[These posts were copied here from the old forum.]
LadyBluebell 30 October, 2012 - 14:16
Hi everyone! Thank you for all of your responses. I really appreciate your clarification of the need of loci for my Spanish example, suncover. It would have saved me a lot of fear over creating pathways if I had understood this earlier.
Just a quick update: I just finished Kenneth Higbee’s “Your Memory…” I would definitely give it a 10. Highly recommended. It is an excellent overview of many of the major memory techniques, but more importantly, it is very honest & upfront about what these techniques AREN’T. I appreciate reading of the realistic expectations, these are helpful techniques, even if they don’t turn you into Rainman.
I know we have all heard the corny saying paraphrased here: “Aim for the stars & even if you fail you’ll still reach the moon.” Nice idea about striving for excellence, but I found that sometimes for me I see the stars as where I should be, where anyone else who had done what I had done would have been a long time ago, assuming this is where everyone else is, etc. I conclude there is something inherently wrong with my aptitude at my current endeavor. Even if I have figuratively reached the moon, passed the moon, I honestly can’t see it. I can’t see my changed surroundings, I can’t see what I have learned, accomplished, or improved. I can’t see how far from Earth I have travelled. I only see how far I am from the “average,” which from the descriptive sales pitch, is probably a distant galaxy. I didn’t even realize I was aiming for the stars - I thought the incredible outcomes were the inevitable result of following the directions.
I will say that “Your Memory” is a great intro to memory techniques. I wish I had read it years ago, even if only before purchasing any memory course. It gives real-life, specific, doable examples. It is much more realistic than either course I have done.
I will let you know how my other books come along. Thanks again!
magicquin 31 October, 2012 - 11:59
Hi LadyBluebell,
just my two cents, this is something that i have found in myself, the more i have done the memory techniques (from this site alone) the more i find my “base” memory improves daily, even without applying the techniques. the brain is a muscle and these exercises are gym for our brains.
even though using the techniques can be a little time consuming they definitely do work, i have been memorizing the bill of rights and i am really blown away at how well these techniques work. I am able to recall any of the sections that i have committed to memory with little effort, granted it does take a bit of work. But once you get going it does get easier.
odranoel 3 November, 2012 - 09:31
Hi LadyBluebell,
I encourage you to stick with pmemory, especially if you’ve already made the initial investment of time and money. You might try asking for specific advice on those forums, especially if you don’t understand the language used in the lessons. I found a comment, years ago, from a woman who was editing the pmemory course to put it into better English, and seemed to be running into trouble understanding what the author was trying to convey. If she completed the job they did not elect to use her edited version, or her editing was not competent. Whatever the case might be, it is important to communicate with the instructors to get a plain English explanation when you can’t decipher the original text.
Others have made the comment that the course is overcomplicated. The techniques, from the beginning of the course, seem to be geared toward complex text memorization. So, yes, you end up putting in a lot of upfront effort to master techniques that might be overkill when you have to memorize simpler information.
Regarding your question about memorizing foreign language vocabulary: in the pmemory course, you would indeed attach an image of a cow to a support image. What probably wasn’t adequately explained to you is that the pmemory course assumes that you will be doing all repetition and review without external aids. For example, many people will create a vocabulary list and either carry around flash cards to review, or will put the words into Anki to implement a spaced-repetition system. In the pmemory course, the assumption is that you will review your vocabulary list mentally, without flash cards or other prompts. This has its advantages - you can review your Spanish vocabulary while standing in line at the store, for example - but does require extra preparation of cicero images.
One frustration I noted from you is that you don’t want to have to come up with lots of loci. I’m not sure how far you are into the course, but you actually learn techniques to avoid that problem. So, for example, when you go through the “my first database” course, you memorize a huge number of items, but you only use five cicero images. In that case, you attach an initial image to the cicero base, and then chain another four images to the initial image. Each of those images is then broken down into five loci that you can store actual information on. In the first database course, these auxilary images are spoonfed to you without rhyme or reason, but you’ll learn later on that you can replicate the same effect more easily by basically playing a quick word-association game with yourself to generate the auxilary images. My point is that the only time you need lots of loci is when you are using the MM software, and that is because using the loci directly tends to be faster than going through a tree of images.
