The Memory Palace is one of the most powerful memory techniques I know. It’s not only effective, but also fun to use — and not hard to learn at all.
The Memory Palace has been used since ancient Rome, and is responsible for some quite incredible memory feats. Eight-time world memory champion Dominic O’Brien, for instance, was able to memorize 54 decks of cards in sequence (that’s 2808 cards), viewing each card only once. And there are countless other similar achievements attributed to people using the Memory Palace technique or variations of it. Even in fiction, there are several references to the technique. In Thomas Harris’ novel Hannibal, for example, serial killer Hannibal Lecter uses Memory Palaces to store amazingly vivid memories of years of intricate patient records (sadly, it was left off the movie).
Of course, most of us are not in Dominic’s memory championship line of business (or in Hannibal’s line of business for that matter). But still, the Memory Palace technique is amazingly effective in all kinds of endeavors, such as learning a foreign language, memorizing a presentation you’re about to deliver, preparing for exams and many others — even if all you want is to jog your memory.
The Memory Palace
The Memory Palace technique is based on the fact that we’re extremely good at remembering places we know. A ‘Memory Palace’ is a metaphor for any well-known place that you’re able to easily visualize. It can be the inside of your home, or maybe the route you take every day to work. That familiar place will be your guide to store and recall any kind of information. Let’s see how it works.
5 Steps to Use the Memory Palace Technique
1. Choose Your Palace
First and foremost, you’ll need to pick a place that you’re very familiar with. The effectiveness of the technique relies on your ability to mentally see and walk around in that place with ease. You should be able to ‘be there’ at will using your mind’s eye only.
A good first choice could be your own home, for example. Remember that the more vividly you can visualize that place’s details, the more effective your memorization will be.
Also, try to define a specific route in your palace instead of just visualize a static scene. So, instead of simply picturing your home, imagine a specific walkthrough in your home. This makes the technique much more powerful, as you’ll be able to recall items in a specific order, as we’ll see in the next step.
Here are some additional suggestions that work well as Memory Palaces, along with possible routes:
- Familiar streets in your city. Possible routes could be your drive to work, or any other sequence of streets you’re familiar with.
- A current or former school. You can imagine the pathway from the classroom to the library (or to the bar on the other side of the street, if that’s the route imprinted on your mind).
- Place of work. Imagine the path from your cubicle to the coffee machine or to your boss’s office (it shouldn’t be hard to choose).
- Scenery. Imagine walking on your neighborhood or the track you use when jogging in a local park.
2. List Distinctive Features
Now you need to pay attention to specific features in the place you chose. If you picked a walkthrough in your home, for example, the first noticeable feature would probably be the front door.
Now go on and mentally walk around your Memory Palace. After you go through the door, what’s in the first room?
Analyze the room methodically (you may define a standard procedure, such as always looking from left to right, for example). What is the next feature that catches your attention? It may be the central table in the dining room, or a picture on the wall.
Continue making mental notes of those features as you go. Each one of them will be a “memory slot” that you’ll later use to store a single piece of information.
3. Imprint the Palace on Your Mind
For the technique to work, the most important thing is to have the place or route 100% imprinted on your mind. Do whatever is necessary to really commit it to memory. If you’re a visual kind of person, you probably won’t have trouble with this. Otherwise, here are some tips that help:
- Physically walk through the route repeating out loud the distinctive features as you see them.
- Write down the selected features on a piece of paper and mentally walk through them, repeating them out loud.
- Always look at the features from the same point of view.
- Be aware that visualization is a just a skill. If you’re still having trouble doing this, you may want to develop your visualization skills first.
- When you believe you’re done, go over it one more time. It’s really important to “overlearn” your way in your Memory Palace.
Once you’re confident that the route is stamped on your mind, you’re set. Now you have your Palace, which can be used over and over again to memorize just about anything you want.
4. Associate!
Now that you’re the master of your palace, it’s time to put it to good use.
Like most memory enhancement systems, the Memory Palace technique works with the use of visual associations. The process is simple: you take a known image — called the memory peg — and combine with the element you want to memorize. For us, each memory peg is a distinctive feature of our Memory Palace.
The memory pegging technique is the same one described in the article ‘Improve Your Memory by Speaking Your Mind’s Language‘, so if you haven’t read it yet, I highly advise you to do so.
