Memory tools help you learn and
store information for recall. There is nothing complicated or demanding
about these tools; they are simply the natural abilities involved when you
collect memory traces.
The next phase of your memory project is to become conscious of your own
memory tools in action, to hone them a bit, and to decide to use them more
often. Making this process an ongoing habit will improve your memory and
enrich the quality of your everyday life.
Valuable memory tools are: sensory awareness mental images words and messages making associations and connections grouping repetition rehearsal and review spacing using memory aids as reminders.
Your basic five senses of sight, hearing, touch, taste, and smell, along
with a kinesthetic sense from your body movement and an intuitive sense
resulting from an inner perception of knowing, can supply a great deal of
information in a short time.
The more you are conscious of what your senses are detecting, the more
memory traces you collect, and the easier the experience will be to recall.
For instance, when introduced to a stranger:
Your eyes can observe the shade, style, and texture of hair; the
color, shape, and expressions of eyes; unusual facial features; body
size, shape, carriage and gestures, and style of clothing.
Your ears can note the name and the qualities of the persons
voice.
Your nose can smell perfume, soap, shaving lotion, or other odors.
Your touch and kinesthetic senses can feel the handshake. Is it
tense or relaxed, cool or warm, firm or soft?
Your intuition may tell you that the person is outgoing or
reserved, energized or passive, enthusiastic or bored.
Sensory awareness of any moment is often the critical tool for recalling
that moment.
Seeing a fine color photograph of Lake Tahoe may bring back your
first sight of the intense blue of the lake from Echo Summit and the awe
you felt at that moment.
A song at a concert may bring tears to your eyes as you recognize
it as the same one your mother sang to you when you were a child. You
feel again a little of the warmth of her tender care.
The smell of an ocean breeze may cause you to recall the surge of
excitement evoked by the first whiff of salt air when you were a
youngster going to the beach.
A tiny baby grasping your finger may remind you of another child
reaching out to you.
The spicy crunch of a bread and butter pickle may
remind you of grandma in her white, bibbed apron canning pickles on the
old wood stove at the farm, even though this occurred forty years ago
and three thousand miles away.
People tend to vary in their reactions to sensory
information. Some tend to notice visual sensations. Others respond more to
the auditory aspects of an experience. For many people, the sense of smell
is an unusually powerful reminder, and they can recognize individual people
and places by their own unique odors. Ask yourself what types of sensory
stimulation you respond to most readily.
A mental image forms in your minds eye when you recall a
person, place, or thing which you have either actually seen or imagined.
Such a mental picture is a useful memory tool because it is explicit, like a
persons face, rather than abstract, like his name.
Mental images are personal and individual. If someone speaks
of Katherine Hepburn, everyone present may remember her differently, perhaps
as a young actress, a mature film star, or during her retirement years as
she appeared in occasional interviews.
Forming a mental picture of a stranger as you are
introduced, and recalling this image from time to time will help you
recognize him in the future. This image also should include the context in
which you met. In recalling a man you met in a clubhouse setting, you might
think: I can see us standing in front of the fireplace and wondering where
the manager got such fine big logs. Now what was his name? Oh, yes,
it was Dave Perez. Imagining a name tag on his lapel with "Dave Perez" written
on it will create another memory trace to support the visual, auditory, and
kinesthetic traces you collected during your conversation with him.
