Memory Palace Method – Worksheets

Introduction

"Memory is the treasure house of the mind wherein the monuments thereof are kept and preserved." – Thomas Fuller

The name of my dissertation paper is "Improving Memory – A Crucial Exercise for the Professional Interpreter.". The technique we'll be learning is called the memory palace, and is also known as the method of loci (for the Latin word "locus" meaning place) and also the mind palace. A very useful tool in everyone's toolbox! I chose this dissertation paper because I found it interesting starting from watching movies with Sherlock Holmes to reading books and documentaries.

This method can be used anywhere, anytime and has only one tool – imagination. Moreover, such a strategy is so effective that it deserves to be taught, learned and applied by anyone. It may at first seem a somewhat difficult but method is just an impression, in time, with a little exercise, it will become something normal, it will be applied instinctively.

Method of memorizing Loci is very old, dating from 2000 years ago. Marcus Tullius Cicero was one of the most brilliant orators in history Romans having a technique infallible memory in that era. He became famous through his talent for lectures at its conferences at that time, but also through memorization techniques because, ever since then the "lecturers" took no notes, but had to keep in mind what they were told. Cicero used the method of loci in which, according to sources, was apparently already successfully applied in the ancient Greek, by a poet named Simonides – its true discoverer – who understand the fundamental mechanisms of working memory.

To better understand what is this method, we'll remember a legend that has the main character right on the poet Simonides, which tells about a chance that nobody knows, neither so far if it happened or not. Well, according to legend this talented poet of ancient Greece attends a celebration in the home of a good friend. At one point Simonides leaves his house, and meanwhile, the building's roof collapses and those who are inside are crushed under rubble.

To find victims (loved ones wanted a proper burial), Simonides has shown exactly the places where was each person, its identity, reconstructing in his mind the whole scene of the party, viewing everything in the room, all the elements made up that space inside the building and associated them with the image of the participants in order to access the memory.

The memory is very important to understand and know, to enhance the prospects of better perceiving reality, and as the famous roman orator Cicero said " the mind must be preserved and developed". It is not enough to have a good memory; you need to keep in shape through exercise. If you analyse the other methods, is no longer the need to remind the non-utilization of the mind and the capacity to save.

The purpose of this method of memorizing consists precisely in this process to put all your thoughts in order to recall the key elements that make better memorizing certain facts and surrounding issues. As did the great orator in time, every time, while having their public discourse have the habit to walk and remember key points, places, people, things you notice them around. Let’s see how it works.

Chapter 1

A Millennial Metaphor

The Memory Palace technique is based on the fact that we are extremely good at remembering places we know. A "Memory Palace" is a metaphor for any well-known place that you’re able to easily visualize. It can be the inside of your home, or maybe the route you take every day to work. That familiar place will be your guide to store and recall any kind of information. (A. H. Maltby, 1835, 112)

Method of Loci sounds scary but "loci" is simply the plural for "locus" which means "place". In this trigger system, you pre-memorize a known route (around your house, office, daily commute etc.) with each noted "place" along the way acting as a trigger just waiting to have information associated with it. (1835, 115)

The method of loci is a method of memory enhancement which uses visualizations with the use of spatial memory, familiar information about one's environment, to quickly and efficiently recall information. The method of loci is also known as the memory palace or mind palace technique. (1835, 115)

This method is a mnemonic device adopted in ancient Roman and Greek rhetorical treatises (in the anonymous Rhetorica Ad Herennium, Cicero's De Oratore, and Quintilian's Institutio Oratoria). Many memory contest champions claim to use this technique to recall faces, digits, and lists of words. These champions' successes have little to do with brain structure or intelligence, but more to do with using spatial memory and the use of the method of loci. (De Oratore, II. 350-353)

The term is most often found in specialized works on psychology, neurobiology, and memory, though it was used in the same general way at least as early as the first half of the nineteenth century in works on rhetoric, logic, and philosophy. John O'Keefe and Lynn Nadel refer to: 'the method of loci', an imaginal technique known to the ancient Greeks and Romans and described by Yates (1966) in her book The Art of Memory as well as by Luria (1969).

In this technique the subject memorizes the layout of some building, or the arrangement of shops on a street, or any geographical entity which is composed of a number of discrete loci.

When desiring to remember a set of items the subject 'walks' through these loci in their imagination and commits an item to each one by forming an image between the item and any feature of that locus. Retrieval of items is achieved by 'walking' through the loci, allowing the latter to activate the desired items. (Lynn, December 7, 1978)

The efficacy of this technique has been well established (Ross and Lawrence 1968, Crovitz 1969, 1971, Briggs, Hawkins and Crovitz 1970, Lea 1975), as is the minimal interference seen with its use.

The items to be remembered in this mnemonic system are mentally associated with specific physical locations. The method relies on memorized spatial relationships to establish, order, and recollect memorial content. It is also known as the "Journey Method," used for storing lists of related items, or the "Roman Room" technique, which is most effective for storing unrelated information. ("The Roman Room Technique", 2013)

The Memory Palace is one of the most powerful memory techniques I know. It’s not only effective, but also fun to use – and not hard to learn at all. The Memory Palace has been used since ancient Rome, and is responsible for some quite incredible memory feats. Eight-time world memory champion Dominic O’Brien, for instance, was able to memorize 54 decks of cards in sequence (that’s 2808 cards), viewing each card only once. (Marcus Tullius, 106–43)

And there are countless other similar achievements attributed to people using the Memory Palace technique or variations of it. Even in fiction, there are several references to the technique. In Thomas Harris’ novel Hannibal, for example, serial killer Hannibal Lecter uses memory palaces to store amazingly vivid memories of years of intricate patient records (sadly, it was left off the movie). (Dominic O'Brian, 1993, 10)

Of course, most of us are not in Dominic’s memory championship line of business (or in Hannibal’s line of business for that matter). But still, the Memory Palace technique is amazingly effective in all kinds of endeavors, such as learning a foreign language, memorizing a presentation you’re about to deliver, preparing for exams and many others – even if all you want is to jog your memory. (1993, 11)

Brain scans of "superior memorizers", 90% of whom use the method of loci technique, have shown that it involves activation of regions of the brain involved in spatial awareness, such as the medial parietal cortex, retrosplenial cortex, and the right posterior hippocampus. (Maguire, E. A., 2002, 90-95)

The medial parietal cortex is most associated with encoding and retrieving of information. Patients who have medial parietal cortex damage have trouble linking landmarks with certain locations; many of these patients are unable to give or follow directions and often get lost. (2002, 95)

The retrosplenial cortex is also linked to memory and navigation. In one study on the effects of selective granular retrosplenial cortex lesions in rats, the researcher found that damage to the retrosplenial cortex led to impaired spatial learning abilities. Rats with damage to this area failed to recall which areas of the maze they had already visited, rarely explored different arms of the maze, almost never recalled the maze in future trials, and took longer to reach the end of the maze, as compared to rats with a fully working retrosplenial cortex. (2002, 95)

In a classic study in cognitive neuroscience, O'Keefe and Nadel proposed "that the hippocampus is the core of a neural memory system providing an objective spatial framework within which the items and events of an organism's experience are located and interrelated." The technique is also used for second language vocabulary learning as polyglot, Timothy Doner, described in his 2014 TED talk. (Rizzo, Matthew (February 13, 2008, 139)

The "memory palace" technique can be applied to learn the vocabulary of a foreign language. The method is wonderfully described in Anthony Metiver's book "How to learn and memorize German vocabulary". What the author suggests is creating a memory palace for each letter of the German alphabet. Each memory palace then shall include a number of loci where an entry (a word or a phrase) can be stored and recalled whenever you need it.

