Enhancing Your Memory

Enhancing your memory is possible. It takes awareness and practice, but the results are well worth it. There are three basic parts of the memory: Attention, storage and retrieval. Think of it as you would a filing cabinet. Pay attention when you start to store information or you will not be able to retrieve it.

To improve your memory, you must increase your attention to details to increase the meaningfulness of the information you want to store. You can get organized through association and visualization. You need to use all five senses every day. Think of something you have seen that really pleased you, listen to some good music, read a book, smell some food that you really enjoy and touch something that feels particularly good to you like a favorite blouse or sweater or dress. Use rhyme to help remember. For instance, “Is this October or November? Did I do good? Will my mom say, ‘You were so sweet to me today!’?” Try acronym for grocery list. Cereal, oranges, milk and bread could be COMB.

Keeping your mind active is imperative. Take some time each day and play a video game or work a crossword puzzle. There is always one in the morning newspaper or online. Work a jigsaw puzzle online or if you have the extra room, keep a jigsaw puzzle going on a table. Then if you have a little time or if you get stuck, you can stop and go back later. Sometimes when you do that, the piece you could not find jumps out at you. Just remember that you lose what you don't use. Find creative ways to exercise your brain everyday.