# How to improve memory

In many ways, a good memory is the foundation for all wellness:

- Good memories allows us to fully absorb and understand ideas, which is critical for us to [connect concepts](mind-creativity.md).
- A reliable memory is not only necessary for [success](success-1_why.md), it also makes us [happier](mind-feelings-happiness.md).
- Like [weight management](body-1_why.md), memory can be trained, and high-powered memory competitions (e.g., trivia, quizzes) are people with normal brains who worked hard to build mnemonics.
- All aspects of [understanding and learning](understanding.md) are connected with a good memory.

## How memory works

The thing we call "memory" is actually 4 distinct steps.

A. Encoding:

1. Take every piece of sensory data:
   - General body and skeleton:
     - Inner ear and skeletal sensors detect acceleration, direction, gravity, and changes in body movement.
     - Skeletal sensors detect the body's orientation related to other body parts.
     - Skeletal sensors also detect bone and joint pain.
     - Water sensors detect thirst.
   - Specific organs:
     - Each body organ has sensors that detect pain in it.
     - Stomach sensors detect hunger.
     - Muscles have sensors that detect muscle tension.
     - The digestive and respiratory systems have sensors that detect blood vessel dilation.
     - The skin has many sensors that detect itchiness, pain, pressure, temperature, touch.
   - The brain has many varieties of sensors:
     - Chemoreceptors that detect drugs and hormones, as well as vomiting.
     - Various sensors detect magnetic fields and sense of direction.
     - While it's debatable how time works, we're amazingly accurate at observing it.
   - The face picks up many senses as well:
     - Rods in the eyes detect brightness.
     - Cones in the eyes detect color.
     - The nose has chemical receptors to detect smell.
     - The eardrums detect vibration that we call sound.
     - Taste buds in the mouth detect bitterness, saltiness, sourness, sweetness, and umami (savory/fatty).
2. From all this information, subtract everything unimportant.
   - People tend to remember smell in particular far more than any other sense, generally followed by sight and sound.

B. Storage:

1. Hold the information in short-term memory for 15--30 seconds.
2. Move everything that's deemed essential in some way for the future to long-term memory.
3. The memory is associated and linked with other experiences and memories.

C. Retrieval/Recall:

- Recall is a typically unconscious association to something else, and is part of the mechanism of [habit triggers](habits.md).
- Often, recalling can trigger more recall, which is how a small experience (e.g., a scrap of paper) can bring back a flood of memories.
- Every time we retrieve that information, the connections through that path of information is strengthened and easier to recall.
  - We most easily recall information from the parts of the brain that navigate space and visually comprehend things.

D. Retention/Fading:

- While memories themselves never "fade", their connections with other associated habits fray when they're not used.
  - If we keep using something regularly, it becomes a "core" memory and will take a much longer time to fade.
- Over time, a memory is officially "lost" if there are no more connections to that set of neurons.

Memory also has various forms:

- Procedural memory, or motor memory, is how we work through body movements and build muscle [habits](habits.md).
- Working memory is "short-term memory".
- Episodic memory is a snapshot of each particular experience we've had.
- Autobiographical memory combines episodic memory to create a [story](stories.md) about ourselves and the world around us.
- Semantic memory is long-term storage of simple information.
- Prospective memory is how we store information we [imagine](imagination.md).

## Our memory system is prone to errors

The most common memory failure is not reliably recording the information:

1. Not gathering information in the first place by not perceiving.
2. Distractions during encoding that override short-term memory.
3. Information being considered unimportant, which means not converting from short-term to long-term memory.

We also have trouble recalling the information on command when we don't reinforce long-term memory:

- The information must have some future use, or we'll slowly forget it.

Over time, the brain condenses our specific and detailed information into vague "summaries":

- The information we encode is to give us general wisdom on what to do in the future, *not* to accurately hold everything as an archive.

