Journal to Remember

Memory Training Journals
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In total transparency, I was inspired by reading meepster’s Memory Training Journal: Un-Stupiding Myself - a Memory Training Journal. If you haven’t yet, I encourage you to take a few minutes to even read the opening post. Their longing to improve their mental acuity (had to look that word up because I forgot it) strongly resonated with me and has been an on-and-off goal for a while now. I think joining a community and making this declaration might finally help me stick to it.

There are no major hardships that led to my poor memory of today. The biggest culprits are likely addictive tendencies to binging series/shorts, constant transitioning from one interest to another, and, of course, social media. So, nowadays, I don’t focus on much except for work, and once that’s done, I really don’t focus on anything.

What does this mean? My attention span, active recall, and overall memory have suffered immeasurably. This will sound a bit pretentious, but after having been pretty good in several languages, I’m nearly back to only knowing one. And it’s really a bummer because I liked learning languages to learn more about people, and I always kept in mind, “when you speak to someone in their second language, you are speaking to their mind. When you speak to someone in their native language, you are speaking to their heart.”

On top of that, I want to remember songs and poems again. I want to reflect on conversations and days and remember the details that made moments within them special. I also, want to remember places more vividly than thinking I’ve seen a couple of buildings. I recognize building my memory won’t solve all of this, but it will sure do a lot more than doing nothing.

So where do I start? I read Moonwalking with Einstein by Joshua Foer a looooong time ago, and it sparked my initial interest in the method of loci and building memory palaces. It’s something I will likely work up to rather than begin with though because when I dove into them initially, it felt clunky and complex. Here is what I’m thinking to start and will fiddle with through trial and error:

Initial Goals:

  • Memorize 8 words in a foreign language a week
  • Memorize a poem a week
  • Dual N-back Exercises (yes, I’ve taken these two ideas from meepster)

I really have no foundational training in this, and, at the same time, I have big aspirations I’m not ready to put in writing yet. I’m excited to see where this goes and worried it will be a tumbleweed of an idea. Anyways I hope to come back with good news on progress.

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I’m honored that my journal inspired you! I wish you luck with your journey. One thing - I’m honestly not sure that Dual N-Back exercises did all that much for me, as it turned out. I did them for a while, got to a reasonably high level, and really didn’t notice much of a difference. I’m now trying focused meditation, following the book “The Mind Illuminated”, and I’m hoping that makes more of a difference in the area of attention span and focus. So, take my Dual N-Back advice with a huge grain of salt.

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Yes—what you say is backed up by most independent scientific studies on the matter, which conclude that brain training is task-specific. In other words, you can upgrade your software, but unfortunately not your hardware.

This recent article, by a blogger I respect, goes into more depth.

On the other hand, anything that makes your mind work (learning, remembering, calculating, languages, physical movement, etc.) will surely keep your mind prepared, and I’d expect there’s a big difference in mental acuity in older people between those who kept challenging their mind and those who didn’t.

Plus, it’s fun and languages/skills are useful.

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Maybe watch this video just to see a memory palace in practice. It’s really straight forward when it’s not somebody theorizing about but rather just doing it. Anyway, hope it helps…

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Thank you all! First of all, I wasn’t expecting anyone to notice this so quickly, especially you meepster, and I’m hugely honored that you’ve all taken the time to reply. You and Daniel have given me back a portion of my day to repurpose for another kind of mental training, and I’ll do some brainstorming on where to focus. I actually meditate daily, but it could be a big help to read a book on it for additional guidance and insights.

bjoern - This video is great! After Moonwalking with Einstein, I used to hop on mullenmemory periodically to pick up tips and tricks. This and the one where he and his wife(?) are memorizing a page or paragraph from a textbook in a room actually stuck out in my mind the moment I saw this video! I think my main problem was that I would always try to squeeze too much into a space. It made recalling difficult, and it also made the journey through the palace feel really slow and cumbersome. I need to go back through their posts - I remember they were super helpful before, and I’ve sadly forgotten much of what I read on their blog.

As for best practices right now, since I’m just starting, I’m really in the habit-carving stage. So I’m making a deliberate effort to carve out specific points in the day where I focus on this. Right now, the goal is words twice a day, once after waking up and once before bed, and poetry memorization after work. The foreign language is Turkish, and I’m vocab-focused specifically because I still use it periodically, but my lexicon is practically microscopic (somehow grammar seems to be more sticky to my memory).

Also, in the spirit of this endeavor, I thought the first poem that would be fun to work on memorizing would be “Forgetfulness” by Billy Collins. We’ll see where I am by the end of the week.

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“You have to kind of push yourself to your limits before you can retract to the optimal place” - Jordan Peterson, random youtube short

“Making a choice that is 1% better or 1% worse is insignificant in the moment. But over a span of moments that make up a lifetime, these choices determine the difference between who you are and who you could be” - James Clear, Atomic Habits

Coming back to this, I stumbled early on with a few events that interrupted the habit. But I also realized I was overly ambitious. My concentration is just not where it was, and I wanted to start the marathon without having run a lap in a long time. I’m continuing with the word memorization but I’m changing up the initial goals to build a better foundation first. First, the criteria for each goal:

  1. It has to have a set start date and a set end date

  2. It must be measurable

  3. There must be sound reasoning for pursuing each goal

  4. It has to be something I want to do, not just something I think will make me better

  5. Each goal is allowed a two-week trial period where I allow myself to drop it

Honestly, this is really important for me because I always build up ideas, try to execute too many, and then get demotivated

These are the guardrails I hope will help me with my goals.

Initial Goals:

  1. Memorize 10 words in Turkish a week starting 10/2 until I memorize 500 words. I want to learn more languages, and I think 500 is a decent base to understand many conversations and express ideas

  2. Build a major system for numbers starting 10/2. My goal is to have the first 001-099 down by the end of December

  3. Read a poem a day, no need to memorize right now

  4. 10-20 minutes a day of mindful meditation with the goal of increases to 30-45 minutes on the weekends

  5. A daily walk, even if it just stepping outside for 5 minutes, with the goal of at least a mile day

These all seem like very reasonable and achievable goals. The big things I think these will help me with in addition to focus is time management and hopefully focus. Honestly, the consistent focus is always the hard part. I’ll probably throw a sticky note on my front door, and maybe lay a few motivational reminders around the house.