Tips for Boosting Memory

This is a good little video with some learning tips to improve memory retention. It's the same thing I learned from a speaker at the LDSholistic Living conference I hosted for last summer. So since I saw it twice, I thought I'd actually post the helpful hints. This one is from www.kwicklearning.com.

Here's the acronym he says to remember when trying to learn:

FAST
F - Focus/Forget (be in the moment, focused on what you are learning--or the person you are talking to, if you hope to remember their name. Forget everything else going on around it....all those needed thoughts will still be there when you're done, but you net to let go of other thoughts to focus on the one needful one at hand.)
A - Active (keep your learning active. Don't just stare blankly and absorb, but look intently, keep your mind engaged with postivity and a desire to get something valuable out of the experience)
S - State (sit or stand in the state you would normally do if you were fully focused and excited about what you are learning. You definitely would be in a lethargic state if what you were learning was super exciting)
T - Take Notes (capture facts and words, then create/apply. Make have two columns or have symbols)

I personally use boxes with various symbols in them for the create part that I indicate in the left margin. I like using check marks for a goal I decide to make, ? for questioned posed or that I have now, I draw a little open book for scripture verse that goes along with it, quote marks for a quote, etc.

It doesn't matter what ways you use to take note, as long as the system works for you. So make sure you have a system that helps you categorize and place what you are hearing and applying. If you're not a systems person, maybe this can help you be more of one.

--
He also did an exercise to memorize 10 keys to overcome information overload: boosting brain power to learn quicker.

1.  Diet
2.  Killing ANTS (Automatic negative thoughts)
3.  Exercise
3.  Brain Nutrients
5.  Positive Peers (friends)
6.  Clean environments
7.  Sleep
8.  Brain protection
9.  New learning
10.Stress management

Memory deals with location. So he tells us how to memorize these 10 points listed above by giving them visual location and a connection of walking to each of them.

So imagine going for a walk in your house and find ten different places/objects in your house you walk to in a certain order (ex: start at bed in bedroom and then go to hallway, and then downstairs, etc.). Close your eyes and visualize going from one spot to the next spot. Then give each location an object or action associated with the ten points you are memorizing (ex: for diet, you could imagine a plant on your bedroom (which was the first location). Then do the walk again with the points associated. Then do the exercise again backwards.With each piece of information in a familiar surrounding you should be able to recall each piece of info, and in any order.

This is how I memorize things, but not normally so intense of an exercise. But I will start doing this exercise more for poems I want to memorize and such. The speaker I heard at the conference said his little boy memorized all his 100 lines of a play in one day using this method. Pretty cool, huh?

He summarizes our ability to learn quicker and have greater clarity in our mind as being better for our health and better for making it through trials and vice versa because we can focus on the essentials we are thinking about at that moment and set trials aside for more important needs.

Other points to consider:
1. Knowledge is potential Power: Use what you learn
2. Use location method to place info - Use the 10 points above
3. Questions are the Answer. Question the information you come across: Do you need it? Is it truth, fact, theory, gossip?