Anyway, the more you practice, the faster you will become. I hope this helped somewhat, and I wish you luck.
JeffreyLucas 4 November, 2012 - 10:56
Pmemory 2.0, i follow it to and this course sucks. The author explains the mnemonics wrong to the people. So, give Dominic O’Brien a try. I hope for you that you downloaded the course like i did…
What you need is to do twice a day a few exercises that you can find on the pmemory website. Further you must read that ebook from Dominic O’Brien to know how to start. If you knew how to use the loci and link/story method, than youre on the right way to memorize books, numbers and other things. It is not so hard, but you must practise everyday.
LadyBluebell 7 November, 2012 - 13:00
Odranoel - your statement about pmemory not adequately explaining that their system is for reviewing without external aids really clarifies A LOT! Thank you!
I did basically go through the course, learning the connected images to loci. But still, they are images that I would need to learn. I totally understood the purpose of either loci or some other list of images for speeches, remembering a specific list, tricks, etc. However, I could never figure out why I would do this for every vocabulary word, each fact, each item. Even parts of a whole, that’s still a good bit.
This is a huge reason I was so overwhelmed. Without being able to repeat loci for a long while, it seemed like a never ending cycle. Everything needs a loci of some sort plus the connection!
A lot of the course that made no sense falls into place now. I really appreciate your clarification. Although an earlier posting clarified that I probably don’t need a loci for every connection, pMemory now makes more sense. Thank you so much for your help.
LadyBluebell 8 November, 2012 - 11:49
I just finished reading Lorayne’s “…Super Power Memory” & I found it to be a great help. I told myself I would just read for now & develop a plan later, but sometimes my questions get in the way.
As I mentioned, I had started reviewing figurative codes for probably 200-300 numbers with the pMemory system. I really don’t remember them, though. Don’t know if the fault was completely mine or the courses, but although it showed a system of sorts to obtain the images for the numbers, I feel I did too much pure memorization of each code & not enough converting image to number, number to image, if that makes any sense. From what I have been reading & inferring, it seems like the Major System focuses more on being able to convert a number into an image on the fly.
I am somewhat debating between the PAO system I have read about & the Major System. One book I read seemed to say that pegs could be created with Major System images as a (better) alternative to loci palaces. Is this accurate? Do you have any tips on this? Using both for different purposes? Thanks!
odranoel 8 November, 2012 - 12:24
The major system and the pmemory system for generating figurative codes are conceptually equivalent. They are both phonetic systems. The pmemory system is based around the frequencies of consonants in English, so that frequent letters are paired up with less frequent letters, for the most part, so that it is a bit easier to construct images on the fly. My opinion is that there’s no advantage to switch from one to the other, unless you are following a particular program.
Memorizing the figurative codes is supposed to be a process that occurs in stages. In the first stage, you learn the phonetic system, and get comfortable translating from number to letters and vice versa. Once you have that under your belt, you start learning the images/words for the numbers themselves. While the course provides some tricks to help you remember the figurative codes, for many of them you will have to translate a number into letters and use that information to figure out the word for the number. Over time, and with practice, the translation should become automatic.
I mentioned before that pmemory seems to give you more image options for a given number. This is both a strength and a weakness. For example, when trying to remember the image for the number 87, you’d translate that to GQL SD. You could form a number of words with these letters, such as gas, goose, god, quisling, lasso, load, and so on. The image given to you by the course is gosling. It is pretty obvious why, if you’ve forgotten the image, you might not be able to recover it from the phonetic system. My system was simply to create flashcards for the first 100 images, and for FCs I routinely had trouble with, I came up with new images for them. My methodology for creating the new images was to use the first noun I came up with based on the phonetic system, under the theory that I would likely call up the same word again were I to forget the FC. In my example above, that would mean I would choose “gas” as the new FC and ignore “gosling.” There’s nothing that says you have to use the codes they gave you.
I haven’t used the PAO system, so I won’t speculate.
