Although I’d love to have one, a memory palace has never worked for me for the simple reason that I struggle to recall the order of even real-world spaces. I’ve lived in the same town my whole life (a town with only one road going down the middle of it) and yet I couldn’t tell you in what order you’d find things along the road. I simply cannot close my eyes and see them happening in sequence. I do have a poor memory in general, but remembering objects on a path and their relative distance is one of my worst facilities.
So the idea of walking a set path in an imagined space and recalling the arrangement of furniture, doors, and so on, is as daunting as it is difficult for me. My theory is that I have a degree of time-blindness due to my ADHD and the part of my mind responsible for tracking time is the same as the part responsible for tracking motion along a path.
Are there other methods with similar impact as the Loci Method that don’t require this sort of natural ability to visualize relative placement and distance of objects? Something I’m pretty good at memorizing is melody when played on an instrument, if that helps. Also, does anyone else have this problem?
Interesting. I hadn’t considered using my own body as a map. I’m not sure how I’d connect concepts to music, it usually only works the other way around (music evokes images) but I can certainly try. Thanks!
Your post doesn’t make sense in that you say it’s “never worked for me” but then talk about the “idea of” it. Which is it? Have you actually tried it? It doesn’t sound like it.
Don’t abandon the best method before you really make an effort.
At worst you can physically walk a route (Lynne Kelly does this) so you don’t have to remember it. But you probably don’t get lost inside your house or in your neighborhood.
I encourage you to explore this more deeply. It’s worth it.
There are plenty of people here that will help you if you make an effort.
I’ve tried a handful of times, but I’ve never been able to progress past a single session. Either the palace disappears completely before I retrieve it, or I can’t even build the space and keep it consistent in the first place.