Our brains can sometimes get stuck repeating specific bits of information:

- When we have [post-traumatic stress](hardship-ptsd.md), we replay the experience incessantly until we come to closure with it or the memories fade from *other* experiences.
- If you have a song stuck in your head, distract yourself with something brain-intensive like a puzzle.
- When a memory keeps persisting against your preference, [find creative ways to rearrange and remix the perspective](mind-creativity.md) to get to whatever answers you subconsciously haven't discovered.

## Lifestyle decisions can improve memory

Our brains tend to stay quick and alert until around age 60.

In general, we can fight the decay of our memories by learning [self-awareness](awareness.md) and making sense of our thoughts:

- [Organizing our environment](organization.md) helps us recall and decreases our chances for Alzheimer's Disease.

Make new hobbies and [create](mind-creativity.md) frequently.

Enjoy and create music frequently:

- It increases [general focus](success-4_routine.md) and decreases the risk of a brain tumor.
- Playing musical instruments builds neural connections that span across many domains of the brain.

Exercise regularly:

- Exercise has been scientifically proven to dramatically improve memory.
- Physical activity helps us discriminate between familiar objects.
- Exercise helps us retain long-term memory.

Play a musical instrument:

- Musical skills improve executive functions.
- Playing music increases verbal fluency, makes thinking faster, and slows brain decay.

Play games:

- Depending on the game, most games teach our brains motor skills, how to organize information, navigate in space, and plan.
- Improving hand-eye coordination helps our spatial recognition and concept of time.
- While many "brain training" games directly help, *most* games that require direct engagement will improve our brain power in some way.
- 30 minutes a day is enough to see a change in gray matter.

Learn a new language:

- Learning words improves executive function.
- Bilingual people are better at solving puzzles, planning, and [managing tasks](success-4_routine.md).

Read more:

- Reading increases the ability to think of words, as well as our vocabulary.
- Readers experience mental connections that mimic physical activities.
- Try [writing](language-writing.md) about what you read to get even more involved in the brain's language management.

## Encoding better

Focus heavily on the present moment:

- [Stay aware of the world around you](awareness.md), and avoid thinking about anything else when you should be paying attention.
- To more easily remember what you read, speak it out loud.
- To remember someone else's name, say it out loud verbally several times when you first hear it.
- Avoid listening to videos/podcasts at 1.5x or 2x speed unless you're simply reviewing information you already know.

Build reinforced patterns in the brain by reviewing and re-reviewing important information.

Focus on smaller chunks of information as you observe:

- Replace smaller words for bigger words as you listen:
  - "Inundation" becomes "flood", "exacerbate" becomes "annoy", "profundity" becomes "deep".
  - Try to swap out trade jargon for commonplace words.
  - This has a two-way effect as well, since it makes it easier to use *big* words as well.
- You can remember 346842052731 more easily by splitting it out:
  - 346
  - 842
  - 052
  - 731

Incorporate as many senses into the experience as possible:

- Physically act out with your body as you listen or see things you want to remember.
- If you can use expressive body language (which may look like interpretive dance) you can create a strong connection to the words.
- Try to associate the experience to as many other experiences you've had in your past, and focus on things that tie to your [feelings](mind-feelings.md).
- Some of the most memorable experiences are tied to [jokes](humor.md).
- If you *must* remember specific information, write it down by hand instead of typing it.
- Beyond knowing *what* you're consuming, understand how it works and why it matters.

Create associations between abstract and concrete experiences:

- Associate numbers to letters or the sounds of letters:
  1. 4 can represent the "j" sound while 3 can represent the "r" sound.
  2. 43, therefore, sounds like "jar".
  3. Further, you can remember 43 as a "jar" you had a hard time opening and had to smash to get the contents inside.
- Associate numbers with nouns:
  - One Run
  - Two Doo
  - Three Sea
  - Four Drawer
  - Five Hive
  - Six Wicks
  - Seven Drive-in
  - Eight Date
  - Nine Wine
- Use an existing association system for numbers:
  - [Mnemonic major system](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mnemonic_major_system) links numbers to sounds.
  - Person, Action, Object (PAO) links images of people, actions, *and* objects for all numbers 0-99.
    - Then, all numbers 0-999,999 can be tracked with (person)-(action)-(object)
    - e.g., 514398 is 51-43-98, or "Brad Pitt throwing an orange".
    - This is *very* useful to memorize decks of cards as well.
  - Whatever your system, it *must* appeal to your personal emotional connections.

