3 Techniques to Increase Your Memory

Your memory gets better the more you challenge it. On the other hand, if you don't use it, you can lose it. This is why we clever humans have created different methods for improving memory. Here are three techniques that can help you record information in your brain to recall quickly and accurately.

The 1 2 3 7 Method

This long-term memory-boosting method is thought to be at least a hundred years old. It's really easy to put into practice.

Imagine that you learned something today. You want to remember it well into the future. You consider it important enough that you want to be able to recall it years from now. Today represents the 1 in the 1 2 3 7 method. Reread or remember in detail what you want to remember tomorrow (2). Do it the next day (3) and a week after you first experienced it (7 days).

If today is June 7, you will revisit the experience or information on June 8, June 9, and June 14. You'll be surprised that the energy required to remember the information will decrease while your clarity on the topic improves.

Put Mnemonics to Use

Mnemonics is a process that uses rhymes, alliteration, words, or some combination of those three elements to represent specific information. It is a simple but powerful way to help you remember information so it's easy to recall later. This also improves the clarity and accuracy of that memory. Here are a couple of examples.

• "30 days have September, April, June and November. All the rest have 31, except February, which has 28 until the leap year comes and gives it 29."
• "I before E except after C, or when sounding like A, as in neighbor and weigh."

That second verse is a mnemonic rhyme. Something about how our brains are hardwired makes short rhymes easy to remember. It's one of the reasons why your favorite songs are so memorable. They contain rhymes, and rhymes are appealing to your brain. You can use simple rhymes to remember important information.

Use Acronyms

An acronym is an abbreviation that's made up of the first letters of words. It makes remembering information easier because you only have to remember the acronym.

NAME is an acronym for Notice, Ask, Mention, and Envision. You can remember things better when you deliberately notice the situation as much as possible. Ask many questions that give you a greater knowledge of what's happening. Mention relevant words, names, or descriptions out loud. Then, envision any applicable visual characteristics.

ROYGBIV stands for Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Indigo and Violet. These are the colors associated with a rainbow. The correct order in which they occur from the outside to the inner arcs of a rainbow is easy to remember with this acronym.

Don't underestimate the power of these three well-known memory boosters. They can help you remember just about any information. Your ability to recall that information correctly and clearly also improves.