about these age-related memory slips and what we can do about them. That’s really how I got started.

Anthony: You mentioned in the book that memory can start decaying or getting worse even younger than we think. What is one of the typical ages that memory loss can start to occur?

Dr. Small: Usually people begin to notice it in their 40s and studies of neuropsychological testing, pencil and paper tests done on many, many research subjects, has found that for the average 40‑year-old a decline in memory performance can be detected. However, we have done some recent studies, collaborating with Gallop Poll, where we find that people even in their early 20s begin to start complaining about their memory. Now, their complaints are probably different from those of somebody who is in their 70s, but still the methods we’ve developed for the book apply to people of all ages.

Anthony: Given this wide age range, is there a common so to speak anti-memory activity that people are engaging in every day and if so what are those things and how can they be treated or how can people go about their daily activities differently so that they are honoring their memories and their brains?

Dr. Small: That is really what the book is about and it takes the latest science of the brain and explains it in a way that people can understand. It then translates that science into practical strategies that people can begin using.

In the 2-week program, we introduce them to these exercises, strategies and they gradually build up their mental strength, and memory power over that 2-week period and it is just long enough for those exercises to become habit-forming. It involves physical exercise, it involves mental stimulation, stress management, nutrition and learning techniques to compensate for any age-related memory challenges people are experiencing.

Can We Really Trust Memory Exercises To Ward Off Alzheimer’s?

Anthony: You mentioned a lot of different memory exercises in the book. I am wondering if you have a personal favorite out of them all that addresses some of the prevention of Alzheimer’s and just longevity in general that you enjoy the most that you do yourself?

Dr. Small: Let me just clarify. I do not know that the memory exercises will prevent Alzheimer’s, but I think that physical exercise very well may delay the onset of symptoms as will general mental stimulation and proper diet. What the memory exercises will do is to compensate for the decline so people can have a stronger memory longer even as their brains age.

If you look at all of these different exercises, it really boils down to two methods that we now call focus and frame. We need to focus our attention because the biggest reason people do not remember is they are simply not paying attention, they are not getting the information into their brains.

Frame is shorthand for trying to frame the information, providing a framework so that it has meaning. If something is meaningful, it will become memorable and we do that by using visual images. Our brains are hardwired to remember visually very effectively.

We can take a very common memory complaint like names and faces, forgetting names and faces, and teach people how to create visual images to link the name to the face. Therefore, if you meet Mr. Foreman, you might notice that he has a prominent forehead. You notice that distinguishing figure and that links it up with the name in a visual way.

The Shocking Truth About Visual Skills And Memory

Anthony: Many of the memory exercises do involve some sort of visual imagination, and one thing I hear from a lot of people is that they are just not visual. They are maybe more auditory or kinesthetic or conceptual. Is there any advice you would have who would feel they do not have the visual capacities that many of these exercises seem to call for?

Dr. Small: That gets down to a common principle that we want to train and not strain our brains and try to cross-train the brain. Everybody has innate strengths and weaknesses. In areas that are weak, it may be visual skills. Those can be built up gradually. In areas that are strong, we can leverage those strengths to help us compensate better. People who are better with auditory skills can say the name or word to themselves or think up a musical jingle that might help them remember something better.

The Minimalist Guide To Einstein’s Brain

Anthony: You mentioned in 2 Weeks to a Younger Brain a few times Einstein’s brain and maybe you can describe that a little bit. Why does not everyone have a brain automatically like Einstein’s brain?

Dr. Small: I think, to a certain degree, it is genetics. Let us face it some people are Einstein’s at birth and others are not. When they looked at Einstein’s brain remarkably, it looked very much like the average person’s brain except for this area called the corpus callosum, which is the connecting point between the right brain and the left brain. What we might theorize is that Professor Einstein was better able to process information quickly compared to the average person.

Another point we make in the book is that genetics is only part of the story. In fact, the MacArthur study on successful aging taught us for the average person nongenetic factors are more important to keeping your brain young. That is why we emphasize all the simple things that people can do every day to get their brains to function better and their memory to be sharper.

What Video Games Can Teach You About
Strengthening Or Harming Your Brain

Anthony: One of the interesting stories in the book is you talk about chiding your son for playing video games and there is a bit of a surprising twist at the end of the story. What is going on with video games and memory?

Dr. Small: It is complicated, but we do devote a whole chapter to brain games and what people can do to use them effectively. That was an incident where I was annoyed by my son playing some kind of a violent videogame. Knowing that this kind of repetitive videogame playing may not be great for his developing brain, I shouted to him, “Harry, get off of that video game and come downstairs and watch television with me.”

Of course, I thought how ridiculous that sounded, but in my mind, I was thinking we are watching a public television program, it is educational, we will have a conversation, but what I did not realize was that my son was playing the videogame with his friends. There was a conversation going on. It was a social interaction.

I think our relationship with this new technology is very complex. In some ways, it can cause wear and tear on our brains when we are spending too much time doing email or searching online doing repetitive tasks. On the other hand, the technology actually augments our biological memory.

We could pick and choose what we try to remember like names and faces and socially that is very important, but we do not need to remember birthdates and appointments. We can use programs for that and we can look at a lot of stuff up. In addition, there are new video games that actually train our brains. They can boost IQ or improve multitasking skills. I am very excited about the technology we use it wisely and do not overuse it.

How Classy Is The Neighborhood Of Your Brain?

Anthony: Speaking of technology, there is something really interesting that you talk about. The brain has kind of a relationship to memory and information where the age of a memory somehow determines where it is located in the brain, and that memories travel from one lobe to the next. I have this picture of sorting files through my computer and they move according to date and rearrange themselves. What is happening in this idea that memories age and then that determines where they are found in the brain?

Dr. Small: The brain is very complex organ and there is a lot of neuroscience research understanding how memories are consolidated. We describe how there are very fleeting momentary memories we call sensory memories that we all experience from moment to moment and we do not notice them. If we pay attention, or if there is an emotional component to the memory, it is more likely to be consolidated in an area that is called the hippocampus underneath the temples.

Once that happens, it is like an information highway as the memory becomes stronger as it becomes more long-term it moves towards the front part of the brain very gradually. They also reside throughout the brain depending on the type of memory. If it is a visual memory, it will be in the back of the brain because that is where the visual cortex is.

It is quite an interesting phenomenon. These memories, in a sense, live in neighborhoods, which explain why it is often difficult to remember some information, but when you are reminded of a neighboring memory, then the memory you are looking for comes back to you.

Is There A Way To End Your Struggle With “Senior Moments”?

Anthony: That is a very interesting metaphor. Given this neighborhood image where do memories go when people are having “senior moments?”

Dr. Small: Senior Moments are not going anywhere. Memory is very much like a filing cabinet. You have to file the information in the proper place and know where to look to pull it out. When we cannot find those memories, we are distracted by other memories so we are a little bit mixed up in our filing system, and we need some help in how to locate those files, which many of the memory techniques we teach help us do.

Anthony: Well heaven forbid that you were to lose your memory, but if that were to happen, is there one memory in particular that you would never want to lose if all else was to disappear?

Dr. Small: Those are such tough questions, and I think to me the memory I would not want to lose is the memory of the emotion of love because I think that is so important to all of us. It is such a strong compelling feeling. It really draws people together and it defines who we are as a species. Humans are very social animals and those positive emotions that we experience really make life so worthwhile.

Anthony: Speaking of love I really loved 2 Weeks to a Younger Brain. I am grateful and honored that you gave us the time to speak about your book for the audience of this podcast. What is coming up for you next?

Dr. Small: In the short term, I am doing a public lecture on the book this afternoon. I am continuing my research on memory and brain aging. My wife and I are continuing to work on a monthly newsletter, Dr. Gary Small’s Mind Health Report. We are putting our heads together for the next book. We have not quite decided what we are going to do but it will probably be in the general area where our interests lie and we are looking forward to continuing our work together.

Anthony: Great. Well again thank you so much and 2 Weeks to a Younger Brain is such an excellent book. I hope everybody listening goes out and gets it.

