An ancient memorization strategy might cause lasting changes to the brain
theverge.com
theverge.com
I could pickup the technique to help me in my day to day life. For very little investment in efforts it managed to drastically improve my life.
Context: I consider myself quite challenged when it comes to memorizing numbers.
The technique described in the book (and in this article) allowed me to remember details of a financial instrument which involves 32 numbers without any pattern. Whenever I have to use this instrument I have to input random 6 numbers out of those 32. Before I discovered this technique I had to pull out the hardcopy of the instrument every time for reference (it was painful - sometime it will be not in my possession, or it would be buried inside some cabinet etc.)
The technique that I use/adapted essentially is, I use mental map of a roadway which I’m intimately familiar with to place the 32 numbers on the various 32 landmark along the way (landmarks can be anything - a funny looking rock next to the road will also do. The key is one should be able to visualize it very clearly). So, whenever I need to retrieve numbers I mentally ’drive’ on the road and start checking out the landmarks. Example: I need to retrieve number corresponding to landmarks 5,9,15,20.. I start ‘driving’ reach landmark no. 5 and able to remember immediately this landmark is associated with number 29, then I move on and reach to next landmark, when I ‘reach’ that one I’m able to recollect that this landmark has number 89 associated with it, and so on…
Somewhere I read that it works so well because as a human species we have ability to remember geo spatial things much better than abstract things like numbers. I would guess that it has to do with our hunter-gatherer days when we were primarily dealing with spatial concepts; brain is hard wired to store those information much better than things like numbers.
You construct words by mapping consonant sounds to numbers and using whatever vowels you need to construct words.
Other people learn gibberish sentences instead. They break down the number into groups of two, three, or four and use pre-memorized words for each group of words.
So to memorize the number "102457692" they might break it up into three groups: 102, 457, 692. Then they have a word memorized for "102" (ton) and a word for "457" (rolling), and "692" (cheapen). They memorize the number as `ton rolling cheapen`.
Words are easier to memorize than numbers, even if the words don't form proper sentences.
Example: 123-555-2222
123 is always encoded as "tomb" in my phonetic system. 555 is always lilacs. 22 is always an onion.
When an image repeats, I place a mirror at that spot.
So 123-555-2222 becomes: a tomb, lilacs, an onion, and an mirror. I store them in a certain order with a story to keep them in order.
Also for those who want a book that demonstrates the use of creating a memory palace, I would recommend The Memory Palace - Learn Anything and Everything[1]. You'll just learn the 37 plays of Shakespeare wherein almost of the descriptions were funny.
I also listen to a free audiobook Memory: How to Develop, Train and Use It by William Walker Atkinson[2].
[0] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Lorayne
[1] - https://www.amazon.com/Memory-Palace-Anything-Everything-Sha...
[2] - https://librivox.org/memory-how-to-develop-train-and-use-it-...
Also highly recommended by Mr. Atkinson: The Power of Concentration (under his pen name Theron Q. Dumont) .
Not really. I phrased it that way ("driving down") for a simple explanation. I actually zip around at light speed on that road :-). After doing it for a while I can now 'jump' from landmark to landmark instantly.
> Do you write each number down, pause and recollect the next number, write it down, pause and recollect...
Yes. The moment I get a number I enter that in a text field (I'm actually using this to fill up a bank form for completing financial transactions). It does not matter if I'm in a noisy place or not, it does not need super focus or anything like that.
You mentally walk through your memory palace and clean it out. You walk through every room and look at every nook and cranny and imagine them clean.
As far as I understand you don't do this every day, but every once in a while or before competitions.
however most of the time it isn't too much of a problem if you want to repeat memorization in short period of time if the things you are remembering are different. So when trying to remember something like cards it can be problematic without adding something like above.
You can't just imagine something and remember it forever, combine mnemotechniques with: http://www.retrievalpractice.org/ https://www.supermemo.com/en/articles/20rules http://rs.io/anki-tips/
If anyone is near SF you can learn how to do the techniques (free) at our memory club: http://artofmemory.com/sf and train for our upcoming memory championships (SF Bay Area and internationally) at https://memoryleague.com/
Ultimately I'd like to use this technique to remember played cards during a card game. I can remember most cards quite easily, but often when it comes to the last 3-8 cards, I can't be 100% sure what they are.
Though I'm not sure it's worth my time. I already remember more cards than my usual opponents.
“Moonwalking With Einstein” does just that: It takes the reader on Foer’s journey from memory novice to national champion.
http://www.salon.com/2011/03/06/foer_moonwalking_with_einste...
I think he spends a day or a weekend to thoroughly clean up before the championship.
I highly recommend it to anyone who dislikes doing presentations.
Some people remember transition phrases but that never seemed helpful for me.
In the end spend time remembering a few core ideas and practice the speech freely a few times.
I actually don't write speeches anymore - i just think of a rough structure and practice until i get through it in a way i like. Then refine beginning and ending, make sure the core ideas are clear to me - and it's in my head for a while. Means I'll never give the same speech twice, but it's also more fun for me as i learn new things/ideas while speaking :)
> "Shocking nonsense" means to make up a short phrase or sentence that is both nonsensical and shocking in the culture of the user, that is, it contains grossly obscene, racist, impossible or other extreme juxtaposition of ideas. This technique is permissable because the passphrase, by its nature, is never revealed to anyone with sensibilities to be offended.
https://www.unix-ag.uni-kl.de/~conrad/krypto/passphrase-faq....
God help anyone trying to read that stuff after the fact.
Does someone know if the course referred to in the article is available to anyone?
I can confirm that within two hours of learning the technique, I was able to memorize a list of 100 random objects with 100% recall hours later, even days later without practice. You could ask me where an object was in relation to another, you could ask me to name them backwards... you could even pick an object at random and I could work forwards and backwards from it.
The effectiveness of the method of loci shocked me to say the least. And I showed anyone that was willing to see. Everyone thought there was some sort of trick, it seems impossible to be able to memorize that many objects so easily. Truth be told, you can go to 1,000+ if you want to. It's all just a matter of what you want to remember.
Start with "images" by linking each image to the next one to form a story, and pick up the techniques for the other disciplines at http://artofmemory.com/start
I went to a customer without notepad, he was telling me what he needs like 20-30 items with amounts, and the way I was able to remember that list was because at the time person was telling what he needs I was imagining place in the truck where I had what he needed.
So only reading that story I realised that I was using some technique that I never heard before.
I found [Unlimited Memory](https://www.amazon.com/Unlimited-Memory-Advanced-Strategies-...) a nice follow-up to the former.
Transfer has been the bane of most cognitive training paradigms. Improvements are seen in the same task, but do not seem to transfer to conceptually related tasks. One idea to overcome problems in transfer has been to identify tasks which inordinately rely on core cognitive processes of memory (e.g. recollection vs. familiarity; Yonelinas, 2002), or relational binding (Konkel & Cohen, 2009). Another idea might be to train using memory strategies, like loci. Typically that research looks to whether using a particular strategy benefits memory, and frequently, does that strategy work in a particular population with poorer memory (e.g. children, adults with Alzheimer)