Being Aware of Original Awareness
Do you often forget where you put things, like your keys? I'm fascinated by the way our brains work, and here's what I've deciphered to date:
- People who forget where they put their keys, etc. may actually need to work on "Original Awareness". The theory is that you aren't actually forgetting, but you were actually never aware of where you put them in the first place. By being "originally aware" of where you put something, you won't forget it later.
The brain remembers by association. That's why people often say, "Oh that reminds me of...". You can take advantage of this by using the "peg" system. Here's a brief overview (although the memory books in the link above go into more detail). First, the hard part. You have to memorize the following letters with the numbers 1 to 10:
- â—¦1 = T
- â—¦2 = N
- â—¦3 = M
- â—¦4 = R
- â—¦5 = L
- â—¦6 = SH
- â—¦7 = K
- â—¦8 = V
- â—¦9 = B
- â—¦0 = S
- Once you've memorized these letters to numbers, you can start combining them. Vowels are "free", i.e., you can add them anytime. So, for example, if someone asks you to remember a shopping list of the following items, you'd do it as follows:
Milk, carrots, hamburgers, apples... etc.
Since milk is the first item, you create an association with your first "peg" of "T". My word is "tie" (remember, you can add any vowels you want). So then I imagine, for example, a tie tied around a jug of milk.
My next word is "noah" (using "N" for #2). So for carrots, I'd imagine a pair of carrots marching out of Noah's Ark.
My next word is "mow" (using "M"). So for hamburgers, maybe I'd imagine mowing a hamburger (messy!).
And so on. Creating vivid images in your mind based on these "pegs" helps you remember (that's the association part I was referring to earlier.) You can read more about the "peg" system here.