The Secret Principles to Superior Memory

The secret principles to superior memory involve both the use of imagination and association.

Because many people have little understanding of how the mind works and how the mind uses imagination and mental association to retain and recall information many have been discouraged from using their imaginative abilities, and consequently learn very little about the nature of mental associating. The Greeks however emphasised these two foundation stones of mental functioning and opened the way for us to develop the techniques even further.

So if you want to significantly increase your memory you have to visualise as vividly as possible ideas or items that you wish to remember. Make these memories as real as possible adding color, movement and sound.

Secondly you associate (link) those ideas or items together with some known or fixed items or ideas calling upon your imagination throughout. This method of association helps the mind build upon previous recalled information and allows the mind to combine and sort the information in a manner that is natural and unique to every person.

The principles to superior memory

Without a scientific basis, the Greeks realized that in order to remember well, you have to use every aspect of your mind. In order to remember well, you have to use every aspect of your mind. These principles involve the following.

Synaesthesia (The use of your senses.)

Most of the great 'natural' memorizers and all the great mnemonists developed an increased sensitivity in each of their senses, and then blended these senses to produce enhanced recall. In developing the memory it was found to be essential to increase your sensitivity and train regularly your senses of:

a) Vision
b) Hearing
c) Taste
d) Smell
e) Touch
f) Kinaesthesia - your awareness of bodily position and movement in space

Association
Whatever you wish to memorise, make sure you associate or link it to something already existing in your mental environment. Associating or linking information helps the mind build upon previous recalled information and allows the mind to combine and sort the information in a manner that is natural and unique to every person.

Humour
The more funny, bizarre, silly and surreal you make your images, the more outstanding and vivid those memories will be. Have fun with your memory.

Imagination
This is the source of your memory. Einstein said, 'imagination is more important than knowledge. For knowledge is limited, whereas imagination embraces the entire world, stimulating progress, giving birth to evolution.' The more you apply your vivid imagination to memory, the better your memory will be.

Color
Whenever possible, use the full range of the rainbow both in your mind and on paper. Use plenty of colorful highlighters to make your ideas more 'colorful' and therefore more memorable.

Order and sequence
Having order and/or sequence when visualizing or writing down your ideas allows for much more immediate reference, and increases the brain's ability to link and arrange information in a memorable way. Examples are: alphabetical order, little to big, sorting by category and hierarchical order.

Exaggeration
In all of your images, exaggerate color, size, shape and sound and therefore memorability.

Positive images
In most instances positive and pleasant imaginary were found to be better for memory purposes, because they made the brain want to return to the images.