Dr. Small: Thank you and I appreciate it.

Further Resources

PDF transcript of this exclusive Magnetic Memory Method Interview with Dr. Gary Small

Dr. Small talking about his book, The Alzheimer’s Prevention Program.

More books by Dr. Small

For more memory improvement tips directed at brain health on the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast, check out this episode directed at university students dealing with depression.

Tony Buzan On The Paradise Of Multiple Intelligences

The post Memory Improvement Tips From Dr. Gary Small appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

A lot of people suffer from a “bad memory.”

Me too.

If I don’t use the simple memory improvement techniques I’ve learned, my memory has about the same chance as a dog hearing “sit” once without a shred of repetition. It doesn’t do much good for improving memory.

But we’re not dogs. And we have memory techniques. We can hear something once and memorize it forever.

And without being dramatic or theatrical (a rare thing for me, dear Memorizers), I can tell you that I think that not developing the skill to do so is a crime against humanity.

Failing to memorize using the simple techniques I teach robs not only yourself, but many others of the benefits of this powerful skill.

Plus, you get to share information that you’ve placed in your mind. Valuable knowledge that you can produce at will. Change the world kind of stuff.

Or it can be the memorize of simple things that makes a huge difference.

Like when you’re boarding a plane and you keep forgetting your seat number, holding up the line to look at your ticket for the umpteenth time.

Or when your child asks you what year some important event took place for his or her exam at school (major).

Or when you’re playing Blackjack and you have no idea how many cards are out (could be major, could be minor depending on your pot).

Or when you’re talking to someone and you have to ask them for a second time what their name is, sometimes just 30 seconds or less after the first time you heard it …

This final point is a real doozy.

Memorizing names is a moral obligation because it tells the person you’re meeting that you care about who they are, that they’re someone worth knowing, that their name has value.

Some names are easy.

You don’t need a special method to memorize Tom, Dick or Harry (at least most of us probably don’t).

But the world is becoming more and more internationalized.

We’re meeting more and more people with name structures that we’re not familiar with. And we need to be able to remember them in to be more sociable and to ensure that people know we value them in the daily interactions we make.

It’s not that difficult. Hear a name, make a bizarre, exaggerated, big and bright picture filled with zany action and you’ll have that name memorized in a Magnetic second.
That’s the basics of one of the techniques.

As you know, there are many others.

And a lot of fine details that structure each. It makes a huge difference if you know what they are and how to use them.

That’s why I’m making the crazy offer of joining the Masterclass for the trial price of $1. For just a buck, you get 7 days access to the Magnetic Memory Method Masterclass.

That’s seven days to work on improving your memory. Seven days to feel the power of memory improvement. Click here for more info and a lesson on 8 Important Memory Principles You Should Follow.

The post Improving Memory And The Moral Obligations Of Memory Improvement appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

Guest post and podcast narration by Tor Refsland.

You’ve finally made the decision.

You are going to improve your memory by building a Memory Palace and learn how to memorize things fast using memory techniques. 

You are so excited! You know that learning how to memorize things fast will give you the unfair advantage compared to the rest of the world.

So you close your eyes and start to dream of your new future.

The feeling of being able to impress your family and friends by reciting stored information as if you were a super computer can only be described with two words …


Freakin’ Awesome!

Perhaps your friends will be so impressed that they will insist on buying you drinks every time you go out.

 And your parents might finally realize that you are the prodigy among your siblings and make you the sole inheritor of your family`s legacy.

There is only one problem.

You are a victim of one of the biggest success crushing myths…

You THINK you don’t have time.

But if I could prove to you that you actually have more than enough time to learn memory techniques, would that be interesting to you?

If so, then read every single word of this post, because it could really change your life.

Let me show you how to find time to create a Memory Palace and start using it in record time.



How To Create More Time

Since we all only have 24 hours per day, time is our most important asset.

But you already know that from reading Time Management Chef, right?

The real issue is that you are super busy and your schedule is packed, right?

Welcome to the club!

That is why creating more time is the most important skill you will ever learn.

But before I move on and tell you how to create more time, let me start by explaining my definition of productivity.

This Productivity Formula Will Double And Even Triple Your Free Time For Using The Magnetic Memory Method

Time period x Goals achieved = Productivity

Your productivity is the total sum of the goals you achieve in a certain period of time. 

There are only two ways to improve your productivity:

– you can achieve the same goals in a shorter period of time

– you can achieve more goals in the same amount of time

If you want to become a productivity superstar you can dramatically increase your own productivity by shortening the period of time and increasing the amount of goals you achieve.

That is the exactly what I did when I increased my own productivity by 200%.

200% is insane.

If you could experience the same boost, that means you would increase your productivity by four times!

Using this formula, I now do in 2 hours what I normally used to do in 8 hours.

Even better, you can take this free memory improvement course first:

The Surprising Tip That Will Free Up Your Time – Fast!

So how do we actually create more time?

 Let me give you a quick crash course.

 There are 3 components that will help you create more time:

1. Planning and prioritizing

The experts say that every minute spent in planning will save you 10 minutes in execution.

In my article at Successful Blogging I talk about planning and prioritizing.

 For example, you can use the ABCDE method to prioritize your tasks:

A: Tasks I must do – serious consequences if it doesn’t get done

B: Tasks I should do – mild consequences if it doesn’t get done

C: Tasks I could do – no consequences if it doesn’t get done

D: Tasks I delegate

E: Tasks I never do

Never do a B task before you have done all the A tasks. Likewise, never do a C task before you have done all the B tasks, etc.

And apply the 80/20 rule: you need to identify each day, which 20% of the tasks on your to do list will give you 80% of the results.

By starting to implement the tactics above, you can literally increase your productivity with 100 % over night.

2. Focus


One of the most important skills when it comes to becoming more productive and achieving your goals in a shorter period of time, is the ability to focus.

As I talk about in my article on Blogging Wizard, true focus comes with some requirements.

In order to be able to laser focus, you have to:
- knowing what to do (work from a plan – to do list)

• remove all distractions (mute your cellphone and turn off Internet connections)
• no multitasking
- focus on only one task until it`s done

3. Increase productivity


Increasing productivity means that we are able to increase our results in a shorter period of time.

Becoming more productive is key when it comes to freeing up more time in your life, so you can spend it on practicing memory techniques.

On Skip Prichard’s site, I’ve talked about one important factor – a factor that can change everything once you understand it.

Studies have shown that most people are most productive the first 2 hours after they get out of bed in the morning.

Some people are most productive in the evening or perhaps during the night.

What does this mean?

It means you have to identify at WHAT time you are the most productive.

Then you have to reserve that period of time for your most important tasks.

 This will literally turbo boost your productivity.

In combination with the time management and productivity techniques you’ve just learned, to improve your memory fast …

You Need The Right Tools

When Anthony asked me to write a guest post for his great website, I asked him for more information regarding the memorizing technique topic. 

He recommended that I read one of his posts about creating and populating a Memory Palace.

Needless to say, Anthony Metivier is one of the best in the business when it comes to helping people learn how to memorize things fast.

So what did I do?

I read the article and decided to use my productivity formula, then I got cranking.


How To Create A Memory Palace

Since I had never created a Memory Palace before, I wasn’t aiming for a world class Memory Palace.

But as a time management and productivity expert, “how long will it take to create a Memory Palace?” was the first question that came to mind.

My next question was, “where should I start my path through the Memory Palace?”

To keep things simple and quick, I decided to use my most familiar place.

So I drew an outline of my apartment, and set a station in every corner of every room. 

To make sure the Memory Palace followed the Magnetic Memory Method principles, I made the starting point in my Memory Palace the front door.

In order to keep my path linear, I made sure to create the journey so that I always follow the right side of the wall. 
 
A couple more decisions later, I had built my first Memory Palace.
And by using a simple system and applying a step-by-step process, I created a simple 32 stations memory palace in 10 minutes!

My success felt awesome!

I thought I was going to spend at least 30-40 minutes on it! 

