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Remembrance Systems - mnemonics
What do you remember better?

There are certain things you remember better than others. Think - what do you remember well?

You will tend to remember episodes associated with strong emotions. For example, your first kiss, when you took a big exam and managed it, the occasion when you were bitten by a viper, etc. Emotions can thus be smart to associate with something you are supposed to remember.

One thing is to store something in your memory; a very different question is to retrieve it. To make the retrieving process easier, it might be an idea to try to structure memory in 'mental folders'. This can be achieved by linking 'mental folders' or anything you want to remember to 'memory pegs'. To achieve this, you must train yourself in creating mental images. To remember mental images you can use some tricks.

  1. Associate
    Connect or associate what you want to remember with something else.
    If you want to remember where you put your car keys, associate your keys with coffee if you put them on the coffee table.

  1. Acronyms
    You may also associate using acronyms. Maybe you still remember the old memory trick from your childhood's physics class: learn the colours in right sequence? ROY G. BIV : Red - Orange - Yelllow - Green - Blue - Indigo - Violet.
    Make funny acronyms that can help you remember long sequences of words. Try to add colour and shape to your acronym to visualise better
  1. Acrostics
    You may also associate by using invented sentences. Here is a good, old one: My Very Eager Mother Just Sent Us Nine Peaches, an acrostic for our solar system: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptun, Pluto.
    See a mental picture of your eager mother with the peaches.

  1. Exaggerate
    You need to exaggerate - wildly.
    It is easier to remember exaggerations.
    Make a mental picture of something that usually is small into something comically huge, or vice versa.


  1. Motion
    Add motion or movements to your mental pictures.
    If you want to remember 'swan' you must make up a mental picture of it.
    Make it excessively large.
    Add colours, like a bright yellow beak and turquoise blue water.
    Make the swan swim and preferably make sounds
  1. Unusual combinations
    You may enhance your mental image by creating an unusual combination.
    If the swan you see in your mental image symbolizes one of your memory pegs, you may associate the word you should remember with the swan.
    A swan can act as a symbol for the number 2, or memory peg #2.

    If the second thing in a long line of things to remember is 'Santa Claus', you can try to make the mental picture of a joyous Santa dancing on the back of a huge swimming swan.
    You have now placed Santa Claus in the 'Swan folder' in your memory, and may bring your memory up by associating: think of your swan and try to remember what you associate with it.

    Your challenge right now is to create at least ten such mental memory pegs.
    These memory pegs must be good.
    Make the mental images with colour, motion, exaggerations and unusual combinations.

    When you create such mental memory pegs you can use the 'number-rhyme' system: 2 - shoe, 3 - knee, 4-door, 5 - hive etc. Or you may use a number - image system.
    1 can be a burning candle, or a magic wand. 2 a swan, 3 a red, beating heart or a three-dented fork, 4 a lightning tearing the sky and looking like a stylized four, 5 could be a hand or a seahorse, 6 could be the waiving tail of a pig or dog or even an elephant trunk as long as it resembles a stylized figure 6.
    7 may be a flag fluttering in the wind, 8 could be a snowman waddling around in a snow storm, or an hourglass, 9 could be a flower or a balloon, 10 could be a knife and a plate. You associate 10 by 'seeing' what is on your plate.

    Which system you choose is of less importance.
    The essential is that you manage to create mental memory-pegs with images that suit you.

    Numbers you may usually remember better if you read them out. E.g. 2984 is easier to remember if you say two thousand nine hundred and eighty four. You can also use the number - image system: See a big swan swimming with a string tied to a big balloon in its beak. On the balloon sits a snowman, holding his hat because he is afraid of the lightning


  1. Emotions
    Perhaps the swan is afraid of something lurking in the water beneath it.
    - The swan swims faster.

    Exaggerations, movements, sounds, colours and emotions may belong in your mental images, because then you use multiple fields in your brain.
  1. Clustering or grouping
    Make clusters or groups of numbers or words. E.g. three and three phone numbers in each cluster. Try to organise items in groups of colour or various symbols.

    You may group words and concepts by their opposing meanings or through antonyms. Examples: bitter - sweet, peace -war.

    Group words into pictures or rooms. E.g. picture your own house. You put certain items in the mental kitchen, the living room, the bedroom, the cellar etc. When you want to retrieve something, you walk through your house and see the mental images of what you have placed in each room.
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