Contemporary usage

Many effective memorizers today use the "method of loci" to some degree. Contemporary memory competition was initiated in 1991 and the first United States championship was held in 1997. Part of the competition requires committing to memory and recalling a sequence of digits, two-digit numbers, alphabetic letters, or playing cards. (Foer, Joshua March 16, 2005)

In a simple method of doing this, contestants, using various strategies well before competing, commit to long-term memory a unique vivid image associated with each item. They have also committed to long-term memory a familiar route with firmly established stop-points or loci. Then in the competition they need only deposit the image that they have associated with each item at the loci. (Foer, Memory World Championships, 2013)

To recall, they retrace the route, "stop" at each locus, and "observe" the image. They then translate this back to the associated item. For example, Ed Cooke, a World Memory Champion Competitor, describes to Josh Foer in his book Moonwalking with Einstein how Ed Cooke uses the method of loci. First, he describes a very familiar location where he can clearly remember many different smaller locations like his sink in his childhood home or his dog's bed. Cooke also advises that the more outlandish and vulgar the symbol used to memorize the material, the more likely it will stick. (Raz A, Neurocase, 2009, 361–372)

Memory champions elaborate on this by combining images. Eight-time World Memory Champion Dominic O'Brien uses this technique. The 2006 World Memory Champion, Clemens Mayer from Germany, used a 300-point-long journey through his house for his world record in "number half marathon", memorizing 1040 random digits in a half-hour. Gary Shang has used the method of loci to memorize pi to over 65,536 (216) digits. (Raz, 2009, 372)

Using this technique, a person with ordinary memorization capabilities, after establishing the route stop-points and committing the associated images to long-term memory, with less than an hour of practice, can remember the sequence of a shuffled deck of cards. The world record for this is held by Simon Reinhard at 21.19 seconds.

The technique is taught as a metacognitive technique in learning-to-learn courses. It is generally applied to encoding the key ideas of a subject. Two approaches are:

Link the key ideas of a subject and then deep-learn those key ideas in relation to each other;

Think through the key ideas of a subject in depth, re-arrange the ideas in relation to an argument, then link the ideas to loci in good order.

The Rhetorica Ad Herennium and most other sources recommend that the method of loci should be integrated with elaborative encoding (i.e., adding visual, auditory, or other details) to strengthen memory. However, due to the strength of spatial memory, simply mentally placing objects in real or imagined locations without further elaboration can be effective for simple associations. (Bremer, Rod, September 20, 2011)

A variation of the "method of loci" involves creating imaginary locations (houses, palaces, roads, and cities) to which the same procedure is applied. It is accepted that there is a greater cost involved in the initial setup, but thereafter the performance is in line with the standard loci method. (Finger, Stanley, October 11, 2001, 333)

The purported advantage is to create towns and cities that each represent a topic or an area of study, thus offering an efficient filing of the information and an easy path for the regular review necessary for long term memory storage. Something that is likely a reference to the "method of loci" techniques survives to this day in the common English phrases "in the first place", "in the second place", and so forth. (2001, 334)

In the ancient Greek arts of rhetoric, memory was a science. The science has an origin in what is surely myth. The poet Simonides of Ceos was hired by the noble Scopas to attend a formal banquet as a paid performer, singing a poem of praise of his host. As was the custom, Simonides began by first praising a pair of gods. After the performance, Scopas informed the poet that he would only get half of the agreed-upon fee, the other half he should get from the gods who had stolen the limelight.

At that point, a messenger came in and told Simonides that a couple of athletic men on horseback were outside waiting for him. Simonides went outside, but nobody was there. But, while he was outside, the gods destroyed the banquet hall to teach Scopas a few lessons about respect. (The lessons being pay the poet; don't mess with the gods; and, memory palaces are a gift from above). ( Cicero On the orator book 1-2, 106-43)

The banquet hall was so badly destroyed that none of the diners could be recognized. Simonides was able to remember the exact location of every guest at the banquet, using the principles of the Method of Loci, the science of memory. Later, Cicero wrote a few pages on the science in his classic work, De Oratore. The definitive treatment in Greek literature, however, is the work of an unknown author previously attributed to Cicero in the classic work Ad Herennium. (The Art of Memory 1966, 70)

The principles of the science are fairly simple, at least using our modern hindsight. A person who wished to memorize a large work, say an address after dinner or the closing argument of a legal proceeding, would begin by constructing a memory palace. While novices constructed a palace by going to a real one and memorizing the rooms, the memory palace could just as easily be any structure that can be imagined. (The Art of Memory,1996, 70)

The advantage of starting with a real palace, of course, is that it already exists. The student would carefully walk through the halls, remembering every room. For training (and for examination) the student would go someplace else and then attempt to describe the palace. The memory palace was the foundation. (1996, 74)

Once that is in your head, you can begin practicing the science of memory. While the palace never changes, the objects inside of a room certainly can change. The strategy, when presented with a large text to memorize, is to walk into the first room of your memory palace and place the first stanza of your address next to a distinctive object, the second stanza next to another object, and so on. (Chambers for a Memory Palace, 1996, 60)

Rehearsing (or indeed delivering a speech) consists of walking back through your memory palace, remembering each of the distinctive objects in the rooms, and then walking past each object and collecting the stanza of text associated with it. Spatial positioning of thoughts as an aid to memory turns out to mirror our natural thought processes of cognition.

What is fascinating about the arts of memory is how this science, like much of the wisdom of the Greeks, faded from the public view. Memorization was still important, though, and it caught the attention of Thomas Aquinas in Summa Theologica, who listed the development of artificial memory and memory-enhancing techniques under the virtue of Prudence. Thomas Aquinas based his work on a few allusions in a surviving work by Aristotle, De memoria et reminiscentia. (The Art of Memory, 1974, 80)

According to St. Thomas, the arts of memory and of placing verse on images is the very essence of remembering: "Man cannot understand without images; the image is a similitude of a corporeal thing, but understanding is of universals which are to be abstracted from particulars." (quoted in Frances Yates, The Art of Memory,1974).

After the endorsement by Thomas Aquinas, the memory arts became almost a fad. Of particular note was the monk Giordano Bruno, who received intense training in a Dominican convent and later became one of the most famous practitioners of the memory arts. Later burned at the stake for heresy, Bruno left the Dominican order and wandered throughout Europe, telling the secrets of memory to all he could find. In addition to his consultations to itinerant occultists and magicians, Bruno published from 1581 to 1591 a series of books including his landmark The Shadows of Ideas. (1974, 133)

To me, the arts of memory are always linked to the image of Giordano Bruno letting out the secrets of the memory arts to a mass audience. The idea of a shadowy underworld of magicians and outlaws who learned (and practiced) the secret arts inspired an obsession by some of the noted authors of the 20th century. (1974, 134)

The image of the rebel Giordanistis, medieval hackers, is an appealing one, and certainly fit the culture of the early Internet. But, the images of the memory palace are relevant to the Internet in a more fundamental way. But, finding those things has become the real challenge. (1974, 137)

Placing objects in places to find them again is the very essence of how we navigate the real world. Memory palaces are maps of thoughts and are used to navigate the world of ideas just as cartographic maps are used to navigate the world of things. With our modern computer networks, the imaginary and the real world merge into a new place, the Internet. (Frances Yates, 1974, 140)

The art of memory

The art of memory (Latin: ars memoriae) is any of a number of a loosely associated mnemonic principles and techniques used to organize memory impressions, improve recall, and assist in the combination and 'invention' of ideas. An alternative and frequently used term is "Ars Memorativa" which is also often translated as "art of memory" although its more literal meaning is "Memorative Art". It is sometimes referred to as mnemotechnics. (The Art of Memory, 1966, 4)

It is an 'art' in the Aristotelian sense, which is to say a method or set of prescriptions that adds order and discipline to the pragmatic, natural activities of human beings. It has existed as a recognized group of principles and techniques since at least as early as the middle of the first millennium BCE, and was usually associated with training in rhetoric or logic, but variants of the art were employed in other contexts, particularly the religious and the magical. (1966, 5)