But 32 stations in just 10 minutes? That`s incredible.

Will you be able to complete your first Memory Palace in less than 10 minutes?

If you follow the principles, I don’t see why not.

The most important thing is that you ask the same questions I asked myself and then complete your Memory Palace as soon as possible.

And remember the following:

• use a familiar setting
• not world class, just applicable
• keep it simple

– move around in the Memory Palace in a logical manner

If you haven`t created a Memory Palace, please spend up to 10 and no more than 15 minutes to create it now.

Have you done it?

Awesome.

Okay, what`s next?

Then it`s time to…


Populate the Memory Palace
 With Killer Information!

As with most things in life, the more passionate you are about the subject, the easier it will be to remember.

Since I`m a time management expert, I don’t spend my time on anything that doesn’t either save me a lot of time, or give me a good amount of value for the time I have spent. 

I’m always about getting the biggest ROI (return on investment).

After all, what’s the point of building a Memory Palace only to populate it with boring, trivial information that you almost NEVER use?

In addition, your first Memory Palace should consist of information that won`t get outdated and that you won’t need to switch out. 

The best information to memorize is the information you want to hold in memory forever. And because it’s important and excites you, this will increase the speed and intensity you bring to the memorization process.

So what did I do?

I had the following criteria:

• passionate about the topic
• important information
• information that I use often
- static information (information that doesn’t change)

Since I have my own blog where I write about time management, I needed to pick a topic that would be useful for my business.

I ended up with headline templates for blog posts.

Notice, I didn’t say headlines.

I said headline templates.



Why?

Because knowing X amount of headline templates is better, than knowing the same amount of headlines (which you would need to dissect, analyze and convert into a template anyway, if you wanted to use each headline in the best way possible).

No need to recite the best headlines ever made, if you can`t apply their formula? Right?

And as you continue reading, you might want to think how memorizing templates might help you in your studies or profession.

For my purposes, I decided to memorize 8 headline templates from Jon Morrow’s free 52 Headline Hacks:

1. The Zen of X

2. Can`t keep up? The 11 Ways to Simplify Your X

3. How to Take Charge of Your X

4. The Minimalist Guide to X

5. 10 Shortcuts for (CTP – completing tedious process) in Record Time

6. Get Rid of (recurring problem) Once and for All

7. How to End X

8. How to X in 5 Minutes

After 30 minutes I had memorized them.

All of them!

How did I remember them
?

I started with memorizing bullet point 1 with a vivid picture. Then I recited bullet point 1 and created bullet point 2. And so on.

It looked like this:

1. Memorize bullet point 1
2. Recite bullet point 1 – memorize bullet point 2
3. Recite bullet points 1 and 2 – memorize bullet point 3
4. Recite bullet points 1 – 3 – memorize bullet point 4
5. Recite bullet points 1 – 4 – memorize bullet point 5
6. Recite bullet points 1 – 5 – memorize bullet point 6
7. Recite bullet points 1 – 6 – memorize bullet point 7
8. Recite bullet points 1 – 7 – memorize bullet point 8

It looks rather easy, right?

No degree in rocket science needed here.

Just following a simple system will do the trick.

How To Find Time To Maintain Your Memory Palace

In order for you to train your memory and to be able to find and recite the necessary information even quicker, you want to take a walk in your Memory Palace daily.

How do you find the time for doing this?

Spend the time that you are already using on other routine activities.

You can recite your whole Memory Palace and everything in it while you do your morning routine, when you are taking the commute or when you are working out.

I would recommend going through your Memory Palaces once a day at the same time everyday.

Think about it.

You will be brushing your teeth no matter what. Why not take a morning stroll through your Memory Palace at the same time?

You may be thinking:

Okay, Tor, I get it.

But when do I find time to expand my Memory Palace?

Well, let`s cover that in the next section…

How To Find Time To Expand Your Memory Palace

When to expand your Memory Palace, depends on your need.

However, when you are a beginner when it comes to using memory techniques I would recommend to start slowly.

The most important thing is to actually build your first Memory Palace and maintain it by reciting it daily (for example, as part of your morning routine).

You can for instance put new bullet points into your Memory Palace every Saturday after breakfast, or when you are doing commute or working out.

When exactly you do this depends on the schedule you have set for yourself in order to reach your specific goals.

Remember …

… the most important thing is to have fun and to just start applying it. 

If you set a schedule that is too hard when it comes to expanding your Memory Palace, you will become fed up and probably look at it as a tedious, boring task.

But it should be neither tedious nor boring. 

There’s too much to gain by expanding your memory, increasing your brain capacity, boosting your confidence and saving time reciting stored information.

In addition to the benefits above, I know that when you are willing to set aside time, you can learn whatever skill you want.

Now you have the recipe for how to create a Memory Palace, how to memorize things fast and how to do both in record time.

So get out there, expand your memory and have fun!

If you want to learn how to create more time, click here to get my free eBook Insane Productivity Hacks and learn how to DOUBLE your productivity in 7 days.

The post How to Memorize Things Fast Using These Time Management Tips appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

To Everyone Who Secretly Believes That The Powers Needed To Increase Memory Will Magically Fall From The Sky …

It’s true. Some people believe that you can get something for nothing.

But luckily not everyone.

Some people grab the Magnet by the poles and take action.

Not only that, but they take the right action.

What is the “right action”? you ask.

That’s what this episode of the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast is all about, so please be sure to listen to every word because it may be the most important episode you ever hear. Then build your first Memory Palace and start using it.

And for your convenience, here’s the letter I received in writing. It forms the basis of the episode.

Give Me A Bit, I’ll Be Swimming Soon Enough

The Only Way To Get Results

The post Increase Memory By Taking Action The Magnetic Memory Method Way appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

People around the world wish they could remember their dreams. And not just remember them.

They want to remember their dreams with clarity, consistency and in ways that change their lives. Profoundly.

And although I don’t do lucid dreaming myself all that often (and try to avoid it), remembering dreams can help you feel more lucid during your waking life.

Here’s what I mean with props to my friend Stefan for his incredible lucid dreaming and memory questions:

Even with this powerful information, I wonder how many people will ever develop the skills needed to recall their dreams consistently?

If the number is low, I find that incredibly sad.

Because here’s the consequence:

Now being able to remember your dreams means you will never develop fluency in one of the world’s most prominent languages: the language of dreaming.

Worse, you will never experience the nuances and layers of experience made possible by advanced dream recall.

Why Is Remembering Dreams Just As Difficult As Lucid Dreaming?

Why is dream recall such a struggle? Many would-be dreamers blame a lack of sleep time. They don’t have enough time in bed for effective dreaming. But with proper training in dream recall, you can learn to notice yourself entering the dream world even before you’ve fallen “unconscious.”

Don’t believe the REM myth that dreaming begins at some special hour after you’re in deep sleep. The notion that dreaming only occurs during REM has never been true. In fact, you are dreaming right now but have not yet learned to see and experience it.

In short, dream recall begins by changing your definition of what counts as a dream. Then try some of these tips:

But even with an improved definition (you’re always dreaming), some still claim that dream recall is too hard. And no doubt. Authors on the top don’t make it easy.

They teach that you should draw symbols on your hand, practice “reality checking” and engage in other tedious methods. The truth is that you don’t need to artificially create “triggers.” There are better ways, more enlightening and elucidating ways, and ways that can improve all aspects of your life.

So what helps with dream recall?

1. A Dedicated Memory Strategy For Remembering Your Dreams

Strategy starts with motivation, so before you start, please make sure that you really want to remember your dreams. It’s an important consideration because you learn a lot about yourself when you recall dreams at an advanced level.

And you motivation requires method if you’re going to experience real gains as you stretch your memory muscles.

2. Believe That Dream Memory Strategies Will Work For You

People often tell me that they cannot remember any dreams. They never have and never will.

But such statements usually come from disbelief. Dream recall has been going on for thousands of years using different techniques. If you can accept that you’re not different than anyone else, your memory will amaze you with what you can achieve.

