How to Trick Your Brain into Remembering Almost Anything | WIRED

1. Start With Strong Images Let’s begin with a relatively easy memorization task: the seven marvels of the world. To memorize these, Dellis recommends beginning by turning each one of those items into an easily-remembered image. Some will be more obvious. For the Great Wall of China, for example, you might just wish to picture a wall. For Petra, you might rather choose a picture of your own family pet.

“Using juicy mental images like these is extremely effective. What you wish to do is produce huge, multisensory memories,” describes Julia Shaw, a mental researcher at University College London and the author of The Memory Impression: Keeping In Mind, Forgetting, and the Science of False Memory. You want to go for mental images that you can practically feel, odor, and see, to make them as real as possible.There’s science

behind all of this.”Images that are strange, and perhaps gross or emotional are sticky,”states Shaw.”When taking a look at the brain, scientists found that the amygdala– a part of the brain that is essential for processing feeling– encourages other parts of the brain to store memories. “That’s why strong emotions make it more likely that memories will stick. 2. Put Those Images in a Place The next step is to locate those strong mental images in

a setting you’re really acquainted with. In Dellis’example, he places each one of the 7 marvels on a path through his house, beginning with a wall in his entryway, then Christ– representing Christ the Redeemer– lazing on his sofa.”The weirder the better,”Dellis says. In the kitchen, you might think of a llama cooking up a meal.This strategy of connecting images with places is called the memory palace, and it’s especially helpful for keeping in mind the order of particular aspects, says Shaw.” A memory palace profits from your existing memory of a genuine location. It is a place that you understand– normally your home or another place that you understand really well.” If it’s a list with simply 7 products, that space can be reasonably small. However when it concerned remembering 10,000 digits of pi, Dellis

had to broaden out his memory palace to the totality of his hometown, Miami. He divided the 10,000 digits into 2,000 portions of five digits each, and placed them all throughout 10 various communities. “Neuroimaging research has actually shown that individuals show increased activity in the [occipito-parietal location] of the brain when finding out memories using a memory palace, “states Shaw.”This suggests that the technique assists to bring in more parts of the brain that are typically dedicated to other senses– the parietal lobe is accountable for navigation, and the occipital lobe is associated with seeing images.” 3. Take note Remembering seven weird images for the wonders of the world shouldn’t be too hard, however when you’re remembering 10,000 digits of pi, you might need a little more inspiration.”I would tell myself this mantra:’