Techniques commonly employed in the art include the association of emotionally striking memory images within visualized locations, the chaining or association of groups of images, the association of images with schematic graphics or notae ("signs, markings, figures" in Latin), and the association of text with images. Any or all of these techniques were often used in combination with the contemplation or study of architecture, books, sculpture and painting, which were seen by practitioners of the art of memory as externalizations of internal memory images and/or organization. Because of the variety of principles and techniques, and their various applications, some researchers refer to "the arts of memory", rather than to a single art. (Carruthers 1990, 123)

The designation is not used with strict consistency. In some cases it refers broadly to what is otherwise known as the art of memory, the origins of which are related, according to tradition, in the story of Simonides of Ceos and the collapsing banquet hall. For example, after relating the story of how Simonides relied on remembered seating arrangements to call to mind the faces of recently deceased guests, Stephen M. Kosslyn remarks "his insight led to the development of a technique the Greeks called the method of loci, which is a systematic way of improving one's memory by using imagery." (Frances A., 1966, 27-30)

Skoyles and Sagan indicate that "an ancient technique of memorization called Method of Loci, by which memories are referenced directly onto spatial maps" originated with the story of Simonides. Referring to mnemonic methods, Verlee Williams mentions, "One such strategy is the 'loci' method, which was developed by Simonides, a Greek poet of the fifth and sixth centuries BC" Loftus cites the foundation story of Simonides (more or less taken from Frances Yates) and describes some of the most basic aspects of the use of space in the art of memory. She states, "This particular mnemonic technique has come to be called the "method of loci". (Frances A. 1966, 28)

While place or position certainly figured prominently in ancient mnemonic techniques, no designation equivalent to "method of loci" was used exclusively to refer to mnemonic schemes relying upon space for organization. In other cases, the designation is generally consistent, but more specific: "The Method of Loci is a Mnemonic Device involving the creation of a Visual Map of one's house. (1966, 29)

This term can be misleading: the ancient principles and techniques of the art of memory, hastily glossed in some of the works, cited above, depended equally upon images and places. The designator "method of loci" does not convey the equal weight placed on both elements. Training in the art or arts of memory as a whole, as attested in classical antiquity, was far more inclusive and comprehensive in the treatment of this subject. (1966, 30)

In classical rhetoric, images and text were mapped onto virtual places to aid the memory of orators. Memory was enormously important to orators because they were expected to deliver long speeches with total accuracy. In fact, memory was of such value that there developed an "art of memory" designed to strengthen the natural memory. Frances Yates explains that this artificial memory depended upon the recollection of images. (Frances A, 1966, 1-2)

According to her the artificial memory is established from places and images. A locus is a place easily grasped by the memory, such as a house, an inter columnar space, a corner, an arch, or the like. Images are forms, marks or simulacra of what we wish to remember. For instance, if we wish to recall the genus of a horse, of a lion, of an eagle, we must place their images on definite loci. Artificial memory was a kind of "inner writing" the orator reviewed while presenting a speech, observing the places and their contents, the images, and recovering the memories for things (the subject matter) that those images represented. (Frances A, 1966, 1-2)

The orator used a series of places (the topoi of classical rhetoric in which one "found" arguments, known as inventio) in which he placed one of many sets of images, depending upon the speech he was to remember."… the loci remain in the memory and can be used again by placing another set of images for another set of material". These images were to be easily memorized. The anonymous author of the Ad Herennium, a classical rhetoric, discusses which types of images the orator should use in order to best remember them. (Yates, 1999, 43)

We ought, then, to set up images that are not many or vague but active, if we assign to them exceptional beauty or singular ugliness, if we ornament some of them, as with crowns or purple cloaks, so that the similitude may be more distinct to us, or if we somehow disfigure them, as by introducing one stained with blood or soiled with mud or smeared with red paint so that its form is more striking, or by assigning certain comic effects to our images, for that, too, will ensure our remembrance of them more readily. The things we easily remember when they are real we likewise remember without difficulty when they are figments. (Yates, 1966, 129-159)

Frances Yates adds: "Our author has clearly got hold of the idea of helping memory by arousing emotional affects through these striking and unusual images, of human figures wearing crowns or purple cloaks, bloodstained or smeared with paint, of human figures dramatically engaged in some activity – doing something". (1966, 130)

The classical rhetoric instructor did not dictate these images to the students; rather the student was encouraged to form his own images so as to find those that most resonated with his own emotions. The student accompanied the images of human figures with accessories in order to remind him of the topic of his speech. The author of Ad Herennium provides an example of one such memory image, used by a defence lawyer to remember the details of a poisoning case. (1966, 134)

As a method for remembering information, the artificial memory of classical rhetoric prefigures a method of writing in virtual worlds. In a simulated environment, we have the capacity to externalize our memory in a machine, striking images which guide the reader through a web of interconnected spaces may produce spoken or written text. The text is related to the images through metonymy and association. Imagine the memory image described above as a "mapped" image in a virtual (or real) space. (Frances, 1966, 150)

Chapter 2

2.1 Memorize something simple and easy first

How to remember names and faces

According to O’Brian Dominic we can form our own images. The brain is more powerful than any computer, far better than anything money can buy. Scientists barely understand how a mere ten per cent of it works. They know, however, that it is capable of storing and recalling enormous amounts of information. (O’Brian, 1993, 11)

If, as is now widely accepted, it contains an estimated 1012 neurons, the number of possible combinations between them (which is the way scientists think information is stored) is greater than the number of particles in the universe. For most of us, however, the memory sits up there unused, like the computer on the kitchen table. There are various ways of getting it to work, some based on theory, some on practice. (1993, 12)

Humans are extremely good at recognizing images they have seen only once. In 1967, the psychologist Shepherd showed a group of people 600 individual slides of pictures, words, and images. He then showed them 68 pairs of slides; one from each pair was from the previous set, and one was new. His subjects were asked to detect the old item. Shepherd recorded an 88 percent success rate for sentences, 90 percent for words, and 98 percent for pictures. (1993, 12)

The human face is essentially an image, but psychologists now believe that the brain processes face quite differently from other images. The existence of prosopagnosia would seem to support this. Prosopagnosia is a rare neurological condition that renders the victims unable to recognize previously familiar faces. Tests have shown that we have difficulty recognizing pictures of faces if they are upside down (Yin, 1970). Inverted buildings, by contrast, present no such problem. (Dominic, 1993, 12)

In 1974, Bower and Karlin found that if subjects were instructed to estimate personal characteristics such as honesty and pleasantness, their subsequent memory recognition was enhanced. Bower and Karlin concluded that faces were processed at a deeper, semantic level. (1993, 12)

“What's in a name? That which we call a rose

By any other name would smell as sweet.”

Romeo and Juliet, WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE

Shakespeare might have been right about roses, but we all know how embarrassing it can be to forget someone's name. People are flattered when you remember it, but insulted when you don't. You might as well tell them, “You have made no impression on me at all. You don't exist in my world. You are completely forgettable.” (Dominic, 1993, 12)

O’Brian speaks from painful experience. For the first thirty years of his life, he forgot people's names with spectacular enthusiasm. In the early days, he used to wade in with clumsy approximations, near misses that still make me squirm today. Then he switched tactics and started to call people “there”. “Hello, there”, He would say, smiling weakly, as old friends came up to him at parties. (O’Brian, 1993, 13)

Worse still, they would invariably ask him to introduce them to people he had only just met. Mercifully, he no longer fear introductions. Remembering people's names is such a simple skill, and yet it has changed his life. It could change yours if you are prepared to practice a little. O’Brian is more confident in social situations, at parties, at business meetings. It has even made him wealthier, or at least it should have done according to him. (1993, 13)

Technique 1

Wherever possible, study a person's face before absorbing his or her name. Ask yourself whether the person reminds you of anyone else. Somebody you already know perhaps, a friend, a relative, or a work colleague. Or maybe he or she resembles a public figure, an actor, a pop star, a sportsperson or a politician. Your reaction must be immediate. It doesn't matter if the likeness is vague. The person must simply serve as a reminder, a trigger. (1993, 14)

Let your mind wander. Your brain will shift, computer-like, through the thousands of stored facial patterns you have gathered over the years. In a split second, it will present you with the nearest or next-best link to the person standing in front of you. You are introduced to a person who, for whatever reason, reminds you of John McEnroe. You have already done half the work, even though you have yet to discover his real name. (1993, 15) You must now imagine a location closely connected to John McEnroe. A tennis court is the obvious place. Once you have established a location, you are ready to process their name. He introduces himself as David Holmes. Take the surname first. What does it make you think of? Holmes might suggest Sherlock Holmes. Imagine him on the court, peering through his magnifying glass searching for evidence of chalk dust. The technique works because you are creating what your memory thrives on: a chain of associations. (1993, 16)

These are the links which you have made so far:

Face Likeness Location Name

(McEnroe) (tennis court) (Holmes)

Or perhaps David Holmes reminds you of your uncle. Imagine Sherlock Holmes at your uncle's house, knocking at the door and smoking his pipe. Your uncle invites him in and introduces him to David, your friend.