Try out the main technique discussed in this episode of the podcast and you will marvel at the progress you’ll make.

3. Stop Thinking That Memory Strategies Are Too Much Work

You will need 1-5 minutes every morning to practice the dream recall technique talked about in this podcast. There’s nothing to it. You only have to do it over a period of two or three days to get results. Often, you’ll get results as soon as the next day.

The best part is that once you start, dream recall will serve your life in many ways.

So I have a suggestion for you before you finish the podcast and start your journey toward advanced dream memorization skills.

Believe in yourself.

When I started working on dream recall, I told myself it wouldn’t work. I wasted a lot of time with this false belief.

But once I settled into the practice, dream recall hooked me. Now I’ve got a YouTube playlist all about the practice:

The ability to remember your dreams with near-100% accuracy creates wonderful things for you. And it opened the world’s doors for me. It also healed me in many ways and changed how I view reality. As a result of dream recall, I am more a positive, productive and contributing member of society. And I’m confident that becoming an effective dream memorizer will do the same for you.

Please note that I’m not talking about anything “New Agey” or “NLP-ish.” I base the dream recall techniques and related approaches I teach on scientifically demonstrated principles known to increase the happiness of individuals.

Dreams remain essential to the human experience. And those with an advanced ability to engage with their dreams experience greater pleasure and more interesting lives.

So I hope that you will take the time to practice dream recall after listening to this episode of the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast. And if it changes how you think about lucid dreaming, let me know. You can also check out the Magnetic Memory Method Masterclass for more information about advanced dream recall.

Further Resources

Lucid dream article on Wikipedia

A dreamy article about using movies and series as Memory Palaces

The post Memory Strategies For Your Nightlife And Why I Don’t Do Lucid Dreaming appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

Ever Felt That Skull Melting Stress When Preparing For An Exam?

If so, this may be the most important information you ever hear and read. Download the episode and keep reading this post all the way to the end so that you never struggle with passing an exam again.

And if your schools days are over and you’re the parent of a student, be their hero and pass this information onto them.

These techniques work for everything you need to learn, even difficult topics like memorizing human anatomy.

How The Regeneration Of Your Cells Can Set The Stage For Making Your Memory Razor Sharp

Wanna know why you forget so much of the information you read?

It’s because we miss so much detail when we only listen or read a book once.

Not only that, but you’re a different person the second time around.

I learned this from my Uncle Walter. Unfortunately, he died in a train wreck, but he told me something I’ve never forgotten:

Read the most important books you’ve encountered at least once every seven years.

Every cell in your body will have been replaced, and you’ll be coming to it as a completely new human being.

Of course, if you’re re-reading memory improvement books, be careful. Even the best memory improvement books are sometimes wrong. No amount of rereading will fix that.

In any case, I’ve taken Walter’s advice to heart, but when it comes to podcasts and audiobooks and learning how to enhance memory, it’s possible to revisit them much sooner.

And I love using Audiobook Builder by Splasm in conjunction with my iPhone so that I can get in all that info super-fast without affecting the sound quality.

And today’s Q&A gives us the opportunity to talk about how to use this software in combination with the regeneration of your cells to learn and memorize everything you need to pass any exam:

Schoolwork Can Be A Ball

———-

Dear Anthony,

When memorizing textbooks, is there a good general guideline as to what key points to place in memory palaces? Only focusing on the most relevant information is a great way to save time when studying, and I am curious if you have a strategy as to what information is placed in a memory palace using your index card method. Are these key ideas derived from what is taught in lectures, or are they based on what is most interesting to you?

I have downloaded your video course Memory Secrets of an A+ student as well as read many books on memory, and your methods make learning and memorizing more fun and effective. I discovered that schoolwork can be a ball no matter what the subject is, all thanks to me stumbling upon you website.

———-

This question is great.

And there are a lot of ways to answer it. For example, How To Memorize A Textbook remains the most popular episode of the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast.

But for now, the first thing I would say is that …

A Good Lecturer Will Make It Clear To You What Key Ideas Are Coming

For example, I used to write down all the “keywords” on the side of the chalkboard in a column. Students could literally “read” what I was saying and match them against the keywords. It seemed really effective because when the final quiz arrived, hardly anyone had trouble getting 98% or higher.

Not all lecturers do things like this, or even present structured talks. Sometimes I don’t follow a plan myself because I like to use tangents and ask questions in the middle of a lecture. In cases like these, it’s a matter of listening for what jumps out at you.

I also recommend taking no notes and recording the lecture. Some nice professors will even allow you to place your recording device on the podium.

If not, you can still get a decent recording if you sit in the first row.

And what are you going to do instead of taking notes?

Harness The Secret Power Of Doodling

Seriously. Give it a try.

Your mind will “scan” what’s being heard, and when something strikes you as a key point, write down one or two words in the middle of your doodle.

You can mindmap too if you want, but I like doodling.

Or sketching.

I find that I can listen intently and deeply when doing this.

In fact, I’d hazard a guess that I’m paying far more attention than anyone else in the room precisely because I’ve got more than one representation center of my brain operating.

At least, that’s my speculation. And that speculation is a key part of learning how to enhance memory in many respects.

Here’s What To Do Next

Go home and listen to the lecture again with a Memory Palace prepared, and a stack of index cards as described in the How to Memorize a Textbook episode of the podcast.

And remember, there are only 4 Memory Improvement Systems You Need to be successful every time you study.

If you’ve been given additional reading as part of the lecture, you might want to do that reading first before returning to the lecture.

Again, the most important information is going to be the stuff that leaps out at you as the most interesting first.

Why?

Because you’re more likely to remember this information without the assistance of mnemonics and Memory Palaces. You won’t have to go to the Method of Loci for this stuff – though later you can if you want. And it’s just good practice to do so.

But the point is that you go to your Memory Palaces primed with interest.

That will make your memory Magnetic.

And that way, the not so interesting stuff will stick with greater ease because you’ll be using the power of familiar locations and well-constructed Memory Palace principles.

And you’ll be connecting it to what interests you. But of course …

A Lot Depends On What The Instructor Is Looking For

So if you want to be a cutting edge student, here’s what you’ve got to do:

Go to the instructor.

Make an appointment if you have to.

Then ask the instructor to make the evaluation criteria clear to you. He or she may have a specific rubric.

And if you can – record this talk!

Why?

Because when you hand in your work or answer questions on an exam that don’t give you the results you were expecting, you have a record of this conversation.

Of course, you don’t want your teachers to feel like they’re under observation in a totalitarian state, but the fact of the matter is that you (or your parents) are paying their wages.

You deserve to have the requirements made available to you in crisp, clear and sparkling detail.

And That’s How You Know What To Focus On In Your Studies

It doesn’t get any simpler than that.

To review:

1) Pay attention to the things that jump out at you. If you’re interested in these details, they’ll be much more Magnetic. You’ll be memorizing them more for detail and ordered recall than anything else. They’ll also be a great “connecting” device for incorporating the information that you don’t find so interesting.

2) Know what the instructor wants and make sure you’ve memorized that information. When learning how to enhance memory for your studies, it only makes sense to focus on the information they want you to know. The rest is icing on the cake.

3) Come prepared with a well-formed Memory Palace. If you don’t know how, scroll up to the top of the page and register for my free Memory Palace Mastery course.

4) Perform proper Recall Rehearsal

5) Listen to this podcast with Scott Gosnell. He talks about a very special way to build a Memory Palace for prepping for exams.

I hope this guidance helps you out. Please let me know if you have any further questions.

Further Resources

Note: The program mentioned at the end of this presentation is no longer available. A modified version of Memory Secrets of an A+ Student (now called The Masterplan) can be found in the Magnetic Memory Method Masterclass. If you’re interested in taking that memory training, here’s where to go next:

Magnetic Memory Method Masterclass

The post How To Enhance Memory And Pass Any Test Or Exam appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

Have you ever found yourself caged in the prison of memory?

I know I sure have …

In this episode of the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast, I’m not talking about being trapped in a Memory Palace or anything about memory techniques.