As far as using FCs as pegs, the pmemory course very explicitly states that you should never use a figurative code as an association base. You shouldn’t attach data to figurative codes because you will need to use those codes in many different places, and you’d end up confusing the information. You are better off using loci and refreshing your memory on generating pegs by association. Example: birthday cake, candles, nightlight, monster, closet. I started out with the image of a birthday cake, which makes me think of candles, which makes me think of a dim light in the darkness and therefore a nightlight, which makes me think of children using nightlights because of being afraid of monsters, who live in the closet. Now I can attach information to each of those images and their parts.
Good luck!
Kinma 10 November, 2012 - 07:59
LadyBluebell wrote:
the Spanish word for cow is “vaca.” Connect a cow & a vacuum somehow, a cow vacuuming…
Now Minnie would have an obvious room for her Spanish information - her Spanish classroom. Jane obviously doesn’t, for she just learns by repetition, rote memorization, hoping it’ll stay in there. (Sounds like my college experience.)
But does Minnie need to connect this cow vacuuming mental scene to one of her Spanish classroom loci images? Or loci to cow - cow with an apron vacuuming? This is a major question of mine.
There is already a link in this case, so is loci necessary? Would Minnie’s method for going through the LinkWord course be fundamentally different from Jane’s? I would assume Minnie would be better at creating the mental images in her mind than Jane, but other than that, might it be the same?
This is a very interesting observation and IMO touches the very heart of memorizing.
If you create the link with the cow and the vacuum and if your link is strong enough there is (IMHO) no need to use a locus. Because if you immediately see a vacuum when you think of a cow, or vice versa, there is no added value in storing it into a locus.
The added value comes when you want to serialize a set of words or when you want to rehearse a set of words.
When learning a new language one needs to learns thousands of words.
Creating links takes a bit of time and storing the link into a locus takes another bit of time.
So if you can bypass the locus, you save a bunch of time.
I have tried both ways and find that you can not learn thousands of words and not make mistakes, forget words, etc.
In the real world you will have to relearn some words when learning a new language.
Whether this is with just creating links, whether this is with rote learning or whether this is with using the most elaborate system.
So in my view it all comes down to efficiency. The method of loci let’s you rehearse your words by walking around your palace.
The riddle you need to solve is 'what is the way that you learn the most words, making no extreme amounts of mistakes and in the least amount of time.
The solution to this is personal.
You have invested a lot of time into pmemory. Work with it if it give you enough results. Discard it if it doesn’t.
LadyBluebell wrote:
I realize this has gotten quite long, but I feel I have never really understood the background of this. Although my pMemory experience was pleasant enough, I think there might be something to this paraphrased statement I read somewhere: “pMemory has a way of making the easy difficult.”
That person was me and I said that here.
BuddingProspects 11 November, 2012 - 17:41
There is NO NEED to place an image in a loci when it comes to vocabulary words. If “vaca” means cow, and “vaca” reminds you of vacuum cleaner, well, that’s all you need. This simply means that ANY TIME you see “vacuum cleaner” you’ll INSTANTLY think of a cow using it, and then the word “vaca” will appear. The same in reverse: seeing “vaca” will INSTANTLY remind you of a cow using a vacuum cleaner.
Of course, you can place the image in a locus, if that’s what you want. But the point is that it is not NECESSARY to think of “place” for a vocabulary word.
Instant association is a very effective way of dealing with hundreds or thousands of words and you’ll never have to worry about running out of loci. All you need do is create a “proper” image, i.e., an image that’s funny, weird, stupid, sexual, outrageous, etc. In other words, simply make it MEMORABLE to you, in YOUR OWN WAY.
This will free you from “placing” an image. Dominic O’Brien used this method to memorize answers to Trivial Pursuit questions.
Yes, he also suggested that you place verbs in a park or gym, or divide a city into areas for masculine and feminine words, etc. I’ve always wondered if he was successful at this for, say, 5000 or 10,000 words. He doesn’t say.