As described in that article, there’s a ‘right way’ of doing visual associations:
Make it crazy, ridiculous, offensive, unusual, extraordinary, animated, nonsensical — after all, these are the things that get remembered, aren’t they? Make the scene so unique that it could never happen in real life. The only rule is: if it’s boring, it’s wrong.
Although we can use the technique to memorize tons of information, let’s start with something very simple: using our ‘Home’ Memory Palace to memorize a groceries list. Let’s suppose the first item in that list is ‘bacon’:
Mentally transport yourself to your Memory Palace. The first feature you see in your mind is your home’s front door. Now, in a ludicrous way, visually combine ‘bacon’ with the sight of your front door. How about giant fried bacon strips flowing out from underneath the door reaching for your legs, just like zombies in those B-movies? Feel the touch of the “bacon hands” on your legs. Feel the smell of darn evil bacon. Is that remarkable enough?
Now open the door and keep walking, following the exact same route you defined before. Look at the next distinctive feature, and associate it with the second item to be memorized. Suppose the next item is ‘eggs’ and the second feature is ‘picture of mother-in-law’. Well, at this point you already know what to do… The process is always the same, so just keep mentally associating images until there are no items left to memorize.
5. Visit Your Palace
At this point, you are done memorizing the items. If you’re new to the technique, though, you’ll probably need to do a little rehearsal, repeating the journey at least once in your mind.
If you start from the same point and follow the same route, the memorized items will come to your mind instantly as you look at the journey’s selected features. Go from the beginning to the end of your route, paying attention to those features and replaying the scenes in your mind. When you get to the end of your route, turn around and walk in the opposite direction until you get to the starting point.
In the end, it’s all a matter of developing your visualization skills. The more relaxed you are, the easier it will be and the more effective your memorization will be.
Final Thoughts
What I like about the Memory Palace (and other pegging methods) is that it’s not only extremely effective, but also quite fun to learn and use.
With just a little bit of experience, the lists you memorize using the Memory Palace will stay fresh in your mind for many days, weeks or even more.
Also have in mind that you can create as many palaces as you want, and that they can be as simple or as elaborate as you wish to make them. Each of them is a “memory bank”, ready to be used to help you memorize anything, anytime.
Associating physical locations with mental concepts is the most powerful memory combination I know. Most other memory techniques (supposedly more sophisticated than the Memory Palace) are, at least in part, based on the concept of physical locations being used as memory pegs.
Have you already used Memory Palace or a similar technique? What do you think? Any opinions or testimonials to share?
I’ve tried this one in a non-structured way. It works fine and this is one of the techniques I intend to use better. It is really cool the use of this technique for both Hannibal Lecter (fictional character) and Mateo Ricci (real one).
Excellent article! I’ve learned from experience that the “ridiculous association” technique is a powerful way to commit things to memory, but I like the Memory Palace elaboration as a deliberate system for doing so over and over. I’m sure you only get better at its application over time.
Thanks for the tips.
I just stumbled upon this and I must say, it is perfect timing. I have a mid-term this week so I am definitely going to try this to memorize some key terms.
Oddly. I do this in meditations but i never thought of actually putting stuff to remember there!
Nice one!
pril: That’s very interesting. I made the exact opposite path: I first learned about the Memory Palace, and only later realized I could put mental places to other uses, such as relaxation and meditation… (which, by the way, is the subject of an article I’m writing)
Very nice article. Thanks.
Nice and fast explanation. This technique works really good. I could remeber 20 items I needed for weeks - and this took me just 5 min or so of preparation! Great!
Thanks, great article.
That’s great, but what happens once you used a room for something. Is it forever taken? You get out of palaces very soon… For example, I used my kitchen to study for my organizational behavior class. Now what? I want to learn for my business communication class, but the pegs are all occupied!
The problem is that information far exceeds vacant pegs!
How do you suggest solving it?
Michael
as a visualization aid, perhaps virtual reality software like Second Life can be used to create memory palaces. I imagine labels of what one would like to remember could be created on the virtual furniture.
Great article. I’m looking forward to using this technique.
I wonder what Dominic O’Brien’s palace look like? and how does he create that association so quickly? I guess I can see remembering 20 or even 100 things, but beyond that, it seems like you’d start to run out of space in your happy place, erm, I mean palace.
I’ve just tried it a little, and it’s a very relaxing technique, as well as useful!
Michael: That’s an excellent question.
I found that you can create ‘long-term’ palaces and ’short-term’ palaces.