I’m talking about how memory can hold you back and keep you down. Like when it leads to avoiding doing new things because someone you know frowned upon it. Or you hold on to a unwanted behaviour because you can’t shake the memories surrounding how you learned it.

A myriad of consequences result. These include avoiding new experiences. Treating others poorly because your parents burned certain responses in your mind. Repeating destructive behaviors. Yes, memory can be a terrible jailor.

The Good News Is That There Are Ways To Break Free

In case you’re foggy on what I’m getting at, let me tell you a story about a friend of mine. Sadly, he died a few years ago from cancer.

And I miss him. He had a fierce personality, incredible intelligence and acidic wit that that burned impressions into your mind.

Although the cancer killed him, these aspects of his personality went untouched until almost the end. The disease got into his brain and then the friend I had known for so long was suddenly no more. It is a strange thing to wait for a body to die after the person him or herself is already gone.

“The life of the dead is placed in the memory of the living.”
– Marcus Tullius Cicero

But that’s the power of memory.

Because even though my friend was gone, one thing stuck with me. It shaped my behavior, and although “prison” is perhaps too strong a word, these remembered things helped me act as my own jailor.

During my friend’s long and valiant period of chemotherapy, I had finished a research and teaching grant in Film Studies. I had moved back to Canada from Germany and had no idea and struggled with finding a new teaching gig.

I had three promising interviews at universities, and was almost hired at one of them. But when that didn’t pan out, I was lost. I didn’t know what to do.

Even through all his pain and suffering, my friend held fast to his conviction that I was a teacher. We’d gotten our BA degrees together. I had watched him go through law school and start a practice as he watched me soar to the heights of a PhD and major research grant.

And although I couldn’t offer a solution for his cancer, he tried to help me during his darkest days. Together, we came up together with the idea of getting a teaching certificate for high school. I rejected it the second I said it, but he encouraged it.

More than encourage it, it sometimes seemed that he lived through my experiences. We talked so much and had been so close for so many years that it was often as if I was not acting alone. So as I accepted the idea and made preparations for going back to school, it became more about him than me.

If You Have To Lower Your Standards, You’re In The Wrong Place

Eating on the remaining funds from my research grant while housesitting to get by, I volunteered in local high schools.

Not because I wanted to volunteer, but because you need to teach under observation on a voluntary basis in a high school to apply for a teaching certificate in Canada. Even though I had taught at universities for years, I still needed to get the proper letters of recommendation from high school level teachers. Otherwise, I could not apply for the education program at Simon Fraser University in Vancouver. These were strange experiences because I was expected to treat the young students far below their obvious abilities.

Whereas I had been used to challenging university students to stretch beyond their comfort zones, I was now expected to spoon feed Victorian era education to young people living in the age of the Internet. It was a false portrait of how I understand the world, but I still worked at painting myself into it.

In case you’ve never been, it’s at the top of a large hill, surrounded by the beautiful mountains of British Columbia where I’m from. The buses huff and puff to reach the top and every trip feels like a cross-country adventure.

And it was a painful place to visit. I had no office, no classroom to teach in and no classroom to learn in.

“Many are stubborn in pursuit of the path they have chosen,
few in pursuit of the goal.”

– Friedrich Nietzsche

I made the journey many times to submit registration papers and pay registration fees. I often spoke with my friend on the phone during these trips. Each time our discussions reinforced the importance of me being a teacher come hell or highwater. The more voluntary teaching while eating rice and tuna and being stressed out over every dime wore me down, the weaker my conviction grew.

And because money was running out, I started seeking a job. Any job. Because I had worked as a store detective as one of my ways to pay for university the first time around, that’s the route I went. But I couldn’t get anything better than a uniformed security guard position.

There’s nothing wrong with being a security guard. But having stood at the podiums of major universities to lecture in front of hundreds of students, monitoring the behaviors of thousands of shoppers in Metrotown mall …

“Through pride we are ever deceiving ourselves.
But deep down below the surface of the average conscience a still,
small voice says to us, something is out of tune.”
– Carl Jung

Even with Jung’s wisdom in tow, it felt like a step down in the world.

And I must admit that I was ashamed as I stood in front of a mirror wearing the ill-fitting white shirt, black dress pants with the ridiculous stripe down the side and pseudo-military shoes. Which is why I tossed the uniform into a clothing donation bin on the way to my first day at work.

Of course, I realized that tossing the uniform was illegal to let a uniform of authority out of my possession like that and the property wasn’t mine to dispose. But the story of how I got the uniform back out of the donation bin and in the hands of the employer is a story for another day.

As is the story of eventually drumming up some cash doing magic on the streets and convincing Haydee Windey to hire me at ELIT after applying three times. She’s the one who gave me the keys to her school, an office to write in and students to teach memory techniques as part of their literary education and ultimately the Magnetic Memory Method. It was for these students that I wrote everything down in what would become the first book in the Magnetic Memory Method Series.

But again, a story for another time.

“Hard times arouse an instinctive desire for authenticity.”
– Coco Chanel

When my application to the education program at Simon Fraser was rejected, I was completely lost. Because I couldn’t get into the program, I couldn’t get a student loan. Without a student loan, I wouldn’t be able to survive much longer and I couldn’t housesit forever. No one would make me go live on the streets, but the pressure from all sides made it feel like I was going in that direction.

And I had my bipolar disorder on top of that to deal with too. The doctor I found refused to give me my medication for longer than 30 days so he could monitor my moods and I had no time to find another one. It had already taken long enough to find this one, Plus, this doctor was … Well, that again is a story for another day.

But my friend did not let me give up. He convinced me to appeal the university’s decision. This meant more painful trips to the campus for meetings and forms and registration fees.

And it was during this time that I started teaching at ELIT. As an after school program that fills in the gaps left by the school system, it was a blessing. I admired the place, its students and the parents who want their kids to have a better chance.

But I was still pushing for a place in the Education program at Simon Fraser University.

And my friend’s belief that I could get into the education program if I fought for it proved true. But after Haydee allowed me to teach at ELIT the way I wanted to teach …

“I don’t often veer away from a big melodic song with big
words for big stadiums.”

– Robbie Williams

I couldn’t stomach the idea of offering students anything less than the teaching I’m capable of giving. Of course, Haydee was nervous at first when she saw me writing terms like “architectonic tautology” on the whiteboards of her classrooms. But I proved that the students were up to my university-level challenges time after time.

And yet I still went ahead with the Education program. I braced myself for the classes I was about to attend that would teach me how to teach according to grade levels decided upon by the government.

Then, one morning on my way to ELIT and six weeks before the education program would begin, I got the call. My friend had died.

Years later, I still mourn his passing. But I never mourn the fact that I betrayed his final wish for my future.

For six weeks, my stomach churned every day at the future before me. I went up and down that hill to get textbooks and study for my courses in advance. It all felt wrong.

Yet the memory of all those conversations with my friend held fast. And the idea that teaching high school now would prepare the stage for a victorious re-entry to university teaching years later echoed in my ears.

But the logic was false. Why suffer now and take part in an education system I know in my heart is broken so that I could enjoy my earlier career later? It made no sense.

And yet, on the first day of classes, I found myself on the bus winding up the hill, imprisoned by the ghost of all those discussions with my friend.

“The only person who is educated is the one who
has learned how to learn and change.”

– Carl Rogers

But even though I went up the campus, I didn’t go to that first class. I didn’t even leave the bus bay. With tears burning in my eyes and the feeling that there must be a better way to find my place in the world I got off one bus and stepped onto another and headed back into the city.

Just as I had dumped the security guard uniform in the donation bin, I left the wishes of another person behind on the bus bay at Simon Fraser University. I left the future and unhappy identity it would have created behind. And I’d like to think that I honored my friend by doing my own thing instead of his.