And so on. You must use the first associations that come into your head. They are the strongest, most obvious ones, and you are more likely to repeat them when it comes to recalling the person's name.

Technique 2

What do you do if you are confronted with someone who resembles no one, not even vaguely? If this happens, try to decide what type of person he or she is. Despite what you might have been told, categorize them! Let's assume that you meet someone who reminds you of a typical bank manager. Go through exactly the same mental process as before, this time using your local bank as the location. You are then told his name: Patrick McLennan. Take his surname first. What does it make you think of?

Assuming you don't know anyone called McLennan, concentrate on the word itself: “Mac” and “Lennan”. Imagine your bank manager in a dirty old raincoat, a flasher's mac, exposing himself to John Lennon. This rather distressing scene would take place in the bank itself. Now the first name. ( D. O’Brian, 1993,15)

You happen to know someone called Patrick, who travels abroad a lot, so imagine him standing in a very long queue for the Bureau de Change, waiting to change money. Everyone is naturally shocked at the bank manager's appalling behavior, not least John Lennon. Clothes are also important when you are using types. If I met a woman in jodhpurs and a puffa jacket, I would immediately think she was a horse rider. If I met a man wearing a loud tie and shirt, I would think he was in advertising. (O’Brian, 16)

In each case, I use the type to trigger off the most obvious setting: horse rider, field or stable; advertising executive, the television room; fashion model, a catwalk; estate agent, an office in the high street. The way we categorize people is based on thousands of previous encounters, either in real life, on TV or in books. You are your own best judge. And no matter how morally wrong it might be to go on appearances, it is the best way to remember names. (1993, 17)

Technique 3

Some people simply don't remind us of anyone, or any type. They are so bland

and uninteresting as to be instantly forgettable. When this occurs, you must use your present surroundings as a location. Let's assume you are holding a party in a restaurant and are introduced to a guest called Jenny Fielding. Her face reminds you of absolutely no one; her clothes are characterless. (Yin, 1970, 18)

In this situation, switch immediately to her name and your present surroundings. „Fielding” makes you think of a cricket fielder. You happen to know someone else called Jenny, so imagine your friend Jenny dressed in full cricket regalia with her hands cupped, poised to catch a cricket ball in the corner of the restaurant. (1970, 19)

What happens if you don't know of anyone named Jenny? You must make one further mental link. Imagine, for example, a donkey (a jenny is a female donkey) acting as a cricket fielder (but don't tell your guest!), or even place an electric generator (genny) at silly mid-off, over by the door. As ever, the more bizarre the image, the more memorable. (1970, 20)

Technique 4

Sometimes you might be given a person's name before you have had time to

study their face. „You must come and meet Victoria Sharpe,” says your boss at the office party, „I am sure you will like her.” Dragging you by the arm, he takes you over

to her. She is a very important person in the company hierarchy and you have only just joined. (1993, 21)

What do you do? If I were in this situation, knowing that I had to remember her name, I would think the following, all of which I am imagining now as I write: Victoria: reminds me of Victoria waterfalls. Sharpe…razor sharpe…someone in a canoe using an enormous razor blade as a paddle, literally cutting through the water. The moment my boss introduces us, I simply imagine her in the canoe, teetering on the edge of the falls. (O’Brian, 22)

Technique 5

Whichever technique you use, the secret of my method is in that first, split-second reaction to seeing a face. Your brain makes an instinctive association that must be cherished. Grab hold of it – develop it – and let your imagination do the rest. One last point: take control of the situation when you are being introduced to people. (Dominic, 23)

This might sound obvious, but if you arrive at a party and the hostess reels off the names of ten people all at once, stop her. “Hang on, one at a time, please. And your name was?” Hear the name correctly and get the person to repeat it if necessary. Say it back to the person as well. It might sound a little awkward, but it is not half as bad as forgetting someone's name two minutes later. (1993, 23)

How to remember numbers

Let's assume you wanted to remember that a friend of yours, or maybe one of your children, came second in a swimming competition. Try to imagine him or her being presented with a swan on the medal rostrum. Or perhaps the reason they came third is because they were wearing handcuffs throughout the race. Similarly, whenever you visit your aunt, you can never remember which flat it is. To remember that it is number 7, imagine that she has taken to hurling boomerangs around her lounge. (She's getting a little eccentric in her old age.)

Your boss has asked you to go out and buy eight cases of wine for the office party. On the way, you visualize him sitting at his desk timing you with an egg timer – typical of the man. Or perhaps your local wine merchant has miraculously turned into Marilyn Monroe. Make a mental note of how out of place she looks, particularly in a sequin dress. Let's assume that you want to memorize the number of somebody's house. A friend of yours lives at number 74, but you are always knocking at 64 and 84. Translated into letters, 74 becomes GD, the French actor Gerard Depardieu. Imagine him sticking his sword through the letter box of your friend's house. (In all these examples, I am using well-known people from the list.)

Location is important. Always picture your person at the house you want to remember. You must also ensure that he or she is doing their appropriate action. This helps to link them to their location. Let's assume another friend of yours lives at number. 79; 79 becomes the Egyptian ex-president Gamal Nasser (7 = G; 9 = N). Imagine him tying his camel up outside your friend's house. Perhaps you want to remember the time trains leave your local station.

If it is 8 minutes past the hour, imagine Oliver Hardy (0 = O, 8 = H) standing on the platform, turning around with a plank on his shoulder, sending passengers flying in all directions.

How to remember appointments

The attraction of flashy year planners is that you can tell at a glance what lies ahead. The forthcoming two months are usually a maze of color-coded dots, thinning out into one or two important fixtures later on in the year. A mental diary works on the same principle.

By using a journey with 31 stages, you can also tell, at a glance, what treats lie in store. And if you want to look forward to the following month, simply add another route. Each stage of the journey represents a day of the month, and appointments are placed at the corresponding stages.

Let's suppose you have an appointment with the doctors on 3rd January, for example. You simply go to the third stage, where your appointment is represented by a key image. Imagine your doctor standing there in a white coat, for example, with a stethoscope around his or her neck.

How to remember speeches

A badly prepared speech or talk is not only embarrassing for the speaker; it can also be acutely painful for the audience as well. For those who try to speak without notes, jokes can often fall apart in public, even though they went well in private beforehand. Ideas tend to peter out rapidly when you are ad-libbing, and remembering a punchline is so much more difficult when the pressure is on to perform. There is also nothing worse than someone reading out an anecdote verbatim from a piece of paper. Their speeches are often punctuated with pregnant pauses as they desperately try to decipher their own handwriting. Anyone who has tried to avoid these pitfalls and attended a public speaking course will have probably been told to condense speeches into a series of key points. Listed on a cue card, they are designed to trigger off particular anecdotes, subjects or aspects of a story. They are written out in sequence, thus preserving the natural order of the speech. This technique usually results in a big improvement, but relying on an external memory aid such as a cue card can still interrupt the flow of a speech.

