Lose the I Forgot an Old Friend Blues by Memory Training

Lose the I Forgot an Old Friend Blues by Memory Training

So you’re walking down the street of your old hometown. It’s been about five years since you’ve last visited and you’re excited to see old friends and loved ones, then it happens. Someone vaguely familiar to you walks up and begins a conversation by using your name. They speak as though the two of you have been best friends since childhood, but you can’t remember their name to save your life. It’s always incredibly embarrassing when you eventually are forced to admit that you can’t remember their name, or even a good deal about them in general and they always look so hurt.

What’s worse is that you always feel so guilty because you forgot them, you didn’t mean to, but your memory just let you down. Fret not wayward worrier, because there are ways to improve your memory. They all fall under a blanket term called memory training. Most of them are techniques that get your knowledge retention up and teach you strategies to commit casual bits of information, like names, to long term memory.

Fitness—Yeah, Like Exercise

Just like your body needs exercise, so does your mind. Now you can’t go and jog for twenty minutes and expect to be able to remember things more accurately. Actually being healthy does help, but, in the same vain there are memory training regimens designed specifically to stretch that big muscle between your ears.

There are a few things you can do during the course of the day to help with your memory training. First, just keep your brain active, this means think about things as opposed to sitting there like a lump on a log. You can also use your imagination, daydream a little bit. Allow your mind to create vivid new worlds for it to explore and then return to them using your memory. You can also engage in little things like doing crossword puzzles or putting a puzzle together without looking at the box.

There are even videogames designed to help you with your memory training. They are inexpensive, priced around thirty dollars, and are pretty challenging. They include exercises that have time limits, as well as an assortment of different quizzes and tests. The bombardment may seem a bit overwhelming at first, but memory training is just like getting into physical shape. At first your brain might ache from the assault of new information, but in the long run that memory training will pay off for you.