And because I freed myself from the memory of those conversations with my friend and the conviction he had about my teaching high school, I’ve since educated more people in a few short years than I could have during an entire career as a high school teacher. More than 51,000 people have read a book or taken a Magnetic Memory Method course. It

And with nearly a million podcast downloads, half a million YouTube views and hundreds of comments and reviews, I think it’s fair to say that I made the right decision.

“I freed a thousand slaves. I could have freed a
thousand more if only they knew they were slaves.”

– Harriet Tubman

The other route would have delivered me into Slave’s Luck, defined as making it into a career you wind up hating. In some cases, people hate that career before they even start preparing for it. In others, they start hating it as part of the journey to qualification. In every case, there’s no point in going through such a long journey only to wind up wearing golden handcuffs.

So what ghosts and memories are powering your behaviors against your own wishes and desires? Take a moment to think about what advices, words of wisdom or the wishes of others might be holding you down.

And then write down what you really want from your life. If you had no pressure from family or friends and had all the resources needed to be fully you and play out your wildest and most fulfilling dreams, what would those be?

For me it was always to write books and correspond with my readers. I remember in grade 8 reading Ray Bradbury talking about all the mail he received and how he answered every letter. I thought then as I think now that this exactly what I want to do.

“Writing in a journal … offers a place where you can hold a deliberate,
thoughtful conversation with yourself.”

– Robin S. Sharma

But before I got there, I had to go through the exercise of writing down what my true dreams are every day.

And so that’s what I want you to do. And do it every day for at least 90 days.

If you can’t do that, then you know what you’ve chosen isn’t really your dream. No amount of knowledge or use of memory techniques is ever going to change that fact.

So as you write every day, refine your dream and your vision of what you want to do. Sooner or later you’ll find what you really want, that thing you can describe again and again for at least 90 days.

And as you do so, your unconscious mind will start finding opportunities to get you what you want. I’m convinced of it, but you need to try for yourself in order to be sure. You don’t have to take my word for it, but I’m confident that it will be one of the most rewarding experiments you’ll ever make.

And it’ll be totally unforgettable too.

So let me know how you fare and until next time, keep Magnetic.

Further Resources

The post How To Escape The Prison Of Memory And Create The Future You Desire appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

How To Build Memory Palaces – Even If Your Home Is Microscopic!

It’s true. Housing in Japan is notoriously tiny.

And that can make it challenging to use them for effective Memory Palace construction.

As always, however, I’ve got a solution to suggest. Today’s podcast Q&A will give you plenty of ideas that will boost your success no matter how small your abode may be.

And the best part is that you can read the entire episode right here too!

Your Cramped Home Is Bigger Than You Think

Hello Anthony,

I am just having a few obstacles come up with completing the worksheet and building the foundations of the Memory Palaces. For example, I know that I have been living at various spots throughout my life, but maybe I am not so confident about the layout of say, the school I attended, or the shopping mall I visited, etc.

How vivid and detailed do these locations have to be in order for them to qualify as a Memory Palace?
Obviously, these places are in my memory, but it has been years since I have been physically there, and in other cases as much as 10+ years since I visited them.

Another question would be about distance. What if I cannot remember in detail where things are in my journey of the Memory Palace? For example, walking around campus in my University. Things that I do remember are sometimes far apart from each other. Also, I am just naming spots, like the library, the parking lot, etc. I can probably go online and look at a map and that would most likely jog my memory as I mentally walk through the campus, and it would have the proper names of the buildings and the locations.

How do I not get crossed up in a cramped area like my apartment? I live in Japan, and things are unbelievable tight in these apartments. This could be a real challenge. Are there strategies for not getting crossed up when memorizing the layout of a memory palace. Do we stay on one side of the wall or walkway and exit through the other side?

For example, the school I work at now. How would I navigate this? (I could also pdf you a map of the layout). Imagine a Square with one side missing. And classrooms go down to the end of each side.
How do I not get crossed up walking over the same path here? This has me a bit confused.

Also, are we walking or are we flying / floating through our Memory Palaces since walking through large spaces like a Shopping Mall, or a University Campus, or an Amusement Park would take too much time to navigate?

Thank you so much for your help and support.

How To Wake Up Your Imagination And Make Even A Fishbowl Seem Like A Football Stadium In Your Mind

Thanks for this question!

Ultimately, a lot of these questions will be answered by experience. But based on my own experience, I can tell you this and then expand on some ideas: I personally don’t need my Memory Palaces to be so vivid.

However, when I take the time to go through various exercises I’ve created (or heard about from Magnetic Memory Method readers and course participants), each Memory Palace becomes more vivid. And the effects are more immediate, intense and long-lasting.

The exercises are simple, but depend upon being relaxed. In fact, all of the technical strategies aside, the number one piece of Magnetic Magic underlying the Magnetic Memory Method is relaxation.

The Surprising Techniques That Makes Everything As Easy As Whip Cream

So here’s what to do first: Get yourself in a relaxed state. Use mediation, Pendulum Breathing, progressive-muscle relation and any other principles you know. Everything will come together.

Once you’re in a relaxed state, all you need to do is wander through the Memory Palaces. Figure out if you can take a journey through the Memory Palace in a way that follows the Magnetic Memory principles of not crossing your path and not trapping yourself.

The journey can be simple or relatively complex so long as these principles are in effect, and you can make a natural journey. I also recommend that you don’t try passing through walls like a ghost or jumping out of windows, etc.

Why?

Because these activities use mental energy and take the focus from simply going from one station to the next. You need that so you can quickly decode the imagery you’ve created and placed at the station.

Can you proceed to memorize using a network of Memory Palaces without following each of these? Of course … but you risk spending mental energy on remembering where to go next. And this prevents you from focusing on what comes next during recall practice.

Very Private Matters That Only You Can Tackle

Again, personal experimentation is key.

Dealing with distances is an interesting issue, but it is again solved by personal experimentation.

I use the campus of one of the universities I studied at extensively, but always focusing on individual college or administrative buildings. There were also not any unusual distances between the buildings.

But if I were to face long distance issues, I would consider creating multiple journeys and labeling each accordingly.

In sum, it sounds like your apartment might not make an ideal Memory Palace.

But don’t throw it away! You can save it for when you are at a more advanced level and start working with virtual Memory Palace elements. These would include bookcases and the like.

How To Play Memory Like Music In Your Mind

As for flying/floating, I came up with the term “Magnetic” because as things work for me, I am simply drawn from station to station. Almost as if a Magnet had pulled me there.

You might like to fly or float, but this is something you will learn from practice and experimentation.

I realize that I “pass the buck” onto practice and experimentation a lot, but there’s a reason for that. It’s because learning the Magnetic Memory Method is essentially like learning music. There are many elements that come together in order for a musician to produce sound based on reading marks on a page.

The Magnetic Memory Method is those marks on the page and you are the musician.

Sure, there are a few shortcuts here and there, but if you want to experience the music (i.e. the boost in fluency made possible by memorizing vocabulary en masse) then you’ve essentially got to know

1) How to read the music and

2) How to perform it on your instrument (which in this case is your mind).

But There’s A Paradox!

A lot of people say “but my mind is different!”

To a certain extent that is true. But how music is written and how it is performed relies on the same eyes, ears, fingers that most of us have to work with. And the principles of music are more or less universal.

Yet each person who picks up an instrument has the amazing ability to play it in a way that is unique from every other musician. I don’t know if Heavy Metal is your thing, but there is no one else on earth who can write and play riffs like David Mustaine from Megadeth.

You can actually use musical terminology to describe his note preferences and some of the flavors and tones he uses. But at the end of the day, only he can do it. This is true of all musicians, whether they are great musicians or not.

And this is true of all language speakers.

Whether it’s our mother tongue or a second language, we learn it and then use it through a vast network of personal mental associations. These are our entirely our own and yet are still based on universal principles.

And That’s A Wonderful Thing!

Why? Because you have all the “Rock Star” substance you need to excel. You’ve just got to take this piece of music I’ve given you, fill in the words you want to memorize and then start to perform.