## Recalling better

Make new connections by rearranging the order of events or sequence of ideas to shift perspective.

If you can't remember a word, clench your fist.

To remember where you left something in the room, scan in the opposite direction from how you typically scan (left to right or right to left).

Try to gain personal experience about whatever you're trying to memorize:

- Most of our experience gives us the means to quickly make sense of what we're observing.
- Even a few days interning at a job or watching a documentary on the subject is enough to give us context.

Further, there are many tricks to [improve your studying](mind-memory-study.md) and [score better on tests](mind-memory-tests.md).

## Make mnemonics

Create associations across words and ideas:

- We must attribute [meaning](meaning.md) to make ideas stick in our minds.
  - Connect the ideas to tangible, emotionally relevant experiences instead of simply trying to memorize them.
- Whenever possible, link ideas together like a "chain".
  - Start with broad ideas, then work your way down to smaller ones.
- To improve your [creativity](mind-creativity.md) and memory, make connections across diverse and unrelated things you're intimately familiar with.
  - Use your body parts to remember numbers.
  - Link colors to letters.
  - Associate colors with smells.

Group things into categories:

- Take an unrelated list and [reorganize](organization.md) the items into categories.
- e.g., cookies, grapes, cheese, can opener, chicken, pie, butter, bananas, bread, pork, gum:
  - dairy: butter, cheese
  - bakery goods: cookies, pie, bread
  - meat: chicken, pork
  - fruit: grapes, bananas
  - other: can opener, gum
- The specific list order is important for recall:
  - The middle of the list is generally harder to memorize than the first or last.
  - If you can, try to place the most meaningful items in the middle of the list.

Compress ideas with acronyms, rhymes and mental diagrams:

- Remember π (3.1415926) by counting the letters in the sentence: "May I have a large container of coffee?"
- Remember the general arithmetic order of operations (Parenthesis/Exponents/Multiplication/Division/Addition/Subtraction, or PEMDAS) with "Please Excuse My Dear Aunt Sally".
- When you can make a jingle or poem from the concept, remembering becomes effortless.

Rebuild each connection into an image:

- Draw pictures or doodles.
- Make lists as sequences of pictures.
- Create a "dictionary" of visual associations for words:
  - "And" as a circle ("and" rhymes with "rund", a German word for "round").
  - "The" is a right-facing arrow ("the" rhymes with "duh", meaning it points to something obvious).
  - A period is a hammered nail because it holds the sentence together.
  - Use rhyming words for abstract concepts (e.g., "ephemeral" becomes someone named "Emeril").
- Focus on the image more than the associated meanings.
- This can even work well for [speeches](language-speaking.md).

Our minds use [stories](stories.md) to understand the world, so make everything into silly, elaborate stories:

- To remember lists of things, convert it into a silly story.
- We remember the story to the degree we [feel](mind-feelings.md) it.
- Use as much variety in your story as possible to spread the experience across many sensory perceptions:
  - Bizarreness
  - Personal connection to events in the story
  - Large numbers that can be daunting
  - Senses and sensory perceptions
  - Unique characteristics of objects
  - Disgusting or revolting parts of the story
  - [Humor](humor.md)
- For memorizing car, hair, sweetener, milk, Yale University, and dinosaur:
  - I was driving in my car, but then my hair set on fire. I pulled to the side of the road but ran over a small packet of sweetener right before I crashed into a gigantic truck of milk right outside Yale University. The driver was a dinosaur who drank the milk as he screamed at me.
- This method seems ridiculous, but has been scientifically proven as the easiest way to remember random facts.