The most successful public speakers, however, are able to store their key points in their heads. Enter the mental speech file. Much like the mental diary, a speech file can help you to remember a talk in its entirety without any notes. Key points are translated into key images, and placed along a simple journey.

How to remember “lost” chapters of your life

Time travelling is all about returning to a particular time and location from your past and trying to recall everything in as much detail as you can. I suspect that we have all experienced that moment when happy memories of a previously forgotten part of our lives come flooding back. It's an exciting feeling but it can also be intensely frustrating: we can remember only bits of the past, glimpses that rapidly fade into nothing. (Dominic, 1993, 26)

Time travelling helps open up whole vistas of your past life. It throws wide the shutters, shedding light on lost scenes and allowing you to re-live lost sounds, smells, textures, tastes and emotions. The past is an integral part of our character; it defines who we are. And although some events in our lives are best forgotten, there are many that are unwittingly and undeservedly confined to oblivion. (1993, 28)

It is common for people in the immediate aftermath of bereavement, for example, to clam up and not deal with the loss for many years. Later on in life, when they have finally come to terms with it, they want to remember every detail about the person who died – their face, the sound of their voice, their scent, the happy times spent together. But a poor memory lets them down. (1993, 29)

Time travel can't bring people back to life, but it can animate memories and preserve scenes for posterity far better than any photo album. I am also about to use it with someone who has lost her memory through an accident. Bit by bit, we hope to re-create her past, sketching rough outlines before filling them in with colour.

Start by returning to a location that conjures up a number of varied, incidental recollections: your old school, an old friend's house you used to visit, or a village you left long ago. Choose a specific starting point: it might be a flagpole in the playground, a chapel pew, a tree hut, a friend's kitchen. Look around you. What little incidents do you remember? How old were you then? What friends did you have? What were the typical noises?

Traffic, trains, children playing? Try to recall individual sounds characteristic of particular objects: the slam of a front door, a squeaky window, a creaky floorboard, a water pipe that always shuddered. See if you can recall voices, even their timbre. If you are using your old school as a location, try to remember catchphrases used by teachers and pupils. Isolate particular events that took place, no matter how trivial they seem now.

They obviously meant something to you then. Use all your senses. Can you recall the smell of a damp, musty room, or the aroma of your garden? And what about the smooth feel of a polished walnut table, or the rough texture of a pebbledash wall, the one you used to run your hands along on the way to school. Association is at the heart of time travel. (1993, 34)

One memory sparks off another. After a while, an overall picture begins to emerge, not just of the physical layout but also of your state of mind. Were you happy? Optimistic? In love? Depressed? Naive? The deeper you reflect; the more memories will be triggered off. Experiences completely forgotten will come flooding back. Eventually, if you work at it, you will have the same problem as I have now: I never run out of memories. Spend a little time every day reflecting on the same area of your past until you feel you have exhausted every avenue of retrieval. It's possible you never will. Every time you return to the scene, you will be starting with a clearer, more comprehensive picture. It's a bit like assembling a jigsaw puzzle: each detail adds something to the overall image.

Don't be surprised if you move the pieces around, making corrections in matters of detail. I have just had to alter the layout in my parent's back garden. One morning I realized that a certain cherry tree I had recently 'rediscovered' had, in fact, been chopped down years ago. I suddenly recalled the sensation of tripping over its stump and stubbing my toe. In turn, that reminded me of our next-door neighbour – someone I had completely forgotten – and his tantrum when the tree crashed through his fence. How far back can you go? I can recall shaking the wooden bars of my cot, aged two. My mother predicted that I would be a boxer one day, given the way I was developing my infantile biceps.

She wasn't far wrong. I did get a pair of boxing gloves for my tenth birthday. Time travel borders on self-hypnosis, but it comes with no health warnings and you won't need the click of someone's fingers to wake you. When I relax in my sauna of early childhood memories, I adopt the same frame of mind I had all those years ago: carefree, innocent, untroubled. Only then do I realize how much my expectations and opinions have changed. Time travel has many other benefits. One common symptom of people who don't know how to use their memories is the failure to recall dreams. It is nonsense to say that we don't dream. We all do, every night. It is the brain's way of filing away the thoughts it has had during the day.

By exercising your memory regularly, you will begin to recall more and more dreams. Finally, you may wish to use the findings of your archaeological dig for one

of your journeys.

Memory and the Greeks

The Greeks, and later the Romans, went on to develop some of the greatest memories the civilized world has ever seen. Memory was ranked as one of the most important disciplines of oratory, a flourishing art. They were living in an age of no paper, so people couldn't readily refer to any notes. Speeches were committed to memory; lawyers depended on their memory in court; and poets, whose role in society was paramount, regularly drew on their enormous powers of recall to recite long passages of verse.

The Greeks in general had a high level of literacy. Important texts were recorded on papyrus, and wax tablets were used to teach reading and writing in schools. Nevertheless, their culture remained a predominantly oral one. Much of what we know about Simonides and the classical art of memory comes from three Roman sources, all written between the first century BC and the first century AD: an anonymous work entitled Ad Herrenium, Quintillian's Institutio Oratorio, and Cicero's De Oratore. (The three are discussed in Dame Frances Yates's absorbing book The Art of Memory, republished by Pimlico, 1992.) The Romans documented and expanded the practice pioneered by the Greeks.

Written by a teacher, Ad Herrenium is addressed to students of rhetoric and concerns itself with the basic rules of memory. In it we learn that the Greeks believed in two types of memory: natural and artificial. Those who are born

with good natural memories could improve them still further by training the artificial memory.

More significantly, training and exercise could dramatically help anyone who is born with a very poor memory. In other words, however bad it was, your memory could be improved if treated like a muscle and exercised constantly. 'In every discipline,' says the author of Ad Herrenium, 'artistic theory is little avail without unremitting exercise, but especially in mnemonics, theory is almost valueless unless made good by industry, devotion, toil, and care.' The Greeks discovered that the best way to remember things was to impose order on them.

They did this by choosing a series of real places or loci which they could visualise in their mind. Images of what they wanted to recall would then be placed on the various loci. Writing in De Oratore, Cicero says, 'The order of the places will preserve the order of the things to be remembered.' The Greeks recommended using spacious and architecturally varied buildings. Ouintillian suggests using buildings with numerous rooms, forecourts, balconies, arches and statues. 'It is an assistance to the memory,' he writes, 'if places are stamped on the mind, which anyone can believe from experiment.

For when we return to a place after a considerable absence, we not merely recognize the place itself, but remember things that we did there, and recall the persons whom we met and even the unuttered thoughts that passed through our minds when we were there before.' A lot of people might have come across this 'Roman room' method, as it is called; I had heard of positioning literal images around rooms, but always thought it sounded too cramped and confusing. Significantly, Quintillian goes on to say that loci don't have to be mapped out around the house: 'What I have spoken of as being done in a house can also be done in public buildings, or on a long journey, or in going through a city.'

This is the only extant text that recommends using journeys. Still, my habit of wandering aimlessly around Guildford, mapping out a mental route, is clearly not so daft after all! Frances Yates even suggests that it would have been common in Greek and Roman times to see lonely students of rhetoric (or poets) meandering around deserted buildings and streets plotting their loci. This discovery has serious implications for me: the end of men-in-white-coat jokes. Loci are compared in Ad Herrenium to wax tablets.

They can be used again and again, even though the images inscribed on them are regularly wiped off. As befits someone from the twentieth century, I have always described my journeys as blank video tapes, which can be similarly wiped clean and used again. The Greeks had a number of interesting rules for loci. The following are taken from Ad Herrenium: Loci should be deserted or solitary places. Crowds of people tend to weaken impressions and distract from the key image. (Guildford is always a ghost town when I use it as a route.) The students are urged to give each 5th locus a distinguishing mark: they should include a gold hand (five fingers) in the scene, for example. On the 10th locus, they should imagine a personal acquaintance called Decimus. (I have always made the 6th, or 11th, or half-way stage stand out in my mind.)

