If you’ve ever read about Sherlock Holmes, you may wonder how anyone can possess so much information in just one brain. We’ll let you in on a secret: the world’s most famous literary detective used the most powerful memory technique in history: the memory palace. Today, this technique is used by world-record-holding memory champions and anyone who wants to study for a test, memorize their grocery list, or win big at their next trivia night. With a little planning and practice, you can build a memory palace, too.
Things You Should Know
- Choose a place you’re familiar with and can easily visualize, like a room, a building, or a town. Plan a route between the objects, rooms, or landmarks in the space.
- Make a list of things you need to memorize. Starting with one or two items, create a mental image of them and place them somewhere in your room.
- Exaggerate your image and make it memorable, e.g. remember Venus in the planet order by imagining a Venus flytrap snapping at you from up on a shelf.
Steps
Creating a Mind Palace
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Choose a place that you can easily visualize. A memory palace must be a place or route that you are extremely familiar with, like your childhood home or daily commute to work. It can be as small as your closet or as large as your entire neighborhood. [1] X Research source
- The important thing is that you’re able to visualize the place in your head without actually seeing it in real life.
- The larger or more detailed the real place is, the more information you can store in the corresponding mental space.
- Other options for memory palace locations include school, church, work, a vacation spot you visit frequently, or a friend’s house.
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Walk through your palace to define a route. Decide how you’ll travel through the palace in your mind rather than just picturing a fixed place. Mentally walk through the route multiple times until you can do it with your eyes closed.
- You can even try doing it backward to really master the flow.
- Practicing your route now will make it easier to memorize later.
- You can always revise your route later, so don’t worry about getting it perfect while you’re still creating your mind palace.
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Identify what you want to memorize. If you’re just getting started with mind palaces, try something small, like a 20-item grocery shopping list. In your chosen memory palace, identify specific locations where you will store each piece of information. [2] X Research source
- You’ll always review your locations in the same order, so place them in an organized way.
- If your palace is just one room or area, try moving through each locale clockwise or organizing items into a left-to-right or up-to-down flow that you can remember.
- If your palace is a building or house, consider separating information into different rooms. Then, within each room, identify smaller locations like paintings, pieces of furniture, or decor.
- If your palace is a route, like your drive to work, choose landmarks along the way. Some examples include your neighbor’s house, a traffic light, a statue, or a building.
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Place each piece of information in a different location. Choose a mental image or symbol that corresponds with each item or piece of data rather than memorizing a long phrase or list. The more exaggerated, bizarre, or humorous the image, the more likely it is that you’ll remember it. In your mind, attach that image to its designated location.
- To remember the U.S. presidents in order, add a picture of a washing machine to the first spot for George Washing ton and a pair of long johns representing John Adams in the next.
- Your images can also interact with the memory palace, like a roast chicken opening your front door if that’s the first item on your shopping list.
- Make sure that your images follow an organized flow so you can correctly remember the order.
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Incorporate other mnemonics to recall longer strings of information. Create a simple mnemonic by forming an acronym using the first letters of the words in a phrase, or make a little rhyme that helps you remember important information. [3] X Research source
- Insert these new shortened pieces of data into your memory palace instead of the longer piece.
- For instance, say you need to recall the order of notes on the lines of the treble clef (EGBDF). Imagine a little boy eating a piece of chocolate fudge, which would evoke the first-letter mnemonic “Every Good Boy Deserves Fudge."
- A rhyming mnemonic is, “In 1492, Columbus sailed the ocean blue.” Envision Columbus holding a blue sailboat toy in your living room.
Using Your Memory Palace
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Spend at least 15 minutes exploring your palace every day. The more you walk through and spend time in your palace, the more easily you will recall its contents on demand. You want the visualization to feel effortless and natural. [4] X Research source
- Try to walk through the entire route a couple of times or block out a chunk of time each day to visualize the palace from start to finish.
- The best part is you can practice this anywhere, anytime. All you have to do is close your eyes.
