Tricks To Make It Stick

It’s late at night.  You’re in bed.  Then it hits you – “Dang!  I forgot to put the trash can out for morning pick up!”  

You could do it in the morning before work, but you’re worried you will forget.  So how do you make sure to remember?

UNUSUAL PLACE

The answer… move your keys (or anything) to an unusual place. In the morning when you wake up and see something out of place it will trigger you to remember the trash. 

THE MEMORY GUY

This week I had the pleasure to have national memory expert, Scott Bornstein, as a guest on my weekly national real estate training webinar.  He is the CEO of Memory Power Training.

Scott shared some helpful tips on improving your memory.  He also gave us some fun “brain hacks,” like putting your keys (or anything) in an unusual spot (on the toaster for instance) to trigger your memory. 

WHAT IS MEMORY? 

Do you know what memory is? 

In essence, memory is how the brain encodes information. This enables us to store and retrieve information when needed. Information retained over time influences our current and future actions.  

If we couldn’t remember anything, it would be impossible for things like language, relationships, and personal identity to develop.  

In fact, the world evolves based on the collective memories of the people who inhabit it (currently about 7.8 billion).

NAME GAME

Scott reminded me of the golden rule for remembering names – Forgetting a name once is excusable. Forgetting a name twice is irritating. Forgetting a name three times is personal.  

Remember the MMFI rule?  Everyone wears an imaginary sign around their neck with the acronym MMFI (Make Me Feel Important). Few things make others feel less important than failing to remember their name for the second and third time.  

So what’s a brain hack to remember a name? 

First, recognize the importance.

Imagine somebody offers you a million dollars to remember the name of the next person you meet. Would you? Of course.  According to memory experts, “reasons reap results in remembering names.”

Next, focus!  

Memory experts say forgetting names happens when you lack immediate focus. So when you meet someone new, say their name to yourself (in your head) three times in a row. Do it slowly and deliberately. 

Finally, make an association. 

Associate the person’s name with a color, a thing, or somebody you know as a mental trigger (like keys out of place) so you think of that and remember their name the next time you see them.  

Some other great memory tricks:

RHYME TIME

In what year did Christopher Columbus sail to America?

Have you ever heard the phrase “In 1492 Columbus sailed the ocean blue?”

Of course you have. It’s a grade school example of using a rhyme to remember.

USING MNEMONICS

Or what about the phrase “Spring forward. Fall back?”  

Even though Arizonans proudly ignore Daylight Savings Time, if you lived in another state (except for Hawaii, which also ignores DST) you would probably use this Mnemonic to remember which way to move your clock in the spring and fall.  

Side note… the word mnemonic derives from Ancient Greek meaning “of or relating to memory,” and is named after Mnemosyne, the goddess of memory in Greek mythology.

HOW POETIC

Answer quickly – how many days are in November?

Did your mind automatically recite this poem…

Thirty days hath September

April, June, and November

All the rest have thirty-one

But February has only twenty-eight

The leap year comes once in four

Giving February one day more

No matter how hard we try, we’re still going to forget things. When it happens to you, remember this anonymous quote:

“We all have a photographic memory. Sometimes we forget the film.” 

Or this quote by Norman Wisdom: 

“As you get older three things happen. The first is your memory goes, and I can’t remember the other two.”