If you use a particular palace to memorize something but don’t revisit it with enough regularity, the memories tend to fade away with time — making the slots available again. I really never had a problem with that.
For pegs that you do use often, however, yes — it’s a problem. As a personal example, I use specific pegs for memorizing the calendar — pegs I’ve been using for years.
Now I am testing a new variation of the calendar technique, which requires me to associate different things with each month. I am having a hard time doing it, and I’m still not sure if I’ll ever be able to erase the previous pegs from my mind.
I know there are ways to overcome that problem — I’m just not skilled enough to use them. One possible way is by using sensory modifiers: you can imagine, for example, your palace during winter (visiting your palace while feeling cold) and summer (hot). Each one of these variations creates an entirely new memory bank to use.
neil: Using Virtual Reality as a visualization aid is an excellent idea!
However, I’m not sure about the effort required to create virtual environments of reasonable size using today’s tools. I have never used Second Life, just a little bit of Google SketchUp without much success. Maybe with a little more practice that can work fine.
Does anybody have any experience on creating virtual environments easily? Any specific recommendations?
Josh: Memory champions like Dominic do have some additional secrets, of course. To be completely fair, guys like him don’t use the Memory Palace technique alone, but usually combine it with other techniques (such as phonetic systems).
Even so, it’s really amazing the level of mastery these people have in each technique alone. If I recall correctly (no pun intended), Dominic is able to memorize one shuffled deck of cards in under a minute; and he does credit the Memory Palace technique as the main component of his method.
It’s worthy to note that people who make quick brain calculations uses phonetic systems too. Maybe the trick is to do your own mix of senses as a technique.
See http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/199
I really enjoy your blog. It’s one of the most thorough, well done, best written, most applicable blogs out there. And I’ve seen a lot. Keep up the great great work. I really can’t say enough. Your blog speaks to me the most with its emphasis on good habits, mind maps, good books to read, quality articles and not inundated with advertisements or buy this or that stuff.
Thank you.
Fier: Wow, I have never thought about using a phonetic system for mental calculations — that’s pretty amazing! I will investigate this, as I have trouble temporarily storing numbers in my head in multi-step calculations. Thanks for the link!
Brian: Thanks for the compliment. Hearing such nice words is really motivating (not to mention good for the ego!).
i can see how this works for lists, and other non complex things ie. bacon door, milkcrate stairs, baguette handrail, girl with olive eyes etc, how one could utilise the technique for more complex academic purposes is something i have trouble understanding.
Say i need to remember a name and a date, and connected to this, details relating to research, like numbers of medical trial participants, percentage remission, along with mechanical details regarding the undertaking of the experiement, this technique seems unsuitable.
Allegedly however, i’ve heard of people using such methods to great effect. would you propose this is a combination of this tech with something else, or merely “freud is in the wardrobe with anna o, and her neurotic coughing, and anxiety, being overseen by her long dead father etc”…
i suppose in creating that story, we re-analyse the data, making it easier to remember. The house / palace tech causes a re evaluation to occur, rather than the technique actualy directly aiding memory in this complex case.
(apologies for turning a question into my thought process…)
-or you could write it down…. your mind is for thinking not memorizing.
This is an excellent article. There are all types of variations on this method.
One technique I used in law school was to write out a one page list of notes for the entire semester. It contained the main points I wanted to remember.
I then would write down the first letter of each word in the sentence.
I would then write down the first letter of ONLY THE FIRST WORD it that sentence.
I would memorize the first letter of ONLY THE FIRST WORD in order. When I went into the test, I would write that out and it would help me, within 5 minutes, to reconstruct my entire one page list of notes. I then basically had an open book exam !!!
The memory palace technique seems a little different, but it sounds like it would work well. HOWEVER, what if you are an auditory person like me, as opposed to a visual person?
Mr. Positioning
Stanley F. Bronstein
Attorney, CPA, Author and Professional Motivational Speaker
ed: You’re right, for more complex data what works best is combining the Memory Palace with other techniques.
Although there are many options available, it seems that combining the Memory Palace technique with phonetic systems is the most popular and effective combination among memory prodigies (see previous comment).
Thanks for the question! It’s a great one, and one that I intend to address in a future article about phonetic systems and how to combine them with the Memory Palace technique to memorize complex, “real world” data.
Stanley: Thanks for sharing your technique. I have used mnemonics before, but not in the extreme way you described. This seems definitely worth trying!