I’ve always only used instant association and, for me, it works. In this way, I never have to spend time “finding a place” to put the image.
odranoel 11 November, 2012 - 19:04
BuddingProspects wrote:
There is NO NEED to place an image in a loci when it comes to vocabulary words. If “vaca” means cow, and “vaca” reminds you of vacuum cleaner, well, that’s all you need. This simply means that ANY TIME you see “vacuum cleaner” you’ll INSTANTLY think of a cow using it, and then the word “vaca” will appear. The same in reverse: seeing “vaca” will INSTANTLY remind you of a cow using a vacuum cleaner.
Respectfully, one still requires some technique for reviewing vocabulary over the long term. Some mnemonics or associations will be so strong, or words used so frequently in your studies, that you never need to go over them. But many will require some dedicated means of making sure the vocabulary stays in your memory. That said, I think spaced repetition software like Anki is probably the best approach for long term memorization. In the short term, it often helps to review daily or even every few hours, and the most convenient means of doing that is, I think, a mental list. Or you can carry around index cards.
BuddingProspects 11 November, 2012 - 19:21
Yes, of course reviewing is necessary. I was simply speaking of the technique for encoding the word in the first place.
I made my own flashcards and carried them around. (Hint = cut an index card into thirds and then use them as flashcards. You don’t need a whole index card for just one word!)
I reviewed them over and over. I got to the point where I only had to review twice a week, then once a week, then once a month, and then the intervals got longer and longer. If you PHYSICALLY make the cards yourself, you’ll make the reinforcement stronger than if you rely on ANKI, because you’d be getting INVOLVED in the words in a way you can’t do with ANKI. Well, that’s what worked for me.
But I still say that instant association is the best way, for the reasons I stated.
Metivier 11 November, 2012 - 19:23
BuddingProspects wrote:
There is NO NEED to place an image in a loci when it comes to vocabulary words. If “vaca” means cow, and “vaca” reminds you of vacuum cleaner, well, that’s all you need. This simply means that ANY TIME you see “vacuum cleaner” you’ll INSTANTLY think of a cow using it, and then the word “vaca” will appear. The same in reverse: seeing “vaca” will INSTANTLY remind you of a cow using a vacuum cleaner.
Of course, you can place the image in a locus, if that’s what you want. But the point is that it is not NECESSARY to think of “place” for a vocabulary word.
Instant association is a very effective way of dealing with hundreds or thousands of words and you’ll never have to worry about running out of loci. All you need do is create a “proper” image, i.e., an image that’s funny, weird, stupid, sexual, outrageous, etc. In other words, simply make it MEMORABLE to you, in YOUR OWN WAY.
This will free you from “placing” an image. Dominic O’Brien used this method to memorize answers to Trivial Pursuit questions.
Yes, he also suggested that you place verbs in a park or gym, or divide a city into areas for masculine and feminine words, etc. I’ve always wondered if he was successful at this for, say, 5000 or 10,000 words. He doesn’t say.
I’ve always only used instant association and, for me, it works. In this way, I never have to spend time “finding a place” to put the image.
This would not work very well for me because I do not like to learn languages randomly. I like to learn them alphabetically.
Take a word like Zerbrechen in German. I have it along a journey with a number of other Zer words, as well as Zu words. With Zerbrechen I have Zerbrechlich and Zerbrechlichkeit at the same location. Before that zerschalgen, before that zerfleischen, etc.
I have no problem with recall and don’t need to actually go through my various journeys to find the words when I need them. But because I memorize alphabetically, loci is for me the only way to travel.
BuddingProspects 11 November, 2012 - 19:51
If you have no problem with recall, then no one has the right to say that what you’re doing is “wrong”.
You may not “like” to learn vocabulary words randomly, but you CAN do it if you had to. You’ve simply made a CHOICE not to. If your system of encoding the words works (and it obviously does work), then it makes no difference whatsoever if you do it alphabetically or randomly. Loci don’t care if you place them all according to initial letter or if you drop them randomly. There is no inherent value to HOW you place them, because they’re locked into a locus, and locking happens whether you do it randomly or not.
I don’t try to talk you out of your system. I’m only saying that your logic is off when you attempt to invest “alphabetically” with some kind of superior power, when it’s only a matter of choice, of personal preference.
