by Tansel Ali
Exaggeration. Make things much larger than they are in real life so your mind creates an extraordinary image to remember. Visualise a kebab six metres tall waddling down the road with garlic sauce dripping down its sides and crowds of screaming, hungry people running up to it, tripping over themselves from all directions with absolute joy. Unforgettable!
How it works
Think of a subject and then apply SMASHIN SCOPE to make it more memorable.
A cat
In milliseconds you just visualised a cat. To make the cat more memorable we could colour the cat red (Colour), make it smell like it had farted (Senses), have it jump up on top of you (Movement) to rub that smell on you (Senses). This (hopefully) is not a real-life scenario so in its creation we used imagination, association with the cat and yourself, as well as exaggeration of the narrative. Try not to use your everyday logic when creating stories. Use your imagination to make silly creative stories that will stick in your mind. After all, you are trying to make it memorable!
Make memorable stories from the following pairs of words using SMASHIN SCOPE. Each pair has been divided into examples of concrete nouns, concrete + abstract nouns, and finally both abstract nouns. Concrete nouns already give us a visual of the word, but abstract nouns don’t. You’ll need to create an image for the abstract noun and connect it back to the other word.
cow + strike
………………………………………………………………………………….
toothpaste + hibernation
………………………………………………………………………………….
experience + mediation
………………………………………………………………………………….
SMASHIN SCOPE helps integrate the logical part of your brain with the creative to enhance your mental capabilities. It may seem ridiculous to make things humorous or to use different colours, but you’re still learning. The more you do these sorts of exercises in your head the more you’ll discover what a practical difference they make in the real world. In meetings where you need to solve problems quickly, instead of having one or two ideas, you might now come up with five. Even in sport, instead of having three options to choose from, your mind can now think laterally and consider other scenarios. Often the best people in sport and business are creative and are making the best decisions. This does not have to be an innate thing. It can be learned by using simple tools such as SMASHIN SCOPE.
How long? Once you’ve done some practising it should take around thirty seconds to create a story using SMASHIN SCOPE. For difficult, non-concrete words, it may take up to one minute.
The Yellow Elephant Memory Model
My first book was called The Yellow Elephant, which also happens to be the name of a memory model I developed. It helps us to solve memory-related problems by following a four-step guide to make something memorable.
1. Abstract
Information, ideas or concepts (without physical form), or things that do not make sense to us are likely to be abstract. This includes languages that we’re unfamiliar with and highly specialised forms of learning such as quantum physics. Strings of numbers, words, and even people’s names can be abstract. Abstract things are slippery to understand and don’t mean anything to us unless an image is created inside our brain.
2. Image
To make things more memorable we need to convert the abstract into an image. We may or may not be able to understand what this abstract thing means, but by making it an image we prepare our mind to understand how to use it at step 3. The word ‘creativity’, for example, is abstract as it does not conjure up a specific image in our mind. If, however, we use the image of a lightbulb or even that of Albert Einstein then we have converted the abstract nature of the word to an image we both recognise and understand.
3. Association
To complete the memorisation process, we need a story connecting the elements through association. A strong association is made when what you’re memorising is physically connected. Earlier I used the example of pen and paper and how when the pen writes on paper, or better yet shreds the paper by pressing too firmly on it, a stronger association is made. The stronger the association, the more memorable it is.
4. Communication
How do you then make this memorable for others? Steps 1 to 3 occur in our own heads but communicating this to others may require some adapting and adjusting. What we create for ourselves may not suit or be appropriate for our audience so we need to consider new ways to craft information that others can understand, whether it’s study notes from class or grand public presentations.
How it works
Remembering names
Names are forgotten because they are abstract in nature. There is no image for our brains to connect and store. So the trick to remembering names is to create the image and make an association.
If you’re trying to remember the name Clare, for example, you could picture Clare being eaten by a bear. ‘Bear’ will trigger the name Clare because of their shared rhyming properties. You may also picture Clare looking like a bear. Or perhaps Clare has lots of hair sprouting from her nose, or claw-like hands! Make this image as graphic as you can. You may even imagine Clare being chased by a bear—but because there is no physical connection or contact between Clare and the bear it weakens the memorisation. So even though there may be an emotional connection to the image, such as Clare’s fear of the bear, a physical connection with your images will help you remember better.
