Hi guys! Long time lurker here who has finally gathered the courage to post. I’m Clau. Apologies if this post is long or confusing but I feel like this is the place where I can talk about it since I don’t know anybody who practices the art of memory in real life. I learnt about the art of memory around two years ago, read Moonwalking with Einstein and Memory Craft (amazing books!) and started experimenting with the techniques. I have been getting more comfortable with memory palaces, so far I’ve used them occasionally to remember presentations and speeches as well as some things for school. However, I’ve mostly used them for short-term memory and just tended to reuse the places I know better.
The issue is that I would like to become more proficient in this art: firstly, because my postgrad studies require me to pass a set of exams that are known to be very competitive and focused on memorization. Secondly, because I have a genuine interest in learning and would like to use the techniques to supplement my retention in the long run instead of feeling like memory palaces are only useful to memorize things for short-term recall.
I have been writing a spreadsheet with ideas for possible memory palaces and journeys, as well as trying to be more mindful of the places I go to. But I feel like I’m getting overwhelmed because I forget routes and loci that could be used for the palaces. I suppose it’s normal if I’ve only gone to the place one time, but I feel like I’ve exhausted all the places I go to regularly. On Saturday I went to the aquarium for the first time in a while and made a conscious effort to be mindful of the steps I was taking on my way there, but then felt like I could only remember the gist of the route. This sucks because I would love to come up with as many loci as possible to store information. At the same time, I’m trying to give virtual memory palaces a shot but again I just feel overwhelmed, like I’m not even going to be able to recall the route or loci, much less the information associated with it. Has anyone gone through this? Do you have any tips on how to improve it? I have been thinking of starting a memory diary of some sort to keep track of the things I memorize and where I memorize them, as well as exercises to improve my visualization.
Any help will be greatly appreciated.
Kind regards,
There are a lot of options for memory palaces - they need not be physical buildings or buildings at all. Any structure that you can mentally traverse at will, will do the job. And the items to be stored need not be placed in a chamber - they can be attached to any feature.
Parts of your body
Your vehicle
An item of clothing
Any item with enough parts - your phone, bicycle, pocket knife, kitchen range
A fantasy scene that you know well
A simple story
A song
You can invent your own fantasy structures, draw them or construct with software
You can use tools to reduce your cognitive load related to these activities and practice making and traversing your MP as a separate activity.
The is my workflow making new memory palaces. I currently have 50 palaces and 1300 loci and I made most of those in the same month.
Brainstorm locations in a general sense and curate a large list
Name the palace and place the named palace into an A-Z network of palaces (A - Airport, B - Ben’s House)
3-1 If it is somewhere I lived in the past mentally walk through it create names for each loci and a brief description in Excel
3-2 If it is somewhere I am visiting in person use Google sheets to create the same named loci and brief description
While referencing my Excel loci create a rudimentary sketch quickly without agonizing over detail
Reference my sketch to slowly draw my long-term reference for the palace (30-45 min avg)
I complete steps 1-3 en masse and then have a backlog of steps 4 and 5 I chip away at over time with a goal of 1 per day.
These drawings are valuable to me not only to have a natural cognitive load dump and learn them faster but also so I can take 6 months off mnemonics in the future and not lose all my palaces. I will just open my binder and it will be like riding a bike to use them again.
New palace location ideas:
Costco, Dick’s Sporting Goods, Best Buy, Five Guys, and several local parks are ones I visited with intent to make a palace.
Museums, airports, hotels, travel airbnb with nice side effect of long-term memory of your vacation.
Everywhere you lived and worked in the past 10 years.
First, take pictures! When you’re walking through the aquarium, pull out your phone and snap a bunch of pictures as you go. You can then go over them a few times and figure it out where to put the loci.
Second, use fictional places. Specifically, scenes from a movie that you know well or a TV show that you watch. Particularly sitcoms where they show the characters’ homes or places of work. If you’ve watched Seinfeld then you’ve seen Jerry’s apartment hundreds of times. Plus it’s easy to find pictures or videos on ,one to go back through and search for places to put your loci.
