We don’t always recognize when using them and have personal preferences. But purposefully applying these more often makes life easier and helps us remember more. Let’s discuss our favorite memory techniques.
Since infanthood, we’ve used memory techniques like association to make sense and learn about the world around us. In fact, we use association so much, we don’t realize it. But when used more purposefully, this and other techniques can enhance memory and improve quality of life. Here are my top three favorite memory techniques and why I love them.
Favorite Memory Techniques
If we want to remember something, what should we do first? Pay attention. This is my favorite because it makes all the others work. If we don’t pay attention, we cannot recall anything. It’s often why we can’t remember someone’s name when we meet them, because we weren’t paying complete attention at that moment. Our minds wander and we are bombarded with so much stimuli that focused attention is increasingly difficult. When busy or distracted, my personal reminder is “focus”. Try it. Purposefully pay attention and stop multitasking to remember more.
We associate almost constantly; it’s how we learn. But when applied methodically, this technique is one of the best and another personal favorite, because it can be used with anything. When we associate a new or unknown thing with a known thing, we create more cross references in our brains. We then have multiple ways to remember when we want to access it. This creates brain building blocks or added detours on the path to finding something in our long-term memory. The more we pay attention and then associate, the more we create memory markers to new things. Association provides multiple methods and information to utilize when trying to remember later. This process works with anything-remembering grocery lists, names, finding things, or recalling what was said in our last conversation. Use association often to help your memory.
There are multiple valuable memory techniques but as a visual person, I love visualization. We all do this: picture something in our mind. I use it frequently to save time when I don’t remember why I walked into a room. I simply return where I was in my mind instead of retracing my steps. Like association, visualization works best when we pay attention. If we write something down or put something away to organize it, we can then later visualize the written information or location of an item. But if we weren’t completely paying attention, it would be much more difficult. Frequently, we take pictures to recall something important or memorable. But I challenge myself to first pay attention, even closing my eyes if possible, to capture the moment with my mind before my camera. Then I always have the picture in my memory to recall anytime. Try visualizing to capture and remember.
This is just a sampling of many memory techniques available to use however they make sense to each of us. Whatever favorite memory techniques you enjoy, try one of these and see if it makes your life easier and your moments more memorable!