Regarding your question about auditory types: I’m a highly visual type, so I can’t speak on personal experience. However, I think the answer probably lies somehow, again, in phonetic systems. Phonetic systems allow you to transform between images and words, which you can use hear and maybe use in rhymes, for example.
i think i might actually have to do stuff to you cause this is a god send. My memory is appalling, i’ll admit that, but i can remember places very well, this is the perfect technique for me! Thank you!
i think i created my own technique for remembering things to do about town. e.g. you want to remember to by some milk at the local store, but have numerous other chores. I find it works simply to visualise the store and think milk and visualise walking past it thinking milk. When you actually walk past it, your memory should trip!
A little query, if your running out of memory places, why not turn it into a whole town? would that still work or would that be a little too much for the brain to handle?
Sharpy: Thanks for sharing your technique. Reading your description, I’m not sure if you think about the word ‘milk’ (like repeating ‘milk, milk, milk’) or if you actually visualize white milk. If you think about the word only, try imagining visiting the store and seeing milk spilling from all over, and people running and screaming in horror. This is guaranteed to be even more effective.
Creating a ‘Memory Town’ is a marvelous idea. It’s definitely not too much for the brain; it’s all a matter of being committed to invest time in practicing it. Actually, I’ve seen somewhere about a memory prodigy that does exactly that — he has his own imaginary town which is his framework for all his memorization efforts. They all take place in the streets or inside its buildings and houses.
I always remember things with the word poop. Sharon - Poop. I don’t know. It just works for me. Great article!
I was taught this technique in middle-school. My teacher made us memorize a list of ten words by associating them with a journey through our house.
I’m 22 and I still remember the list:
teeth
shoes
desk
basket
milk
addition
ring
kite
house
water
I’m anxious to use The Palace Method and would like to ask if a particular way of using the method (that I think would help me) is a valid one. I’ve spent 30 years building true palaces, (as a builder, I was once hired to supervise 17 Pakistani men during the reconstruction of the Kuwaiti palaces after the first Gulf war.) I now live in an American Colonial Historic home and having the intimate knowledge of every joint of every piece of millwork in the house, I wondered if going room to room, using every joint of millwork as an association point, could I make use of each of those stationary points? It occurred that they might offer more association points than a room with furniture that can be relocated.
Samuel: Sure, use every detail you can! Having such a deep knowledge about a place is a privilege: since the pegs are already vivid in your mind, those are virtually free memory slots you can use.
This technique really is amazing. I’ve remembered a lot of things that i wouldn’t have remembered otherwise. But what are the other techniques? are there any?
Cordell: Certainly there are many more memory techniques, as there are many great resources in the net discussing them. WikiHow, for example, is a great place to start exploring.
I’ve always wanted to try this, but I think I am an extremely un-visual person, and can barely visualize my own home in detail. (I suppose I’d never know until I tried, though…)
The comments here were really useful, though. Stanley’s super-mnemonics method might work better for me, because I definitely get a lot out of writing things down, and can usually remember how many items I’m trying to remember.
For example, for small grocery lists (forgotten at home on the fridge, of course) I can usually remember all the items after I remember how many there were. Maybe if I attempted to remember the first letters of the items, I’d be able to remember longer lists!
Qrystal: Glad to have you back here!
Some people naturally do better with techniques that involve mnemonics and words instead of images. Bear in mind, however, that visualization is a skill — and unless you have trained at least a little bit — you won’t be good at it at first.
For basic memorization (such as small lists), it’s a matter of personal preference — pick the technique you like best and stick with it for a while. If you feel the technique you’re using doesn’t suit your needs anymore, you can always upgrade it or combine it with a more powerful one.
this way to remember aidsto visualizing links: “span” (a bridgr) s=substitution/ p=proportion. a=action, n=numbers. for elaboration of these keywords, see”the memory book,” by lorayne and lucas.
I’m definitely going to try this one. I’m very visual, and I pretty much can already walk through anywhere I’ve been in my mind. I’ve also associated real objects with things to remember so that when I see it my memory gets jogged.
The technique actually predates ancient Rome. Frances Yates book, The Art of Memory gives the history. The Greek poet Simonides was at a dinner, left early, there was a disaster and he was able to recognize the bodies by remembering who sat where at table. Thus the insight: when information is linked to places, it is easier to remember. The “palace’ is merely a place with many rooms, gothic cathedrals were also used, but any physical place will do. This technique was taught in schools for centuries, the classic text is the anonymous Rhetorica ad Herennium. The technique was routinely used by lawyers to help remember facts because there was no paper in Rome, and papyrus was at a premium. Both books are worth a look.