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Recall information by walking through your palace or looking around it. Once you have memorized the contents of your palace, remember them when you need them by following the route or visualizing a room. With practice, you will be able to start anywhere in your palace or along your route to recall a specific piece of information. [5] X Research source
- If you need to remember that your girlfriend’s birthday is March 16, go into your bedroom and see the soldiers “marching" on the bed to the tune of the 80s cult classic “Sixteen Candles."
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Clean up your memory palace when you need to update data. A memory palace can be reused over and over again. Replace the existing contents with new information. After a few practice runs, you’ll soon forget the old data and only remember the new data in its place. [6] X Research source
- If your palace is becoming too large or contains information you no longer need, remove that data from the route.
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Build new palaces for different topics and information. If you have something new you’d like to commit to memory but don’t want to erase your current memory palace, build a new one. File the old palace away and start the process again, choosing a different place to use as your palace. [7] X Research source
- Memory palaces will last as long as you want them to once they’re stored in your brain, and there’s no limit to how many you can build.
- For example, you might store the names of British monarchs in your house, your family’s phone numbers on your walk to work, and the script for tomorrow’s presentation in your office.
Community Q&A
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QuestionCan I have multiple mind palaces that have a few similar items in them?Community AnswerOf course, your mind palace is designed and created by you, so you decide what to put in it. Just be careful if you decide to put similar items in different mind palaces, because you might get confused or mixed up.
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QuestionHow can I learn to remember a speech requiring 950 words?Community AnswerDon't memorise every word; instead, memorise the key points. Then walk around your memory palace in the specific order of the things in your speech, so that you go through front door and see the first thing, etc.
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QuestionCan I remember everything I want, or is there a limit to memory?Community AnswerMost people forget things from time to time, but if you keep reminding yourself of details, you can remember as much as you want.
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Tips
- Drawing out your mind palace on paper can help you memorize it. Try walking through your palace in your head, then checking against the drawing to see if you missed anything that you included in your drawing.Thanks
- There are computer programs that can help you build digital mind palaces so you can take a virtual tour of them whenever you like.Thanks
- Be persistent. The memory palace is a powerful tool that takes time, patience, and dedication to master.Thanks
Tips from our Readers
- To memorize letter order for spelling tests, try coming up with an acronym with all the letters of each word in order, like Caramel Apple Tattoo for "cat." Then, choose an image connected to the acronym for your mind palace.
- "The Memory Palace of Matteo Ricci" is really helpful if you're looking to learn more about mind palaces.
References
- ↑ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/secrets-sherlocks-mind-palace-180949567/
- ↑ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/secrets-sherlocks-mind-palace-180949567/
- ↑ http://theweek.com/articles/465649/10-superhelpful-mnemonic-tricks
- ↑ https://www.cnbc.com/2018/03/07/study-this-ancient-technique-can-dramatically-improve-your-memory.html
- ↑ https://www.cnbc.com/2018/03/07/study-this-ancient-technique-can-dramatically-improve-your-memory.html
- ↑ https://www.theverge.com/2017/3/16/14950798/memory-palace-method-of-loci-brain-fmri-activity-neuroscience
- ↑ http://theweek.com/articles/448876/how-develop-photographic-memory-4-easy-steps
- ↑ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/secrets-sherlocks-mind-palace-180949567/
- ↑ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4056179/
About This Article
To build a memory palace, first imagine a real place that you’re familiar with, like your bedroom or your drive to work. As you imagine walking or driving through the location, pick objects or landmarks to represent information. For instance, if you’re memorizing a speech, then your bedroom door might store the first few sentences, your desk might be the next segment, and so on. Commit your palace to memory by drawing it on paper, making notes for the locations of your important information. Keep reading to learn how to use symbols and mnemonic devices in your memory palace!
Reader Success Stories
- "These ideas are really awesome! I want to build a real house of my own, so I think it can also be my mind palace with some additions (maybe secret rooms from stories I love or a garage I always want to have). I am gonna use a 3D program to make it visual for now. " ..." more