How did you turn the memory palace into a training habit? I already have a memory palace and can use it to memorize information, but my problem is turning it into a regular practice. I’d like to know how you established the habit of training with the palace: what kind of information you started memorizing, how often you trained, how you handled reviews, and how you gradually increased the difficulty. I’d also like to know if you follow any specific routine or exercises to improve your ability to create images and associations, and to retrieve information from the palace. In short: how did you transform the memory palace from a technique you know how to use into a skill you train regularly and continue to improve?
I use a spaced repetition software (anki) (one card per locus). I don’t want to waste brainpower/time to plan my reviews and an SRS does it much better than me anyway. I try to review the cards as fast as possible to train for speed.
But I also review my memory palaces “for fun” while hiking or before sleep, etc. These reviews are more meditative, the point is to enjoy the memory palaces and their contents.
So… Just integrate what I learn in my life I guess. I suppose it’s different if you do competition (which I don’t, so maybe somebody who does would have a completely different approach)
When I was doing a lot of memory palace stuff, I found that I’d be walking through my memory palace when I went to sleep. You can spend a lot of time thinking of different review schemes, but I think the secret is to just do them.
If you insisted, it’s easy to imagine a scheme where you review once a day for a week, once a week for seven weeks, once a month for seven months, and then once or twice a year as the spirit takes you. You could even keep the schedule in different memory palaces. (One for daily, one for each day of the week, one for each day of the month) At that point, you should probably just write it down.
The chief argument against using Anki is this situation is to avoid the distraction-box nature of computers and modern phones, but that isn’t a very argument against flash cards and a shoebox-style zettelkasten system.
But I will insist again: just get started with using a memory palace every day, and when review becomes a problem, there are many systems available to you.
The review started to lose its meaning because I don’t know what to put in it, you know? It seems stagnant; just put something random and simple. I like the palace and I don’t want to give up; turn it into a training habit.
Yes. Better an imperfect review system that you actually do, than a perfect one that you never use (or even begin using because you spend your time optimising before even starting).
Does it mean that you review empty memory palaces? Yeah aimless reviewing doesn’t make much sense and that’s not very motivating.
Your project always comes first! Choose something you want to learn, review the memory palace once it’s filled with the aim of reviewing/reviewing the contents (not with the aim of reviewing the palace, it’s only the tool, it’s not the reason to memorise). (And… dare I say it… not all memorisation/learning has to be done with memory palaces).
If you do competition you need empty memory palaces but you can review them by training.
As a personal aside, I find it’s ok to take a break and let yourself forget things (really it’s ok, you’ll memorise it again if you need it, and it will come back), and to concentrate on other things. We’re always told “do ALL your reviews before you start with new things, otherwise it’s a waste of the things you’ve already learnt”… But I don’t think that way anymore.
Firstly our brain craves novelty and getting stuck with old reviews is demotivating and means I’ll probably stop learning entirely because I’m bored if I don’t introduce new things from time to time.
Secondly, we are changing, our interests may be changing, our life (and the time we have to learn) may change too. It’s normal if our priorities change too.