Thanks for providing a more accurate history of the technique.
I am going to take a look at the book “The Art of Memory”. “The Memory Book”, which was suggested by previous commenter walterhenry, also seems very interesting.
Thanks for the recommendations, guys!
I love this method - as I began to build my website, I used this exact method to walk through each unique type of user’s experience. It was a fantastic process, because it also allowed me to decipher why some other needs might be required of some users and not others.
Also works very well when you’re trying to get out of the house on time in the morning - do your walk-through while you’re in the shower and you’ll be amazed how much more organized you feel as you’re leaving. love it.
I saw that Michael needed help freeing up pegs…
if you wanted to free a memory peg, simply remove it from your mental place, and visualize the peg empty. Then mentally walk through enough times that you get used to it not being there.
If you want to replace an item, simply replace the association, and walk through until you get used to it.
– Roshkins
Roshkins: That’s a very clever idea — I am going to try it myself! It seems that it’ll work. Thanks for the contribution!
Hey I had been using this system for a short time before I came across this post. It was great by the way. Anyway I had never really used it seriously at all until today when I used it to store some information for my English final. This took a long time to do and afterward, I actually felt exhausted from the concentration required. Have you ever had this happen to you?
Slice22358: This never happened to me. Maybe you’re having trouble visualizing the palace? Remember that it’s imperative to know really well the place you choose.
Also, bear in mind that visualization is a skill: the more you use it, the more effortless it becomes. If you feel you need to develop it, check out this post by Albert Foong:
How to Develop Your Visualization Skill.
Good luck!
To be honest, I believe that the visualization is the source of the problem, but in an opposite way to what you suggested. It seems to me that the more detail I put into my palace at the time(sometimes there’s more sometimes less) the more it taxes my energy. I did it again today, not for storing information, but to meditate as in your other post. I stayed inside for a little while but not too long, and it was very relaxing. However, when I awoke I found myself tired yet in the same relaxed state as before. Interesting I shall have to experiment with it and see what I can come up with.
Slice22358: Wow, that seems very unusual. Please do report back here if you find out anything, as it may be helpful to other readers.
Thanks for sharing your experiences!
Luciano: How did my technique work? (Ok, I admit it, I’m just to lazy to try it myself.)
roshkins: Unfortunately I didn’t have the chance to try it out yet.
I’ll report back here and let you know as soon as I do it. Thanks for the interest!
This is all the stuff Derren Brown does its workS!
Try using The Sims to create your visual palace. You can create any kind of home with various rooms for small bits you might need such as a speech or an exam. You can then deleted if you no longer need the infomation.
This is great for people who need to “see” their palace in 3D and even move around it.
Also a good visualization for removing informations is to picture yourself taking the item off the peg and putting it in the recycle or moving it to a room further away.
Sarah: Thanks for your suggestions!
I never tried The Sims. Although it does not seem to be free (like Google SketchUp), my bet is that it’s much easier and quicker to use. Previous commenter Neil also mentioned using SecondLife. Does anyone have any thoughts on how these compare?
Your suggestion about clearing pegs also seems a very sensible one!
Clearing pegs is a common question (which I still don’t have a decisive answer). Previous commenter Roshkins suggested a similar solution, but we didn’t have the chance to try it yet.
Do you always have success with your procedure for clearing pegs? Can you please tell us any experience you had with it? Thanks again!
An excellent article. I am from Nepal and I learned similar technique from a Memory trainer Madhav Aryal in Kathmandu. Now I can demonstrate 1000 random items serially, randomly and also in reverse order. Actually, in this technique, a scene is taken for each word from phonetic numbering system(0=saw 1=tea 2=hen… upto 100=thesis or even more) and from each scene 10 images are taken. First image from scene for word saw(0) is given no. 1 2nd image is given no. 2 …. Similarly first image from scene for tea(1) is given no.11 2nd image is given no. 12. And this pattern goes on. For scene 99=Pipe, the first image is given no. 991 and the 10th image is given no. 1000. But I want to know if there are any techniques for speed memory, like memorising 40 random decimal digits in less than 30 seconds, remembering a random suffled pack of cards in 30 seconds , remembering 60 random binary digits in 15 seconds and so on. What i have noticed is that, Once we can be very rapid in the images, we can remember 30 random decimal digits in 40-45 seconds, 40 random binary digits 1n 15-20 seconds , a random suffled pack of cards in 70-80 seconds.But I think memory heros like Spanish Ramón Campayo have different techniques for speed memory . I request you to share other methods too for memory with me.