The last thing I would suggest to you (for now) is that you start visiting new places and take care to pay attention to their layout. If you haven’t got enough places in your past, the good news is that the future is a big place. There is no end to the new locations you can collect for:

a) General enjoyment in life and

b) Memory Palace development

Carry a notebook with you, make a list of new places you’ve been and take a few seconds to draw a layout or take some photos if that helps.

Trust me, you won’t regret it.

It’s True: Size Does Not Matter

On the matter of size, I was in Leipzig the other day, but it really doesn’t matter that the hotel room was small. I still made a mental image of it because there are all kinds of occasions where even just a tiny space can quickly provide ten stations for memorizing something.

There is no building too large or small for Memory Palace construction and use.

I hope these thoughts help you move forward! Let me know if I’ve missed anything or if you have any further questions and I hope to be in touch again soon.

Further Resources

How to Renovate A Memory Palace

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You’re standing in the Kitchen with the refrigerator door open. You know you’re not hungry, but for some reason you’re staring inside. You think to yourself, “What was the reason again I’m here?”

But nothing comes. You’re mind is blank. You can’t remember why you went into the kitchen at. “Curse this short term memory of mine!” you say. “If only I had a better memory…”

Do You Make This Epic Mistake About Your Memory?

Many people give up on trying to learn a foreign language because they have this notion that they don’t have the memory for all of the vocabulary words involved. We’re here to dispel that myth.

Many believe a strong memory is something you are either born with, or are lacking and are doomed for all of eternity. People watch the World Memory Championships and think “Man … I could never be like that”. The truth is, improving your memory is a coachable skill that like any coachable skill, can be improved upon by proper training. We’re not talking about training through rote memory, which is simply the process of memorizing through repetition. We’re talking about the use of Mnemonics.

How To Understand Understand
Why You Remember And Why You Forget

Before we explain what Mnemonics are, let’s try and understand why we remember certain things, and forget others. The mind takes in information through any of our five senses during the day. It has the chance to accept or reject thousands of stimuli at any given point. Right now, while you are sitting and reading this article, pay attention to all of the external stimuli to which your mind can pay attention.

Where are you? What are you staring at? How do you feel? Are your shoes too tight? Do you smell anything? Are your taste buds still active from the last meal you had?

In order retain that which is important, the mind needs to filter out that which is not.

This brings us back to our earlier question:

Why do we pay attention to some items while discarding others? The answer lies in the significance that we place on the external stimuli.

The Blazingly Obvious Truth About
Organizing Information In Your Mind

What did the 13th person you saw today look like?

Can’t remember?

What if you saw a clown walk by you today holding 6 puppies while crossing the street. Would you remember that?

I bet you’d remember that not only today, but for many years to come. The reason for that is because it was a unique experience in which you attached significance to.

Training your mind to remember anything at any given time is a simple task once you are prepared to attached significance to the item you are trying to remember.

Here’s a quick question:

What is easier to navigate?

A large filing cabinet with forty index cards containing one word on each of them, randomly dispersed in the cabinet; or a small filing cabinet with 1,000 index cards containing one word on each of them, each set up alphabetically?

The key to training your mind to memorize any content is to attach significance to each item and organize the information in your brain effectively. While there are many ways to train your mind to do so, we are going to focus on association.

Big yellow balloon. What are the first thoughts that come to your head? Birthday party? Children? Celebration? The mind is constantly associating new information with information we are already familiar with. The key to organizing information in your brain effectively is to use association to link items together.

Rubber band, keychain, eraser, river, drum, jelly, magic wand, mud, dart, ice cube.

How To Take Charge Of Information Using Linking And Stories

How can we apply what we just learned to remember the items listed above?

Let’s start with associating and linking the first two items to each other.

Now, we could just imagine a rubber band on a keychain, but remember, in order to remember something we need to make it unique.

Add some significance to it. A rubber band on a keychain is too ordinary for us to find any uniqueness  and attach significance to it.

What if we imagine shooting a rubber band and it landing in someone’s pocket, attaching to their keychain. That would be a unique event that you would probably remember, would you not?

Now what if we took that keychain, and imagined getting rid of it entirely by erasing it with an eraser? and what if the friction from rubbing the eraser was so strong that your hand caught fire, and you had to put it out in a river?

But while you were in the river, someone threw you what was supposed to be a lifeboat but was instead a drum? So you took some jelly, but rather than sliding the drum off of you with it( that would be too plain), you broke off a piece of the drum and made a drum and jelly sandwich?

And as you did that, you got some jelly stuck in your teeth and had to use a magic wand to pick the jelly out.

Now, instead of picking the jelly out, you just turned it from jelly to mud. So you asked a friend to throw a dart at the speck of mud in between your teeth. When your friend threw the dart, he hit a bullseye right on your teeth, and out popped an ice cube.

See if you could recall the story, starting from the rubber band.

Alert, Alert: How To Take Charge Of Unruly Vocabulary

Now, what if the word is difficult to picture in your mind, like the word “magnificent?” What if we broke down the word magnificent to words that sounded similar, like “magnify” and “cent?” Now when we hear the word magnificent we could think of a cent under a magnifying glass, maybe catching fire from the sun.

The same holds true for words in another language!

Let’s now try memorizing 5 key phases in Spanish:

In order to remember buenos dias, we can imagine booing Carmen Diaz after she walks out of her house with a poor nose job, and says good morning. To remember mucho gusto, we can imagine meeting a goose and smooching it’s toe as a nice gesture.

To remember cómo estás, we can imagine combing a stack of pennies (or anything for that matter), and responding that we have been very busy combing when someone asks us “How are you?”.

To remember me llamo, we can imagine telling someone our name, and then holding a yam in your hand and introducing it as well.

Finally, to remember muy bien, gracias, we can imagine a cow saying “Moo” as you try to stop it from bending over, and the look of grace in its eyes as you save him.

These don’t have to be the examples you use to remember things – the important thing is that you attach significance to these words with your own kookie imagination to help you remember them 1-2-3.

Get Rid Of Language Learning Forgetfulness Once And For All!

Let’s do a recap of what we learned.

In order to remember something, the mind needs to attach a sense of significance to it. A good way of attaching significance is if something is unique. Once we attach significance to an item that is unique, we need to organize and store it effectively in our mind. A good way to organize data is through association.

Now, ladies and gentlemen, it is time to put theory to practice. Think you’re ready for some more Spanish words? Let’s meet over video chat on Skill Silo for a free Spanish lesson to get you up to speed in no time!

Author: Josh Aharonoff – Director of Sales and Marketing, Spanish Virtually

Further Resources

Olly Richards’ Fluent Spanish Academy

How to Memorize 50 Spanish Provinces On Your First Go

A Magnetic Little Tip On Memorize Foreign Language Vocabulary

Fluent Spanish Academy

The post How To Memorize Key Spanish Phrases In Seconds appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

It’s no secret and certainly no shame about it. People get depressed.

Ain’t nothing new.

Before depression, was melancholy.

Some called it “deprimare” (Latin).

Some called it “melas” (Greek).

Manic comes from the “manikós” and “manía” (Greek) and means inclined to madness.

Latin later turned the word into “mania.”

The names may change, but the states remain the same.

Mania and depression are the sorts of thing that can happen to anyone, at any time, for any reason … or for no reason at all.

I hope these states never happen to you, dear Memorizers. But if they do, I highly recommend that you supplement your medical treatment with mnemonics.

I’m not a doctor (at least not the medical kind), so I’m not qualified to offer medical advice.

I can only tell you that when the black bile of melancholia hit me during my graduate studies, it hit hard, it hit bad and it did its best to sink my Magnetic ship into the rough seas of depression.

Anyhow, the inspiration for today’s episode and sharing these memory improvement tips for students suffering from Manic Depression comes from a listener of the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast. He wrote:

Thanks for sharing your story.  I also have bipolar.  It’s a tough thing to deal with and I appreciate your willingness to share your story.  I have always wanted a doctorate degree. But for reasons you are well acquainted with, it has been a massive struggle.  Another one of my life goals is to learn Russian and be fluent.  I feel skeptical that the methods outlined here can help someone like me to accomplish these goals, but I’m willing to take a deep breath, and give it 100%.  Honestly, what’s the worst that can happen? It either works or it doesn’t, right?  I’m going to try hard to make this work, and I will be in touch to let you know how I’ve progressed, but for now I wanted to just thank you for bringing the possibility to me, and for sharing your struggle with bipolar.

