Forgetting things is part of being human, it happens to us all sometimes. If you are revising or doing a talk or presentation and need to remember some essential things, or even if you just want to improve your memory skills, here are some fool proof ways to create memory pegs that will make memorising easier...

Put it into a story

Our minds remember things more easily when there is meaning attached and it also helps the visual part of our brain to hook onto them. So putting a series of things you need to remember a story will help your mind to link them together, even (and especially) if the story is unrelated to the context. Take 5 random words (tree, money, cats, race, cloud) and make a story out of them. For example ‘We climbed the tree to get the money and the cats raced us to the clouds’. Wait 10 minutes then try and recall the 5 words.

Use a reminder that’s in a sense you don’t use very often

We all have a preference for using a particular sense to process. Some people are more visual, some more into sounds and words and some people touch and feelings. The one you use LEAST will stand out and therefore is a useful way to create reminders. For example, if you are very visual but not so attuned to music, creating a song to remind you works really well. If you are more attuned to sounds create a visual reminder or something that will jog your memory when you touch it (like a fluffy key ring).

Another strategy that helps with memory overall is to reduce stress, take deep a breath and slow life down a bit. When stress builds one of our first processes that gets shut down when our body feels under threat is our memory.

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Blog post photo by Soragrit Wongsa on Unsplash