I have a huge issue in which I can remember the ‘essence’ of a conversation, but never the exact wording. I can remember that someone made a nice sentiment that made me feel good, but can never remember the exact words they said. I am really bad at retelling stories because I’m never going to get to wording right.
Ive written things down in the past, even recorded conversations I don’t want to forget, but it’s not always practical.
I wonder if there’s anything I can do to get better at remembering wording/actual quotes said to me.
Okay so the issue is related to both speed of encoding and recall. First thing is you should have memory palaces ready to be used, empty. Second thing is you should have an alphabet system well trained, to the point that you can think about the letters and immediatly remember the PAO or PO.
Once that is done, you’ll have to practice recalling the info mid conversation depending on how long the convo is.
You can do all of this without being completely focused on memorizing, but you’ll be slightly distracted from the words being spoken as you memorize. Focus on pauses in the conversation as perfect available time to memorize what was said. Maybe even create small moments of distraction like pretending to look away then saying “sorry” and asking them to repeat what they had said.
Also, exact wording will require thinking about the most important words in the sentence. You want to focus on lexical words instead of functional word classes, such as prepositions and articles.