Photographic memory - How to have a super memory, remember anything and get better grades

This is something that probably affects almost everyone - a poor memory. We meet people and it's like we forget their names almost instantaneously. If someone sends us to the store and gives us a list of 10 things we end up only remembering 5 to 7 of them unless they're written down for us. How many times have you forgotten where you put your keys or something important but your cell phone? It happens to everyone of us. Forgetfulness does not mean we have a poor memory and it is not something we should just give in to and learn to deal with. Just like with multiples our brain and its memory powers can be developed to levels that would simply amaze and astonish others.

There are numerous techniques and tricks that have been used some of them are more recent and some are centuries old. When we were younger in elementary school and middle school teachers didn't spend a lot of time teaching us techniques to improve our memories instead they use repeat memorization. Albeit this technique is better than nothing it leaves a large area for improvement as just repeating and memorizing terms, foreign language words, etc. is not a good use of one's time and it really doesn't impress a lasting image on our mind and in our memories. Besides it does more to frustrate than anything else.

So what does work? As I said earlier there a lot of techniques that work for improving one's memory but there are two that stand out from all others. They are easy to learn and are very powerful techniques for improving your memory and improving your ability to recall just about anything. These two techniques are association and linking. And they both work interchangeably. Let's start with association and let's take the German word for Battlefield which is schlachtfeld. Schlachtfeld doesn't look like the easiest word to remember, but with association it won't be hard at all. With association we do is we take the difficult looking word and split apart into smaller parts. Then we find something similar to them in spelling and sounding and we link them together if it's a bigger word.

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So, with schlachtfeld we split into schlacht and feld. Now, schlacht is similar to shellac which is a varnish or finish used on various wooden and similar services. And feld is easy as it is very similar to field which is part of the original word Battlefield. Now all you have to do is take these two parts and link them together in a way that you can memorize them and remember that they mean battlefield in German. And remember the key here is to make it as obnoxious or outlandish as possible because this will impress it more deeply in your memory and make easier to recall it and make it last almost forever.

So, we could easily start with a just taking a field and cover it with shellac, but that's not really the best way to memorize it and impress it in our minds. So let's make it a little bit more outlandish - instead listen vision a battle field made entirely of wood and all covered very thickly with very black or dark shellac. Everything is covered with shellac, the tanks, the infantry, etc... Make this image is vivid as possible and just think about it for a second or two. Now when you see the word schlachtfeld you will easily see the battle field that is smothered in shellac which will remind you of exactly what it means. Now, you could also have used slickfield wherein the battlefield is covered in oil and is so slick or slippery that tanks and infantry and everything else are just slipping and sliding everywhere.

There is no limit to what you can use in association memorization and the fact that you have to actually think and develop or create these associations guaranteed that you are basically imprinting or burning these images into your mind which is a longer lasting and more active version of memorization than just repeat memorization. The difference is repeat memorization does not last for long at all association memorization depending on how vivid and creative your images are can last forever. If you get really good at association memorization this is what is commonly referred to as having a photographic memory with total recall.



Here's another example – hipoteca is the spanish word for mortgage. To easily remember this word is divided up into its parts agai. Hipo is obviously hippo (as in the animal), and teca could be techno (modern form or style of music popular with the younger generation). You could also use tech as in technology. Any of these would work fine – its the visual association that you make and how vivid you make it that is most important in later recalling and memorizing it. Now let's take those two parts and relate them so they remind us of mortgage. You see a hippopotamus (hippo) dancing to techno music and the dance floor is a large mortgage contract or deed. You can also see a hippo dancing to techno and hippo is made up of entirely mortgage papers. These would all work and help you to instantly memorize hipoteca as the Spanish word for mortgage.

Let's try one more association. The Spanish word for thunderstorm is tormenta. Now this is not a long or extremely difficult word to memorize, but the principle for association memorization is still the same. Split into more, easily memorable parts. Split into tor and menta. Tor sounds like tour and menta is similar to mental or Mentos. So just envision a mental tour was just consists of huge brain shaped vehicles and somehow it's causing such a ruckus that is causing lightning and thunderstorms everywhere goes. For more incredulous and ridiculous you make these associations are more powerful they will be in the longer they will last. So even though some associations I just did above might sound ridiculous like tour of brain shaped vehicles or whatever, it's the vivid image that we are creating that causes the memorization in association. And remember the most important thing here is make the image as ridiculous and vivid as possible so it becomes permanently stored in your memory and you will be able to remember it for many years to come.



Now the other method is just as handy is linking. Linking is where you can take a list of items that could be 10 items or it could be 50 items and you learn to memorize them in such a way that you can repeat them forward and backwards and not miss a single one of them. You couldn't hope to do that with repeat memorization. You guaranteed end up messing up several of them and would quickly forget them. With linking just remembering the first one will remind you the second one which will remind you the third one which will remind you forth one so on and so forth.

So what you do here is you take a list of let's say six things - ball, newspaper, president, milk, coffee and textbook and link them together. So let's start with ball and newspaper. Envision that you see a huge 9 foot tall ball and is made entirely of newspaper wrapped together (kind of like the famous wall of yarn that is in Ripley's believe it or not and the Guinness Book of World Records except that it's made of newspaper). And then you see that huge ball of newspaper's coming out of President Obama's ears or mouth. Then you see a enormous gallon jug of milk and is full of Obama's face like little gobstoppers or other similar candies. And then you take this and heated up real high it melts and turns into coffee or Juan Valdes if that reminds you of coffee. Then you take the coffee and related textbook by having a textbook is made entirely of coffee grounds and it smells really heavy of coffee.

Now once you do that and take the time to envision the list above in this new way it may seem like a lot of work, but it really isn't because now once you've seen in envision that in your mind you won't forget it. And not only that but you'll also know it backwards as well as textbook will remind you of coffee which will remind you of milk which will remind you of president which will remind you of newspaper which remind you of ball. You can do this for lists as short as six words as we have done here, or for as many as 20 to 50 words or more. You can even do this for foreign languages or what ever.

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Now you will never forget your shopping list and you won't need to write it down and bring a list with you. You also remember any word you want regardless of the language and your member first long as you want. Everyone around you will start to think you're super brain or genius. The best part is that it wasn't really all that hard and it just takes a little practice and effort on your part. I've personally used these two techniques to ace everything from college-level business course like accounting and economics to calculus, biology, physics, statistics and chemistry classes like organic chemistry and biochemistry.

These two techniques are easy to learn and will carry you so far in life and make things so much easier for you in the long run. And with time you'll only get better and faster at it. Do not pass these two techniques of word association and linking off as childish or benign – they definitely work. With just these two techniques alone one can definitely go from a poor memory to total recall and have what many people would consider a photographic memory. Lee Iacocca practiced these techniques every morning to memorize his to do list and goals for each day and he attained greatness as one of the greatest CEOs in history. Give it a try – it costs you nothing but a few minutes of your time and you have nothing to lose and everything to gain. I believe in the pay it forward system so I've helped you so please if you feel this has helped you go out and help someone else in some way. If enough people did this we could change the world and make it a better place for everyone. Good luck and have fun with your new found super memory.


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  • 5/25/2009 6:40 PM Bob White wrote:
    Just another great article. I really appreciate the articles you have here on Bestbraindrain. There is a lot of great information on here and just like this article on how to better remember stuff it is a tremendous free resource. I just wanted to say thanks.
    Reply to this

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