Instant association is my way, so that I can cut out the extra step of trying to figure out a “place” to put the word, of trying to figure out an “appropriate” place, of trying constantly to come up with journey after journey for 20,000 words or of extending a journey to 20,000 places.
If you want to come up with 20,000 loci for 20,000 vocabulary words and if it does, in fact, work for you, then who’s to say “no”? Not I.
Kinma 12 November, 2012 - 11:23
I agree with the previous speakers. There is no inherent need for using loci when learning a language.
You can do it if you feel this will be advantageous in some way, but again it is not necessary.
Create strong links where you think of a cow when you see a vacuum (in your mind) and when you think of a vacuum you see a cow. If you can do this; that’s it. That is all there is to learning words.
Then, after learning maybe 100-200 words, there might be 5 or 10 that seem particularly difficult.
Put them inside a palace and rehearse them for 5 days straight. I bet you will never forget those difficult words.
Alex 13 November, 2012 - 20:08
Short answer:
Yes. It is time-consuming.
Longer answer:
Do you type using the hunt-and-peck method, or do you just sit down at the keyboard and the letters show up as you type semi-consciously? It takes months and months to get to the point where you can sit down, start typing, and then do something else while you tap on the keys. Was it worth all that effort?
odranoel 13 November, 2012 - 20:38
Alex makes an excellent point. It takes time to develop a skill that works like a reflex. It is the same thing for any complicated human activity: playing an instrument, learning mathematics, even driving. The more you work at it, the faster you will be. Like learning music, memory techniques have more than one aspect that you must master if you want to be a well-rounded mnemonist. Anybody can learn to competently play one or two songs on an instrument, but musicianship includes being able to read music, improvise, understand the relationships between chords, and so on.
Learning the major system or something similar is just one aspect of being competent, but if you stick with it and put in the effort, I think you will find it is worthwhile.
Matiaz 25 November, 2012 - 18:01
Hello, i understand that Locci is not necessary unless im trying to store concepts in ceratin order in my head.
Im trying to learn cities and and capitals and agree that i dont need to do the extra work by trying to find a place for each country and capital.
Now i need to learn a large number of importante cities for every country in my geography class (also rivers, mountains, ports, mines, etc), so my question is:
Can i store a large amount of cities for each country with using locci? I dont need an specific order or secuence, i only need to know where every citie belongs, as well as rivers, mines, etc.
looking fwd for a response.
odranoel 25 November, 2012 - 20:55
matiaz wrote:
Hello, i understand that Locci is not necessary unless im trying to store concepts in ceratin order in my head.
Im trying to learn cities and and capitals and agree that i dont need to do the extra work by trying to find a place for each country and capital.Now i need to learn a large number of importante cities for every country in my geography class (also rivers, mountains, ports, mines, etc), so my question is:
Can i store a large amount of cities for each country with using locci? I dont need an specific order or secuence, i only need to know where every citie belongs, as well as rivers, mines, etc.
looking fwd for a response.
Loci or a memory palace is the preferred technique, in my mind, when you have a one-to-many relationship. In this case, for each country, you have a bunch of bits of information that you want to be associated with the country. Loci allows you to group items without redundantly keeping track of the country for each item.
However, you will probably want to base the technique on how you are being tested. Grouping items in the way I suggest would lead to inefficient recall if you are given the city or geographic feature and then expected to give the country.
In that situation, you could just create images for each city or feature and attach an image for the country to the image for the city or feature. As an example: if you needed to remember that the Tiber is in Italy, you might remember it by imagining a tree falling (timber!) with spaghetti and meatballs on the tree. You could imagine a garden hose wrapped around the tree stump to signify a river. When you read “Tiber,” you will then be able to immediate derive that it is a river in Italy.
LociInTheSky 1 June, 2014 - 21:12
Lol, it really is, imho…
I was at a bar talking to the American competitor Livan about random words after the USAMC. The 43rd and 44th words I believe…were “deserve” and “rose.” He said he remembered those by thinking of how his girlfriend deserves a rose for putting up with all his training! xD
“Mine too,” I thought.
Sorry to respond only to the thread title :\