Loci should not be too similar: too many intercolumnar spaces are not recommended, as they might lead to confusion. (I always make sure that my stages are different from each other.) The intervals between loci should be a particular length: 30 feet. The loci should be not too large, or too small, too brightly lit, or too dark. Imaginary places can be used as well as real. It is also good to mix both together: give your house an extra floor, etc.

The Greeks had two types of images; one for memorizing things, arguments or notions; and one for remembering single words. Each image would be placed at a different locus. As he was reciting his poetry, Simonides would have moved around his mental journey, recalling each image as he went. Lawyers would remind themselves of the details of a case in this way; orators would know their next subject or topic. (Interestingly, the English word 'topic' comes from the Greek topoi, which means place or locus.)

The second type of imagery, for individual words, seems a little extreme. Most Latin sources are in agreement that the idea of referring to a new locus for each word of a speech was preposterous. The author of Ad Herrenium suggests that it was, at best, a good mental exercise. According to the author of Ad Herrenium, certain images stick in the mind, others don't; adopting the tone of a psychologist, he sets out to find the most memorable image.

The passage from Ad Herrenium illustrates another similarity between our two systems. The emphasis on active images (imagines agentes) is identical; I have always stressed that each person must have a unique and distinguishing action, and here Simonides is saying that the image must be doing something. There are only three examples of human images in Ad Herrenium. This is a pity, although I applaud the reason why the author didn't leave us with more.

The best images are the ones that you make up for yourself. The author of Ad Herrenium took a similar line, stating his task as tutor is not to list a thousand examples, but to teach the method, give a couple of illustrations, and let the student do the rest. Those images that we do have are, nevertheless, fine examples. The author of Ad Herrenium urges the student to throw together a number of different images. In the following example, he chooses an image that a lawyer might use when remembering details about a case: the defendant has poisoned a man, the motive was to gain an inheritance, and there were numerous witnesses. 'We shall imagine the man in question as lying ill in bed, if we know him personally.

If we do not know him, we shall take someone to be our invalid, so that he may come to mind at once. And we shall place the defendant at the bedside, holding in his right hand a cup, in his left, tablets, and on the fourth finger, a ram's testicles. In this way we can have in memory the man who was poisoned, the witnesses, and the inheritance.' This complex image would be placed on the first locus.

The cup would remind the lawyer of the poison; and the tablets, the inheritance. The lawyer could, in this way, remember the pertinent details of the case. Further, related information would be stored in similar form at the second locus, and so on. In effect, the lawyer is using his loci as a mental filing cabinet. It is also worth noting here, although it is not as clear as it could be in this passage, that the author of Ad Herrenium is suggesting that we use people we know personally.

Frances Yates, in her discussion on the subject, suggests that the Latin word for testicle (testiculus) would have reminded the lawyer of the word for witnesses (testes). In another part of Ad Herrenium, she points out, the author gives an example of an image ('Domitius raising his hands to heaven while he is lashed by the Marcii Reges') that is designed to remind the student of rhetoric of a particular sentence ('domum itionem reges').

The only obvious connection is in the sound of the words. Loci, images, actions, persons, imagination, association, order – it's no wonder the Greeks had such good memories.

Chapter 3

3.1 How to build memory palaces like a champ

Here are some additional suggestions before we start

Creating your memory palace, and giving it persistence

Creating a memory palace is not the most complicated of things. You can take your pick between creating one completely from scratch, or using a place you are very familiar with as a memory palace, all that matters is for you to be able to recall it very vividly, which is the hardest part. Either way, apply the same techniques to actually give it more personal touches. (Elizabeth F. Loftus, 1976, 65)

Memory hooks, and hooking up memories

Furniture and decoration will play a role in recalling information. That's for now. Everything you've added in the rooms so far is going to be used as what is called "memory hooks". Simply put, memory hooks are all those imaginary items that you set up in the rooms, and that we'll use to store and connect to memories. (Loftus, 1976, 68)

Keeping your memory palace in shape

Just like all buildings when they are forgotten, memory palaces can fall down and collapse too – even more so since they're not made of material much more solid than the electricity that fires between your neurons. So how can you keep your palaces in shape? There aren't many around this but here are a few pointers. (1976, 70)

Decide on a blueprint for your palace

While a memory palace can be a purely imagined place, it is easier to base it upon a place that exists in the real world and that you are familiar with. A basic palace could be your bedroom, for example. Larger memory palaces can be based on your house, a cathedral, a walk to the corner store, or your whole town. The larger or more detailed the real place, the more information you can store in the corresponding mental space. (1976, 71)

Define a route

If you will need to remember things in a certain order, it is essential that you follow a specific route through your palace, both in the real world and in your mind. Thus, once you’ve decided what your memory palace is, decide how you will travel through it. If you don’t really need to remember things in order, this step is unnecessary, but still useful, as it makes memorizing your palace easier. (Elizabeth F, 1976, 72)

Identify specific storage locations in your palace or along your route

When you use your memory palace you will put individual things to be remembered (a number, a name, or a part of a speech that you will be giving, for example), in specific locations. Thus, you need to identify as many locations as you think you will need. (1976, 74)

Walk through your structure or along your route and really observe it. If your palace is actually a route, such as your drive to work, the storage locations can be landmarks along the way: your neighbour’s house, a crossroads, a statue, or a skyscraper, for example. If the palace is a structure, you can put things in the different rooms. Within rooms, you can identify smaller locations, such as paintings, pieces of furniture, and so on. The key is to make sure the locations you choose are distinct from each other so that no location can be mistaken for another. (1976, 75)

Memorize your memory palace

For your memory palace to be effective, you need to commit it to memory perfectly. The best way to do this is to actually draw out a blueprint (or a map, if the palace is a route) which shows the landmarks or storage locations you have chosen.

Try visualizing the palace when you are not there, and then check your mental image against the map to make sure you have remembered every location and put them in the correct order. Picture the landmarks in as much detail as possible: make sure your mental image includes their colours, sizes, smells, and any other defining characteristics. (Elizabeth, 1976, 77)

Place things to be remembered in your palace

Once you have constructed your palace and have it firmly implanted in your mind, you are ready to use it. Put a manageable amount of information in each place. For example, if your palace is your house, and you are trying to remember a speech, you might place the first few sentences on your doormat and the next few in the keyhole of your door.

Don’t put too much information in any one place, and if certain things must be kept separate from others, put them in different places. Make sure that you place things along your route in the order in which you need to remember them, if applicable. Use natural finishes such as polished marble flooring and top of the line materials like drapes. (1976, 79)

Use symbols

You don’t necessarily need to put a whole string of words or numbers in a given location in order to be able to remember it, and trying to do so can be unwieldy and counterproductive. Generally, all you need to store in each location is something that will jog your memory, something that will lead you to the actual idea you’re trying to remember. (Loftus, 1976, 80)

Thus, if you are trying to remember a ship, picture an anchor on your couch. If the ship is the U.S.S. Wisconsin, picture the anchor made out of cheese. Symbols are shorthand and make memories more manageable, but they also can be more effective than picturing the actual thing you are trying to remember. (1976, 81)

Be creative

The images you put in your palace should, obviously, be as memorable as possible. Generally, images will be more memorable if they are absurd (out of the ordinary), or if they are attached to some strong emotion or personal experience.

The number 124 is not particularly memorable, but an image of a spear shaped like the number 1, going through a swan (which looks like the number 2), and splitting the swan into 4 pieces is. Yes, it’s disturbing, but that’s part of what makes it stick in your mind. (Elizabeth F, 1976, 83)

Stock your palace with other mnemonics

There are many simpler mnemonics that you can use in combination with the memory palace. As an example, suppose you need to remember a great deal about music composition. (1976, 85)

As you enter your kitchen, you could see a little boy eating a piece of chocolate fudge, which would evoke the first-letter mnemonic “Every Good Boy Deserves Fudge," which would in turn allow you to recall the order of notes on the lines in treble clef (EGBDF).