In today’s episode of the podcast, I address this letter in detail, giving you the reasons why you should feel the mania and depression and do it anyway. There is nothing that you cannot achieve just because you have this emotional dis-ease.

Concentration Zen For Students With Brains Bipolar Medication Has Turned To Mush

I’ve talked several times before about my personal history with concentration issues, so you’re not alone. I was thrown into a severe depression as a grad student and that’s one of the things that led me to memorization techniques. And of course, no sooner than I emerged from the depression, I found myself riding back up to the sky. And it’s hard to focus when you’ve got the wind blowing hard in your face as you blast towards the moon.

But even with memory techniques to guide me during these torrential states, they didn’t completely eliminate the concentration issues. One practice that I found helpful (though not always) was to read out loud. Narrating books can put strain on the voice and requires a lot of water, but it also helps generate focus during especially difficult passages.

When narration wasn’t possible, I found audiobooks whenever I possibly could. This is usually easy for novels, but not so easy for dry theoretical texts – hence reading out loud.

But the point is not to “read” the audiobooks while walking around or cooking bacon. For the purposes of serious study, you want to have the actual text in front of you and read along with. That’s why I always listened and read at the same time. And If I had to, I recited the book myself and then listened to my own narration while following along with the book in hand.

How Memory Techniques Saved The Lovely Voice You Hear Today On The MMM Podcast

Next, I studied memorization techniques (you knew that was coming). These are great because they sharpen the mind and improve concentration. I think it’s because practicing with Memory Palaces and related techniques sends more oxygen to the brain. It also helps improve recall (of course) because it’s a simple matter to store key points in a carefully prepared and predetermined Memory Palace.

Along with memorization techniques, meditation is incredibly helpful for avoiding all of the 17 student fails I’ve talked about elsewhere on the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast.. Nothing fancy. Just sitting, breathing, watching your thoughts. 3-5 minutes is good, 10 minutes is very good and 15 minutes is exceptional (that’s a loose quote from a meditation training I heard once upon a time). Three 15 minute sessions a day works gangbusters for me.

Then there’s the matter of diet and exercise. Sorry to spread the bad news, but eating processed foods and anything wrapped in plastic or bolted into a can is probably not going to help concentration. I’m not a doctor (well, I am, but not the medical kind) so I can’t give any dietary advice. But you know the drill. Eat well and keep fit.

While You “Treat” Manic Depression With Memory Palaces … Look At What Else They Can Do …

And then read these …

Further Resources

Memorizing Vocabulary Fights Depression

Robin Williams And The Most Unusable Memory Palace In The World

Dr. Jim Samuels on using mnemonics to relieve stress

Before I go, don’t think that you have to have a mental illness to benefit from these memory tips. They’re good for anyone and everyone.

The post Memory Improvement Tips For The Manic Depressive University Student appeared first on Magnetic Memory Method - How to Memorize With A Memory Palace.

In this episode of the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast, you’ll learn about how to get fat off of all the free donuts you can stuff in your Magnetic little belly (or big belly as the case soon shall be …)

Plus, I want to show you a number of Memory Palaces created by Magnetic Memory Method readers and course participants.

Incredible Images That Show You Exactly How You Can Build Your Own Rome Of Memory In A Single Day!

So read every word on this page, watch each and every video from beginning to end and listen to the entire podcast.

First up …

A Killer Resource For Becoming A SuperHuman!

Not so long ago, I interviewed the great Jonathan Levi, a fellow instructor over at Udemy and now podcaster extraordinaire. He interviewed me in an hour long session that covers all kinds of memory topics that you’re going to want to listen to right away and then subscribe to the Becoming Superhuman Podcast.

What you’ll learn in this special Magnetic Memory Method interview includes:

* How to reduce stress with mnemonics …

* Fundamental principles of memory and how I improve my memory every day …

* How to increase memory power simply by understanding what noripinephrine is … and then acting according to its whims! …

* Memory improvement tips for overcoming the “primacy effect” like a sabre-toothed tiger glides through the jungles of forgetfulness …

* How to improve short term memory by understanding the Method of Loci and creating top-notch, bulletproof and 100% Magnetic Memory Palaces …

* … and much, much more!

Next up …

The Unbelievable Secret To Getting Free Donuts While You Relieve Boredom At Work And Get Really, Really Fat!

It was just another Magnetic day here at the Magnetic Memory Method headquarters until I opened my email and a subject line leapt out at me …

Thanks for the Donuts!

And so I asked myself … What manner of spam chicanery is this?

No chicanery at all. Check it out!

Good Morning Anthony!

I am emailing to thank you for the donuts.

As a fun activity and to help take our minds off of work, I made a wager with my fellow office coworkers that I could memorize – verbatim – a chart of makes, submakes, model numbers and letters, RV types, sub-types, and the 2-digit VIN identifier of 83 RVs as produced by our company.

Again, this was for fun and by no means a testament to memorizing things “verbatim.”

If I lost, I would buy the office donuts. If I won, the office would by donuts and I could have as many as would be considered gluttonous.

Though this apparently seemed to them a silly bet that I could never win, I did warn the office that I was quite confident in my ability to do this. So, after a 2-week study window and a 20-question “test” (plus many shouts of random VIN IDs from the non-believers) I received enough donuts to move my belt out a notch.

Again, !!THANKS!! For the donuts and I’m sure you will be happy to know I passed your information out to everyone as a gift for their participation.

Sincerely,

Matt Simon
Memorizer-in-Training

And because this email comes with an amazing graph of what Matt memorized … I made a video for you so you can see it!

Next up …

A Memory Palace Made Of BEAR MACE!

Okay, not really, but check this Memory Palace sent to us by the amazing actor Matt Newby who has a hilarious produce spoof over at Famousoldie.com.

He writes:

Hey Anthony!

Wanted to share with you some things!

First when I started keeping a memory journal I found myself not wanting to open it because well I guess it just looked boring to me … nothing to exciting about a green composition book. So I printed out of retro futuristic designs and things this resulting in

Now I want to open it!

Second I’ve been doing cards using the Person Action Object method and an 18 room Memory Palace I built in Minecraft.

Between Dec when it started and today I’ve done it 17 times with an average time memorized 12min and an average time recalled 9min missing about 4 on average.

I feel like I’ve hit an “OK plateau”. Do you think I haven’t done it enough times to feel that way yet? I’ve done a lot of work with the PAO method. I got your book last night about cards and I feel like I’ve done so much work with the PAO I don’t want to switch methods just yet. I did however love the idea of breaking it down into 4 sets good way to make it seem easier!

I will get this down to 1 minute! Do you have any drills I could do? Should I try other methods?

You da main man with da plan!

Matt

PS I’m an actor I loved your last podcast!

Having come this far, I thought …

Why Not Show You Some More Amazing Memory Palaces Created By People Just Like You?

Why not, indeed?

Here’s one by a young person in grade school sent to me by her teacher (with the permission of the parents, of course).

Here’s another presented by a Magnetic Memory Method course participant down in Australia:

And to close off this episode of the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast, let’s look inside one of my very own Memory Palaces!

So, I hope you enjoyed this episode.

But even if you hated it … what are you waiting for?

Get out there and build some Memory Palaces so that you can memorize anything you please!

Further Resources Mentioned In The Podcast

Jonathan Levi talks about Becoming A Superlearner.

My take on the Person Action Object method … and serial killers!

Tap the Mind Of A Ten Year-Old Memory Palace Master for more information on using Minecraft as a Memory Palace generator.

Magnetic Memory Method Interview with Marc Shannon who talks about How to Remember Anything.

The Magnetic Memory Method Masterclass.

Method of Loci article on Wikipedia.

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