Try this Memory Tool to Remember Everything

My blog last week has generated so many comments and so many questions that I thought I would give you more on the topic this week as well! Here's a quick recap from last week: They've studied the brains of the highest prolific mental athletes of the world, only to find out that their brains are average, because just the fact of having a brain is enough to be able to do it all. If you missed it, go check it out HERE and then come back to this.

Have you ever heard or said: "I can't remember EVERYTHING!"? Well, the good news is, as we have learned last week, you can! This week's blog is about all the questions that you sent me asking: "Okay, I get it. I can do this. I want to do that. Now, how do I do this?" I'm going to give you a very useful tool today on how to practice your memory and how to remember things...

There's so much that we must remember everyday, and we live in an era where we cheat all the time, right? We don't even try to remember phone numbers anymore, even if our brain has the capacity to do it all. Well, the following technique works like a charm, whether you want to remember your to-do list, your grocery list, people's names, or in my case, the order of a speech when I'm on stage and don't have access to my notes.

I've learned about this technique from Moonwalking with Einstein, by Joshua Foer, an absolutely amazing book that I adored. Thank you to William Plamondon, my cousin, who referred me to this book. It is absolutely phenomenal.

 Let's practice together, right now. Okay? Take a look at this grocery list.

All right. Instead trying to remember the letters of the word you are trying to remember, the key is to remember a location. Let me explain. If I say the word "cheese", the first item on the list, you have heard this before, you have a representation in your brain of what cheese looks like and of the cheese that you want to buy, right? Well, Joshua Foer uses the memory palace technique. What you do is you create a palace. It doesn't need to be very big. Today, let's use the house that you grew up in. This is the example that Joshua uses in the book, because it needs to be a place you know very well. So, you're going to use the location and you're going to drop all these items as you come into the house.

Go ahead and pull into your driveway. At the base of the driveway, there might be a mailbox. Make the mailbox be cheese-shaped. Then, before you enter the house, maybe you have a pool. Fill it up with rice. Okay? So, notice how a pool full of rice or a mailbox made out of cheese is gonna pop out in your memory. Then you open the door, and maybe the door knob is a French baguette (bread). As you step into the first room, you look to your left. In my case, in my parents' house, it's a stairway that goes to the basement. So, what I'll do is I'll picture the stairway filled with tomatoes. Then, in my case, I walk up three steps I front of me and arrive in the kitchen. There are some stools in the kitchen at my parents' house, so I'm going to drape a towel over these stools, but don't just put a regular towel there. Place a towel that is super colorful or stinky, for example, so that you notice it. Next on the list is paper. So is it a pack of paper? What is it that you need? You can place that on the counter and make it full of stacks of paper so that you notice it right away. Then you keep going, enter the living room and place dozens and dozens of eggs on the couch.

It needs to be really vibrant images like that, so that all you have to do is walk back into your house and notice them right away: the mailbox made out of cheese, the pool filled with rice, the door knob a French bread, the tomatoes filling the stairs on the side, the stinky towel on the stool in the kitchen, the kitchen counter filled with paper, and the couch filled with eggs.  

Next, ice water. You keep walking and you arrive in the hallway that leads to the bathroom, and then you can see ice cold water pouring out of the bathroom. You can also see a giant pair of scissors in the hallway. You keep going, and then there's your parents' bedroom. The door is all taped up! You enter your bedroom, and it's filled with cardboard boxes. A huge remote control is hanging from the ceiling. You turn around and you exit through the door that leads to the balcony. As you come out, you can see a giant shovel. You walk down into the garden and there's this giant pencil on the ground. Finally, you finish your route and walk back to your car, noticing a big bag on the floor beside your car door.

 Now all you have to do is to walk back through the house to remember your 15 items!

Of course, I went really fast with us today. What you really want to do is to close your eyes and take your time. Just walk through your home and take the time to notice all these things. You can use this technique with a speech, you can use it with a process, you can use it with so many different things! You can create a whole bunch of different lists for as many locations as you have. You can do even do it with your body parts, by placing something on your nails, on your fingers, on your hands, on your forearms, on your biceps, on your shoulder, and then go through your whole body to remember.

 To remember names, you could place them all with an association. I shared that trick last week on how to remember names, right? You could associate and find something that is similar to the name you want to remember in order to help you. And then you associate this image with something in your memory palace.

 Hopefully, this helps. I was very touched and impressed by the response that I got last week. I believe that I'm not the only one that's fascinated about the brain and that loves the brain. Keep enjoying working your mind, your memory, and trust this tool to work so that you can remember everything.