There's no denying that as we get older, our once sharp and reliable memory, often fails us, when we least expected.A common scenario would be like, a fifty something person, who had just slam shut the front door of the house and on reaching the car,grope absentmindedly for the keys.Realizing the keys are still in the house, turns back to retrieve the keys,but suddenly it occurred to this person that the house keys are inside, too!

It may be a far-fetched story but little things like forgetting where we put our car keys, will somehow leads to more serious cases. And just because we are in our 50s, pushing on 60s or 70s for the matter,there's no reason at all to (conveniently) blames it on our advancing age.A famous memory trainer, once said, "There's no such thing as a forgetful memory,there's only a trained or an untrained memory." He proceeded to stress the fact that our memory is liken to that of a muscle. The old adage,"Use it or lose It" strikes home loud and clear. Thirty years ago, I had the opportunity to read his book and I can still remember his book. and that's it, just the book! How I wished, I had acted more sensibly back then, because now it would have put me in good stead. All those block-buster titles, I could have read... if only I can remember where I put those books, or did I remember to buy them at all?

Peg System

The point in question here, is not so much the technique but really it's on our effort to practice and practice until it's second nature. It simply means, we apply our system of remembering without having to think about the "steps" to remembering. One of the method used (by the author of the book I had read) is called the "peg" method. It's an ingenious way to associate items, numbers,list and so on. The system assigns an alphabet letter to a number and used this alphabet to form a word. For example, the number 1, is given the letter of " t ", and the word used to associate with this number is " tie ". The number 2 is assigned the letter " n " and the word can be " nose ".
So, if you need to remember a numbered grocery list, like...item 1-eggs..item 2-cigarettes..and so on, you simply need to remember the key words, that is Tie for number 1and NOSE for number 2. The first item is eggs, simply associate the words TIE and EGGS to form the most ridiculous or funniest picture, you.can think of. Try picturing an image of eggs wearing colorful ties walking around you doing shopping with basket in toll to boot! As for item number 2 CIGARETTES and NOSE, try seeing a bunch of cigarettes sticking out of the nose, in both nostrils of the salesperson , servicing you.
The key elements involved here, emphasizes the need to picture shocking,humorous,quantified and out of the norm situation to create an "unforgettable" image in our mind.That in a nutshell is the basis a for trained memory.

OOPS! Didn't I tell you , you need to be imaginative with a sense of humor (hilarious) and a flexible attitude to do this? Just kidding. Of course there is also the Link method, in associating unnumbered items, but I won't be delving into it for fear of infringing on copyrights matters. Like I said, I read this some time back and ...now , where did I put this book..? Oh! Before I forget, I am embarking on a new memory course, I heard it's easy and virtually requires no effort at all! Till next time, DO join me in my campaign. The link is below somewhere...