Explore your palace

Once you have stocked your palace with evocative images, you need to go through it and look at them. The more you explore your palace, the more easily you will recall its contents on demand. In your mind you want to see James Joyce, for example, sitting on your toilet as if he belonged there and was really an integral part of your bathroom decor. (1976, 87)

Use your palace

Once you have memorized the contents of your palace you can recall them simply by mentally walking through it or looking around it. If you need to give a speech, just follow your route in order as you do so. If you need to remember that your girlfriend’s birthday is March 16, simply go into your bedroom and see the soldiers “marching" on the bed to the tune of the 80s cult classic “Sixteen Candles." With practice you will be able to start anywhere in your palace or along your route to recall a specific piece of information. (1976, 90)

Build new palaces

A memory palace can be reused over and over again if you need only commit things to memory for a short time. Just replace the existing contents with new ones, and you’ll soon remember only the new ones. (F. Loftus, 1976, 92)

If you need to remember the contents of your palace for a long time, you can keep that palace as it is and create new ones in which to store other information as needed. If your house contains the phone numbers of everyone you know, you can walk to your workplace if you need to remember the order of a deck of cards. (1976, 93)

3.2 Let’s start to use the memory palace technique

Choose your palace

First and foremost, you’ll need to pick a place that you’re very familiar with. The effectiveness of the technique relies on your ability to mentally see and walk around in that place with ease. You should be able to ‘be there’ at will using your mind’s eye only. A good first choice could be your own home, for example. Remember that the more vividly you can visualize that place’s details, the more effective your memorization will be. (Brown, J.S, 1989, 32-42)

Also, try to define a specific route in your palace instead of just visualize a static scene. So, instead of simply picturing your home, imagine a specific walkthrough in your home. This makes the technique much more powerful, as you’ll be able to recall items in a specific order, as we’ll see in the next steps: (J. S, 1989, 33)

Familiar streets in your city. Possible routes could be your drive to work, or any other sequence of streets you’re familiar with;

A current or former school. You can imagine the pathway from the classroom to the library (or to the bar on the other side of the street, if that’s the route imprinted on your mind);

Place of work. Imagine the path from your cubicle to the coffee machine or to your boss’s office (it shouldn’t be hard to choose);

Scenery. Imagine walking on your neighborhood or the track you use when jogging in a local park.

List distinctive features

Now you need to pay attention to specific features in the place you chose. If you picked a walkthrough in your home, for example, the first noticeable feature would probably be the front door. Now go on and mentally walk around your Memory Palace. After you go through the door, what’s in the first room?

Analyze the room methodically (you may define a standard procedure, such as always looking from left to right, for example). What is the next feature that catches your attention? It may be the central table in the dining room, or a picture on the wall. Continue making mental notes of those features as you go. Each one of them will be a “memory slot” that you’ll later use to store a single piece of information.

Imprint the Palace on your mind

For the technique to work, the most important thing is to have the place or route 100% imprinted on your mind. Do whatever is necessary to really commit it to memory. If you’re a visual kind of person, you probably won’t have trouble with this. Otherwise, here are some tips that help:

Physically walk through the route repeating out loud the distinctive features as you see them;

Write down the selected features on a piece of paper and mentally walk through them, repeating them out loud;

Always look at the features from the same point of view;

Be aware that visualization is a just a skill. If you’re still having trouble doing this, you may want to develop your visualization skills first;

When you believe you’re done, go over it one more time. It’s really important to “overlearn” your way in your Memory Palace.

Once you’re confident that the route is stamped on your mind, you’re set. Now you have your Palace, which can be used over and over again to memorize just about anything you want.

Associate!

Now that you’re the master of your palace, it’s time to put it to good use. Like most memory enhancement systems, the Memory Palace technique works with the use of visual associations. The process is simple: you take a known image – called the memory peg – and combine with the element you want to memorize.

For us, each memory peg is a distinctive feature of our Memory Palace. The memory pegging technique is the same one described in the article “Improve Your Memory by Speaking Your Mind’s Language”, so if you haven’t read it yet, I highly advise you to do so.

As described in that article, there’s a “right way” of doing visual associations:

“Make it crazy, ridiculous, offensive, unusual, extraordinary, animated, nonsensical –

after all, these are the things that get remembered, aren’t they? Make the scene so unique that it could never happen in real life. The only rule is: if it’s boring, it’s wrong”.

Although we can use the technique to memorize tons of information, let’s start with something very simple: using our „Home” Memory Palace to memorize a groceries list. Let’s suppose the first item in that list is „bacon”:

Mentally transport yourself to your Memory Palace. The first feature you see in your mind is your home’s front door. Now, in a ludicrous way, visually combine „bacon” with the sight of your front door. How about giant fried bacon strips flowing out from underneath the door reaching for your legs, just like zombies in those B-movies? Feel the touch of the “bacon hands” on your legs.

Feel the smell of darn evil bacon. Is that remarkable enough? Now open the door and keep walking, following the exact same route you defined before. Look at the next distinctive feature, and associate it with the second item to be memorized. Suppose the next item is “eggs” and the second feature is „picture of mother-in-law”. Well, at this point you already know what to do…The process is always the same, so just keep mentally associating images until there are no items left to memorize.

Visit your Palace

At this point, you are done memorizing the items. If you’re new to the technique, though, you’ll probably need to do a little rehearsal, repeating the journey at least once in your mind.

If you start from the same point and follow the same route, the memorized items will come to your mind instantly as you look at the journey’s selected features. Go from the beginning to the end of your route, paying attention to those features and replaying the scenes in your mind.

When you get to the end of your route, turn around and walk in the opposite direction until you get to the starting point. In the end, it’s all a matter of developing your visualization skills. The more relaxed you are, the easier it will be and the more effective your memorization will be.

Final thoughts

What I like about the Memory Palace (and other pegging methods) is that it’s not only extremely effective, but also quite fun to learn and use. With just a little bit of experience, the lists you memorize using the Memory Palace will stay fresh in your mind for many days, weeks or even more.

Also, have in mind that you can create as many palaces as you want, and that they can be as simple or as elaborate as you wish to make them. Each of them is a “memory bank”, ready to be used to help you memorize anything, anytime.

Associating physical locations with mental concepts is the most powerful memory combination I know. Most other memory techniques (supposedly more sophisticated than the Memory Palace) are, at least in part, based on the concept of physical locations being used as memory pegs.

Tips and tricks

Be persistent. The memory palace is a very powerful tool, but it is not necessarily easy to master. If you’re looking for a quick fix to help you keep track of things, get a pen and paper, but if you really want to improve your ability to memorize things, take the time to learn and practice this method.

Also, keep in mind that the modern age of computers brings many easy ways to build your own virtual palaces or simply choose from many of the other creations already online and take a virtual tour of them whenever you like. The impact is somewhat stronger than a drawing which makes the imprint into your mind quite effortless. There are many variations of the memory palace, such as the Roman Room and the Journey.

They are all based on the Method of Loci, which sprang from the recognition that people are very good at remembering locations, and if you can associate abstract or unfamiliar ideas with a well-known location, you can more easily recall the things you want to. You will need to prepare each new memory palace as you did the first, so you may want to develop new ones before you need them.

At the World Memory Championships, top competitors memorize the order of 20 shuffled decks of cards in an hour and more than 500 random digits in 15 minutes, among other events. Think you have what it takes? Believe it or not, almost everybody has the capability to perform such amazing feats.

Competitive people who memorize don’t necessarily have “better memories” than the rest of us; instead, they learn and perfect a variety of mnemonics (memory aids) to improve their ability to quickly learn and recall just about anything. There are a number of books and memory-enhancement products available to help you learn how to build a memory palace.

They can be costly, however, and not all are effective for all people. Practice the steps above, and you may save yourself some money. You can use objects that have pronunciation of letters in the beginning that are the same as the word you are trying to memorize. This method will be useful for the words which are new for you. A dictionary can help you in this case.

