Developing a Razor Sharp Memory Part 1

DEVELOPING A RAZOR SHARP MEMORY 

By Daniel Theyagu 

 

You’ve so often heard it!

 “I’ve got a bad memory!”

“I’m not good at remembering names!”

“I always forget what I want to do!”

“My memory is failing!”

 

These are all just superb excuses to the one undeniable fact that we all have an excellent memory.  The trouble is that we are not using it well enough.  As such our memory begins to atrophy with time.  Your memory works like a muscle.  When you work on your muscle you get fitter and well toned.  Likewise when you work on your memory you will get your memory to work effectively for you.

 

You can develop a razor sharp memory at any moment in your life as long as you are a normal human being.  However, it’s not going to happen overnight nor is it going to be a simple process.  You need commitment and constant practice to keep your memory intact.  Many of us spend lots of time trying to keep our body healthy and fit.  I think that some of that time should also be spend on keeping your brain in good working order.  The best way to do this is to work out your brain’s wonderful ability to remember and recall information. 

 

There are several ways in which you can develop a razor sharp memory.  For a start you need to understand how your brain works.  Putting it simply, our brain consists of three types of memory – Sensory memory, short term memory and long term memory.

 

 

Sensory Memory

This memory helps us remember things that we need to survive. Like feeling hungry or feeling cold or warm.  The body will respond to these stimuli appropriately.  Like if you are feeling too warm, you will start to perspire.

 

Short Term Memory

Short Term Memory or STM is like the RAM (Random Access Memory) of your computer.  If you have a small RAM in your computer and run many programs your computer system crashes or ‘hangs’.  Likewise, when we try to store too many information in the STM, we start to ‘forget’ these information as the storage capacity of the STM is limited.  Our STM can remember information for a period of seven seconds to a maximum of 48 hours.  In fact within the first 24 hours we forget up to 80% of the information we are trying to remember unless this is transferred to the long term memory (LTM)

 

Long Term Memory

The transfer of information from STM to LTM requires you to re-configure the information in a manner that allows the LTM to remember.  The LTM is situated more to the right part of the brain and thus it remembers information in a unique manner very unlike the STM which is situated more to the left hemisphere of the brain. 

 

Put simply your LTM only remembers three kinds of things.  If you want to develop a razor sharp memory, you need to change whatever information that you want to remember long term into any of these three modes. 

The first of the three kinds of things are survival skills like eating, walking or swimming.  Silly as it may sound, can you ever ‘forget’ how to walk or swim?  The second is events that remind us of something sad that had happened in our lives like a bad experience or an accident that we had.  Such information automatically gets stored in the LTM and often we are triggered into remembering it. 

 

The third kind is those things that are funny, silly or stupid.  Just to prove this point, see whether you can answer the following questions:

i.                 What was the fruit that Snowhite ate?

ii.               At 12 midnight what did Cinderella leave behind?

iii.             What is Popeye’s favourite food?

iv.             Who was Little Red Riding Hood visiting?

 

If you can answer all these questions it just goes to show how much you’ve retained such information from your childhood days.  And why so is because these stories are funny and sometimes ludicrous such that your brain seems to enjoy it. 

 

Now think for a moment what you were doing this time last week!  Unless you’ve been doing something very interesting, chances are you need to refer to your diary or crack your head a little to try to figure out what you were doing.  Mundane activities are processed in the STM and soon forgotten. 

 

The key to having a razor sharp memory is to engage more of the right brain and make information creative and exaggerated such that the right brain will want to remember it.   This may sound difficult however you will notice that with practice it is easier than you think.  

 

Tomorrow I will share with you some techniques that you can use to help you develop a razor sharp memory.

 

 

Article contributed by:Daniel Theyagu is a keynote speaker and seminar leader for many conferences and training program.  He runs Lateral Solutions Consultancy which designs and conduct competency based training for organizations.   To engage his services please contact:dtheyagu@singnet.com.sg; www.lateralsolutionsconsult.com; Fax: 67522160