When listening
Words are extremely powerful and can have deep emotional connections—but only if they’re visualised. You can listen to instructions, presentations, or even a friend chatting to you, but if you don’t convert what they are saying into images you may miss the importance of the message and increase your likelihood of forgetting. When listening to anything, visualise the images using SMASHIN SCOPE principles to make better stories and you’ll remember much more than before.
When trying to learn anything new
When you first come across information it needs to be organised and arranged in a way for your brain to make sense of it and create images. Techniques such as mind maps (chapter 3) and drawings help you visualise and order information. Once you have visual order, you can make connecting stories.
• Imagination is the key to making anything more memorable.
• Build on foundation memory principles with SMASHIN ScOPE and bring your story to life. You can practise on anything you can visualise.
• The Yellow Elephant Memory Model will help you when you are not sure how to remember something. Break it down by looking at how you can create memorable mental images and link the story.
CHAPTER 3
MEMORY TECHNIQUES
Many people believe having a great memory is a gift. When I was nineteen, I actually believed I had a ‘shocking’ memory. I would forget names, directions, what I had just read, and even what people had said to me a minute ago. It was embarrassing; however, I accepted that I had not been born with a great memory – that is, until I stumbled upon memory techniques.
These ‘mental activities’ made me use my imagination and little did I know how easy it was to improve my memory. Not only that, but I would go on to learn much faster, achieve more, and gain significant confidence in myself to do anything as I got older. Now it is your turn to experience the power of memory techniques.
Linking and association
Linking and association is a technique that helps us remember effectively by creating stories using the items we want to remember in a sequential order. I
t’s possible to link and associate any piece of information with another. Many people are unsuccessful in their early attempts to do this, though, because their links and connections are broken along the way to memorisation.
How it works
Let’s say we had five items to remember. The linking process would look like this:
The first item is connected to the initial subject, and to the second item. Each subsequent item is connected to the one following it in a sequence.
How to use
Remembering a list of words:
1. shoes
2. milk
3. postman
4. donkey
5. blue
Imagine your shoes smelling profusely. You decide to take them off, and as you do milk starts to pour out! The milk splatters everywhere and somehow splashes into the eye of the postman. The postman is angry, jumps on his donkey and starts to chase you. You run for your life and feel yourself getting sick and suddenly you turn blue!
To-do list:
1. Take the rubbish bin out.
2. Buy the newspaper.
3. Pick up dry cleaning.
4. Work out at the gym.
5. Water the plants.
You head out of the house and suddenly the rubbish bin flips over and tips itself on top of you. The rubbish is full of newspapers that stink like something has died in them. Before you retch you head over to the dry cleaners to change into clean clothes. You feel refreshed and pumped, so much so that you’re inspired to workout at the gym. You drink too much water during your workout and the toilets are out of order so you end up watering the plants.
With linking and association the word you are memorising does not have to be exactly the same as how you memorise it. So if I try to remember the word ‘kaleidoscope’, I might visualise and come up with something that sounds like the first part of the word, such as ‘calendar’, where ‘cal’ acts as a trigger to ‘kaleidoscope’. My associative story could then be that I looked at my calendar and it was spiralling visually like broken mirrors.
How long? As long as it takes to read the paragraph and connect with the listed words, around one minute.
This book uses many triggers to form associations with words. Since we are using our own imagination everyone’s stories and triggers will be different, so feel free to create your own triggers to the exercises in this book.
Number rhyme
This is where the numbers rhyme with the words.
How it works
one = gun
two = shoe
three = tree
four = door
five = hive
six = sticks
seven = heaven
eight = gate
nine = wine
ten = pen
How to use
Let’s say we want to remember the words on the right of the rhyming words. We link the rhyming list with the words to be remembered list.
1. gun: elephant
2. shoe: breakfast
3. tree: CD
4. door: computer
5. hive: TV remote
6. sticks: water
7. heaven: towel
8. gate: chocolate
9. wine: tomato
10. pen: phone
The elephant is shot with a gun. (Luckily it does not die.)
You eat breakfast with your shoe as a spoon.
The tree outside is growing cDs.
The door opens onto a supercomputer.
There is a beehive inside the TV remote.