Mahesh: Creating a memory palace in such a methodical way (such as creating these huge matrices) is really pushing it to the next level and can be amazingly powerful.
Regarding speed memory, I am not aware of any specific techniques for increasing speed, other than just training. Just as you suggested, the bottleneck of speed is usually on the ability to quickly use visualization.
I plan to cover additional memory techniques here in the site (as well as how to combine multiple techniques), but none of them are specifically focused on speed.
If you go on in your research and find something, please share. That’s something I would definitely be interested in learning.
I have used the memory palace technique with great success! I aced all my exams that semester
I use the palace in conjuntion with other mnemonics, using mainly the association and jouney techniques.
But now i am stuck for places for a memory palace, i need more pegs. As the existing one’s are filled, i considred expanding my palace using imaginary rooms, although i find it hard to picture those rooms and also a lack of creativity to create a room worthy to hold information for any span of time. Any pointers for creating rooms? Should they be based on existing rooms despite their location within my palace?
I am writing again and this time, a different topic, about mathematics. Actually I was seeking some ways to ease mathematical calculations. And really I found those qualities in Vedic mathematical system. Using this system, we can solve the problems easily in a very short time. Solving becomes fun and no more stress. I am trying to be able to multiply two 25-digit-numbers each ,that too mentally, and only the result on the paper in a single line, using Vedic multiplication. I takes 15-20 minutes for me now but I am trying to do the same in less time.So I request everybody, who really wants to excel in mathematics, to bother to see at least once what Vedic mathematics is. And if you like you may follow the techniques.
Luke: If you know any other places (real that is) that you know well, you could have an imaginary street, and have many different places for palaces.
Thanks for the help. I’ll see what I can do
Luke: For more pegs, remember that you can try first to add more details to your current rooms.
If you still need or want new imaginary rooms, bear in mind that visualization is a skill: you need to walk through your new rooms during some time in order to ‘imprint’ them on your mind.
In order to make them more vivid and rememberable, you may want to add emotions and senses other than vision. To ideas about that, please read the article Put Yourself in Any Mental State With a Mental Sanctuary.
Hope this helps. Good luck — and please let us know how it goes!
Mahesh: I’ve never heard about Vedic mathematics but, judging by its Wikipedia entry, it does look interesting. Thanks for the pointer!
Thanks for the help. I read the article on developing a mental santuary. Thanks for the link! It was a great article. The beuty of it, i would think, is that i can incorperate it right into my memory palace, as if to join the two together. I’ll give it a go, and visit it every day!
I also read about the Vedic mathematics. It was so interesting, that i borrowed a book from a friend entitled “The Natural Calculator”, which teaches Vedic mathematics. It is realy a simple way to do mental calculations and i recommend it to everyone.
Sorry for getting off track a little. Thanks for all the support.
Wow, I knew a similar technique with “Numbers” to remember stuff in order, but this one is really interesting too. I’ll certainly try it ! By the way, nice blog, continue the good work ! =)
I really like this idea.
Although I haven’t tried using Memory Palaces yet (but I now will), the concept of having multiple palaces comes naturally to me. For example, if I’m trying to memorize my grocery shopping list, I would visualize my most-used supermarket and peg the list items to the actual places where I’d find them on the shelves.
Unrelated question- is there a way to use memory palaces for reminders such as remembering schedules? I.e. having the palace pull me in instead of me deciding to go there.
Jacob- In relation to our last comment, I have never heard of that concept although it intrigues me. I will definitely have to try to set up palace reminders. One time during some free time I had, I set up a clock in my palace and tried to keep the time going for some 15 minutes. Perhaps that could be used to set up some reminders. I’ll just have to try it out.
@Jacob: I’m not sure if I understand your question. Are you looking for some kind of trigger so you remember to visit your palace at given intervals?
If that’s the case, sorry, I have never tried anything like that. (It looks like a bootstrapping problem, remembering to remember…)
Does any other reader have any experiences in that regard?
