I am new to the world of Memory Palaces and memory training. Using a PAO and loci system I have successfully attempted and retained 4 lists so far. The names of all NFL and NBA teams by conference and division, all MLB teams by league and division and all 50 US states.
I had a difficult time retaining a list of states and capitals as geography is least of my favorite subjects but I believe necessary for ones own knowledge. I admit, I also became fatigued by the idea of creating a memory palace for the states.
My difficulty lead to a question which I will ask everyone reading this. How many palaces have you retained? In other words, how many have you personally created and are confident that you will retain the information for life? I am curious if anyone has retained lists in the double or triple digits.
@mnemonicHec Hey. So, there’s almost no uniformity to this practice. I haven’t needed to utilize my memory Palace(s) yet but I do navigate them everyday so as to be certain that I can even teleport from one location to another. I have about 13 places now that I frequent constructed into a layered Palace. I’m considering building another space into it. But as long as you have your 
planted, any information should be easy. But as I stated above; this practice is not very uniform. You remembered the 50 states with Loci. I remembered them with a story(SEAO).
I will reach my thousandth memory palace next week! 
On top of that I have around 150-200 peg lists, which all combined has a total of around 150.000 loci I think. I stopped counting my loci long ago haha.
Most have permanent knowledge. I wouldnt say it is for life but with regular maintenance I get pretty close to permanent for most of those 
@user_7e thanks for the response, that is extremely impressive. Global Palace for your palaces?? Planets??? You must have a great visualization technique and/or concrete system. I would love to hear more about that.
That is impressive @Mayarra, it’s good to know their isn’t a limit to this. I try to review my 4 lists each day starting from my most difficult, that has helped with retention. I’m getting to the point where I am not struggling to recall my first 3 palaces. I can see how/why you would stop counting your loci.
@Kemsimba thanks for the response, “layered Palace?” do you mean reusing loci or multiple loci (for separate lists) in the same space? SEAO sounds interesting and I believe what I’ve done can be considered stories in loci as well, for example, my first loci contains an image of DJ Kalid, Bam Bam, Alice in Wonderland drinking Arizona’s on an Ark.
It’s PAO but I’ve also told a short story.
DJ Kalid = California
Bam Bam = Alabama
Alice = Alaska
Arizonas = Arizona
Ark = Arkansas
The capitals kind of pop in their place naturally with a little review or I’ll say their names while mentally reviewing.
I would love to hear how you managed to fit capitals with your states in your SEAO
You’re my hero! Truly amazing! What posts here /techniques / books do up you recommend to build and manage memory palaces?
What are your most important content types to memorize? Work / school / languages ??
Do you give lessons? I need to visit The Netherlands soon!
That is great ! I had fun going through your journey! I also naturally put small amount of locations in this manner, and I wouldn’t have put any more than what you did.
@user_7e thank you for the detailed explanation. I was able to visualize the method you’ve described. It seems logical that if I should ever run out of real life loci this would be a worthwhile option.
I have created many, but i usually re-use the same 2.
Kevin Horsley said that no one has a memory problem - they have a review problem. So if you want to remember 50 states create a memory palace and review it regularly until it become permanent knowledge.
This is a struggle in the beginning but it becomes very easy with practice. I follow this method:
- Write out the locations in the memory palace in Excel
- Write next to each location the thing you want to remember
- Create a mnemonic association of the object to each location
- Review regularly, checking your notes if you need to
Maybe this takes you an hour to do. But many people on this site can do this in less than 10 minutes and some less than 2 minutes.
Then review the memory palace daily, then weekly, then monthly to maintain it.
hey @Mnemoriser I’ve got the technique down and remembering 50 states is no longer an issue. The question was how many memory palaces have you personally retained with or without regular review and maintenance? While you may have 3 or so there are some here that have retained a few thousand it seems…
@mnemonicHec
I haven’t gotten the capitals yet. But I’d probably use the same though, with a secondary tether, if you will. This would effectively let me learn the capitals more efficiently.
@user_7e
Yeah. That was an awesome explanation. I’ve never actively done that but I have created loci before. This is what I did to learn the 50 states. The area is not familiar from any explicit memory but I know it now. Thank you for your insight. That’s greatly helpful.
Gavino’s massive memory palace is a great start to manage palaces. Simply put, it is a memory palace where the loci link to other palaces rather than to images.
Gavino’s Massive Memory Palace
I use an adaptation of that in my Memory city. Rather than linking to different palaces, I place them in a city with many pegs that each hold one or two palaces (occasionally more)
Maya’s 1.000.000-Loci Memory Palace
For the building part, I would recommend mainly practice. As for books, Moonwalking with Einstein is an easy-to-grasp introduction that has some focus on. Practice is key though, it will help you in creating, memorizing and using new palaces.
This does depend on what you need. To me, medical checklists are incredibly important. Languages are quite low on my lists. They are not important for me to know and they are things that have to be used rather than known.
I have given a few, but I don’t have any planned at the moment
Just wrote down the location for each image. good suggestion thanks