You throw sticks into the water because you are bored.
As soon as you enter heaven you are given a refresher towel.
The gate is made out of chocolate and you have to bite your way through to enter.
You shove a whole tomato inside a wine bottle.
You draw smiley faces with your coloured pen on a stranger’s mobile phone.
Recall
All that’s left now is to remember what happened with each of the rhyming numbers to give you the item you had memorised.
1. gun
…………………….
2. shoe
…………………….
3. tree
…………………….
4. door
…………………….
5. hive
…………………….
6. sticks
…………………….
7. heaven
…………………….
8. gate
…………………….
9. wine
…………………….
10. pen
…………………….
How long? Around ten seconds for each story from the above examples, so a little under two minutes.
Number shape
This is just like the number rhyme system but it uses images that look like the number instead of rhyming with it.
How it works
one =
two =
three =
four =
five =
six =
seven =
eight =
nine =
ten =
How to use
Let’s say we want to remember the words on the right of the number shape words. We link both the shape list with the words to be remembered list.
1. candlestick elephant
2. swan breakfast
3. trident CD
4. boat computer
5. hook TV remote
6. elephant’s trunk water
7. feathers towel
8. glasses chocolate
9. snake tomato
10. bat and ball phone
The candlestick burns the butt of the elephant.
The swan eats poached eggs for breakfast.
At Trident Motors they are giving away free One Direction CDs.
Your boat has a computer attached to the end of it for GPS navigation.
You grab your TV remote with a hook because you just can’t be bothered getting up.
The elephant’s trunk sprays water all over you at the zoo.
As the leaves come down you suddenly notice you are only wearing a towel.
Your glasses are drenched in chocolate. (Mmmm, chocolate.) You feed your pet snake a juicy red tomato.
You hit the ball with the bat so hard that it breaks your neighbour’s mobile phone as they are using it.
Recall
All that’s left now is to remember what happened with each of the number shape words to give you the item you had memorised.
1. candlestick . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
2. swan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
3. trident . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
4. boat . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
5. hook . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
6. elephant’s trunk . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
7. feathers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
8. glasses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
9. snake . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
10. bat and ball . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
How long? Around ten seconds for each story from the above examples, so a little under two minutes.
Method of Loci
This memory technique creates locations and/or objects in a sequential order to store information. The storage is done through linking and association of the location and item to be memorised. The most important feature of this method is to remember information in sequence order. The number of locations is almost limitless and I have over 300 sequential locations just while walking down the street!
How it works
Here is a set of locations that might be in sequential order
.
1. front door
2. bed
3. shower
4. sink
5. cupboard
How to use
Location Item to be memorised
1. front door mobile phone
2. bed yoghurt
3. shower cucumber
4. sink chainsaw
5. cupboard tiger
You head towards the front door of your house and it turns into a huge mobile phone, which you have to swipe through to get inside. You hop into bed and you feel something sticky. Oh dear, someone has smothered yoghurt all over the bed. You jump into the shower and rub cucumber all over your body thinking it is soap. You turn the sink tap on and it makes a buzzing chainsaw noise. You peer deeper into the sink and find a miniature chainsaw inside. You open the cupboard to find a live tiger all squashed inside, ready to jump out and attack.
Recall
All that’s left to do now is to remember what happened in each of the locations to give you the item you had memorised.
1. front door ……………………. .
2. bed ……………………. .
3. shower ……………………. .
4. sink ……………………. .
5. cupboard ……………………. .
How long? Around twenty seconds for each story from the above examples, so a little under two minutes.
Mind mapping
Mind mapping helps you organise information and ideas in a non-linear manner. Its inventor, Tony Buzan, calls it a thinking tool that reflects externally what goes on inside your head. Often when we’re thinking, things are not exactly organised. Thoughts are scattered and we need to gather together snippets of information from many places in our brain to understand something. A mind map allows you to create a complete plan all on one page so you can see direct and tangential links for specific topics. Mind maps can be used to make and take study notes, memorise books and even organise weddings! It is also a powerful technique for improved productivity, as demonstrated by the abundance of apps and software available such as iMindMap, XMind, Mindnode, Mindgenius, NovaMind and Mind Manager. But it’s not necessary to buy software as they’re easy to draw by hand.