I used to have a terrific memory. Then I got a Palm Pilot and have had one ever since (11 years). Although I love it for many reasons, there’s no question that relying on it has allowed my memory to atrophy. I’ve decided that I want it back and more.
One of things my Palm does so well is reminders. Could memory palaces be harnessed in that sense? That’s clearer, I hope.
@Jacob: Sorry, never had any experiences with delegating reminders to memory in a reliable way (using the Memory Palace or otherwise). In that regard I am also completely dependent on my PDA.
If any other reader uses just plain memory for everyday reminders in a reliable way, please speak up! How do you do it?
I’d love to hear about new techniques to try!
Thought I’d share. I have only just started using “MPs”, even if it comes to nothing it’s a good mental workout! I learned them as a system called “losai”. Builing a map of 10 points in my town’s main street, after 2 days I had memorised 60 random items ( 6 in each location ), the locations are getting cluttered so I am just starting to learn how to drop memories, which is a lot harder than setting them up in the first place! I have started playing with historical facts, the only problem I have is that I end up breaking each tiny fact and placing it in a separate location, which makes it appear like “memory rambling”, where I end up having to spread so much info over so many places, I can pull it back OK, I think I need to find a way to refine it better.
Great article and great site, keep it up!
@George: Your ‘memory town’ system is quite amazing — thanks for sharing!
It’s surprising how these location-based memory systems are effective to the point that forgetting (even if that’s exactly what you want to do) becomes much harder than remembering, isn’t it?!
Great article. I found this page after reading about Hannibal’s Memory Palace, funnily enough. I heard of the technique before reading the book, but it showed me how powerful it can be, and I started my research
Thanks for the information. The way you’ve written about it is very easy to understand.
@Jacob from Group Writing Projects:
For reminders, this involves a slightly different training. With this, you’ll rely less on your watch and calendar, and more on your own clock. That will come naturally. It’s rough starting out, but after maybe a few months, depending on how much devotion you give it, you’ll be setting off your own alarms.
In my palace, I have a secretary in the lobby. Sometimes the secretary is a celebrity or historical figure depending on mood or need. Every hour, I visit the secretary for current appointments. I kept missing the check-in for a while, but eventually I got into a regular habit. Now, the secretary’s desk is a huge, round table with various trinkets and statuettes. I always proceed in a clockwise direction starting at the front. Where I have devoted pegs to each object on the desk, I can visit each one and recall the reminder as necessary. For example, the first object is a miniature painting on an easel with the image of a king eating a hamburger. Hanging on the corner is a tiny hunter’s cap. This reminds me of a dinner plan with my Dad at Burger King. The next two objects sitting beside it are pegs for a personal day and time I developed way back.
I’ve only ever used four spaces on this desk, each mnemonic set around at symmetrical spots. For example, if we used a clock to pick the points on the table, then my objects are at 12, 3, 6, and 9 o’clock. You could put more in there, but it really helps to give them some space.
You could expand on this if you have numerous reminders. You would build a room specifically for your schedule. It would be quite grand. Perhaps six hallways on each side, with a huge column in the middle (so you have three hallways to each side of the column,and with stairs going to other levels for expansion. Each level can correspond to a day of the month. Additional building sets could be designed for each month. Day one is on level one of the first building. Now, each hallway corresponds to a an hour of the day, going clockwise. So, yeah, you’ll undoubtedly be using only one section of the building for most of your appointments. Down each hallway are your pegs for your appointments.
Hope that helps!
@Daniel P: thanks for your terrific suggestion and experience.
Basically you’re saying that we need to regularly ask ourselves if there’s something we need reminding of. That sounds more effective that the usual, more random ‘letting it hit you’ way humans do things.
Plus, I like the idea of having my own virtual-virtual assistant
@Daniel P: Wow, thanks for sharing this wonderful idea!
I won’t dump my PDA just yet, but I’m adding your idea to my Someday/Maybe list for when I feel ready for such a mind stretch!
Thanks again!
I just wanted to write with my thoughts on the memory palace technique. I’m currently using it to remember historical events and one of the things I’ve found is a lack of practical examples of how people create an image. I thought I’d paint a picture of one of my images so that people can see that the system is not just for remembering shopping lists. I combine the journey technique with the phonetic numbering system mentioned in a previous comment.
So for Alexamder the Great…..
I’ve imagined a journey that takes me on a walk from my house to the local pub with a number of stops along the way. At each stop I’ve deposited a hi