Chapter 4

4.1 Memory palace method – worksheets

Readers of O’Brian Dominic are familiar with the following three principles:

Location

Imagination

Action

To become truly fluent or all-encompassing when it comes to memorizing a particular subject area, we want to create as many palaces as there are letters in the alphabet, and in some cases more. The following pages include example exercises and worksheets that you can print out and use when building your own unique memory palaces.

To begin, think about 10 locations that you know well. These will become the basis for your first ten memory palaces. Whenever possible, try to link the place with the letter. For instance, I might associate A with Aberdeen Mall, S with the Sony Center and Z with Zoltan’s Movie Theatre. You will undoubtedly have more than 26 locations, so save the extra ones to build palaces for grammar or miscellaneous material you might want to pick up from time to time. Do your best to link your Memory Palaces with locations that match the first letter now, but if you can’t, keep identifying locations that you can use anyway.

You can always come back and organize your locations more thoroughly and alphabetically later. One of the keys to the Magnetic Memory method is to keep moving forward. To paraphrase Edison, make a mess now and clean it up later. That’s what these worksheets are for, so print them out as many times as you like and start fresh. On that matter, I’ve provided you with both PDF and a .doc file.

Experiment with both. There is reason to believe that writing with the hand builds the mind differently than typing. I talk more about ways you can develop your mind through handwriting in my coaching and will be revealing the concept in a future book, but for now, keep that in mind when creating your Memory Palace files:

1. (A)

2. (B)

3. (C)

4. (D)

5. (E)

6. (F)

7. (G)

8. (H)

9. (I)

10. (J)

If you can do all 26, then by all means, please continue.

11. (K)

12. (L)

13. (M)

14. (N)

15. (O)

16. (P)

17. (Q)

18. (R)

19. (S)

20. (T)

21. (U)

22. (V)

23. (W)

24. (X)

25. (Y)

26. (Z)

Whether you have identified only 10 or all 26 locations, start now by detailing one of those locations by figuring out 10 “stations” within that location. For example, in my Aberdeen Mall example, I would have:

Front entrance

Jewelry store

Book store

Escalator

Radio Shack

Food court entrance

Orange Julius

McDonald’s

Dairy Queen

Back exit

Notice here that I’ve constructed my path between all locations by obeying the following two principles:

I do not cross my own path

I do not trap myself along the way (and I have ensured that I can add ten more stations (I have the parking lot, the McDonald’s on the other side, the movie theatre, and then a number of stores I remember down the road leading to another shopping mall I can use later on if I choose). Always keep your options to extend each Memory Palace open. Now you try:

There are two very important principles when selecting your stations:

Never trap yourself

Never cross your own path

This means that when identifying your palaces, you should pick a starting location in a place that will allow you to move forward without running into barriers or dead-ends. For example, you would not want to start at the front entrance of your home and then end in the basement. This would prevent you from extending your Memory Palace.

However, if you start in the basement, you can then move outside your home and then add new stations for as long as you would like. In terms of not crossing your own path, we do this in order to avoid confusion. One of the main principles of this method is to avoid having to remember the order of your stations. If you cross and re-cross your own path, you can wind up having to spend too much time remembering which station comes next. Avoid this.

4.2 Here are some tips for creating and storing your Memory Palaces

Although the point is to eventually be able to do everything in your mind, it is useful when starting out to write everything down. Even advanced memorizers like to keep records for the purposes of testing, forgoing them only during competition. You can copy out the worksheets I’ve included at the end of this handout, or you can use an Excel file. I myself use Excel and create a separate file for each and every letter.

This lets me easily list the individual stations in a top-to-bottom manner. But I also like to write out my material by hand from time to time because it helps build the mind in a different way. I also use handwriting to test myself, i.e. I write out the words I’ve memorized and only then look at the Excel file. I do not close my eyes with the file open or give myself any opportunity to peak at the next word. It’s important to be disciplined and rigorous when testing.

Finally, if you find it useful, you can draw maps of the different locations. Some visual people benefit from doing taking this step. I myself have created drawings to help refresh my memory about how certain locations looked. You may also want to get in the habit of photographing places you’ve been in order to better build Memory Palaces if you are not a particularly visual person.

Blank A-Z Sheet

(A)

(B)

(C)

(D)

(E)

(F)

(G)

(H)

(I)

(J)

(K)

(L)

(M)

(N)

(O)

(P)

(Q)

(R)

(S)

(T)

(U)

(V)

(W)

(X)

(Y)

(Z)

Blank Station Sheets

Location for Letter A: ___________________

Location for Letter B: ___________________

Location for Letter C: ___________________

Location for Letter D: ___________________

Location for Letter E: ___________________

Location for Letter F: ___________________

Location for Letter G: ___________________

Location for Letter H: ___________________

Location for Letter I: ___________________

Location for Letter J: ___________________

Location for Letter K: ___________________

Location for Letter L: ___________________

Location for Letter M: ___________________

Location for Letter N: ___________________

Location for Letter O: ___________________

Location for Letter P: ___________________

Location for Letter Q: ___________________

Location for Letter R: ___________________

Location for Letter S: ___________________

Location for Letter T: ___________________

Location for Letter U: ___________________

Location for Letter V: ___________________

Location for Letter W: ___________________

Location for Letter X: ___________________

Location for Letter Y: ___________________

Location for Letter Z: ___________________

Bibliography

Books

A. R. Luria, The Mind of Mnemonist, Harvard University Press 1987.

Anthony Metivier, Memory Improvement Masterplan & Magnetic Memory Method Worksheets, Berlin, Germnay, 2014.

Bartok Mira, The memory palace – A memoir, Free Press, New York, 2011.

Cicero, M. T., May, J. M., & Wisse, J. Cicero on the ideal orator, New York: Oxford University Press, 2001.

Dominic O'Brian, How to develop a perfect memory, Headline Book, Pavilion Books Limited, 1993.

Donlyn Lyndon and Charles W. Moore Chambers for a Memory Palace, London, England, MIT Press, 1994.

Dudai, Y. Memory from A to Z: keywords, concepts, and beyond. Oxford, England – Oxford University Press, 2002.

Eric L.G. Legge, Christopher R. Madan, Enoch T. Ng, Acta Psychologica, University of Alberta, Department of Psychology, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, 2012.

Frances A Yates, The Art of Memory, University of Chicago, 1974.

Herrmann, D. J, Memory improvement: implications for memory theory – New York: Springer -Verlag, 1992.

John Kelly Memory Palaces, London, April, 2011.

Jonathan D. Spence, The Memory Palace of Matteo Ricci, New York, Viking Penguin, 1994.

Joshua Foer, MoonWalking with Einstein – The art of science of remembering everything, The penguin press, new york, 2011.

Merlin Donald, Memory Palaces – The Revolutionary Function of Libraries, Queen's Quarterly, Winter 2001.

Stuart Lloyd, The Lindenbaum Memory Palace, Gamebook, Windhammer Prize, 2013.

Electronic resources

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memory_palace

http://www.wikihow.com/Build-a-Memory-Palace

http://www.instructables.com/id/How-to-build-a-memory-palace-SuperStructInstruc/

http://www.remarkablemarbles.com/memory/triggers/method-of-loci

http://www.mundi.net/cartography/Palace/

http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/gcsebitesize/science/add_ocr_gateway/green_orld/photosynthesisrev2.shtml

http://www.bbc.co.uk/learningzone/clips/joseph-priestley-the-discovery-of gases/2078.html

http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/gcsebitesize/science/add_aqa_pre_2011/plants/plants1.shtml

http://www.sciencegeek.net/Chemistry/taters/EquationBalancing.htm

http://www.files.chem.vt.edu/RVGS/ACT/notes/scripts/bal_eq1.html

http://www.reading.ac.uk/virtualexperiments/ves/preloader-photosynthesis-full.html