Two time USA Memory Champion and Memory Training Expert Ron White shares his thoughts on trusting your memory:
In learning how to memorize one of the first things that should be learned is the many benefits of trusting your memory. Trusting your memory allows you to move faster and memorize more information quickly.
One of the most common things I hear people say is, ‘Oh my memory is TERRIBLE! I can’t remember names! I am a terrible test taker! My memory is getting worse and worse!’ The first element of trusting your memory is STOP SAYING THIS KIND OF STUFF! What you tell yourself about your memory will be programmed into your subconscious and ultimately become your reality. I daily tell myself, ‘My brain operates fast and I find it EASY to remember.’ I am programming myself to TRUST my memory!
However, trusting your memory is more than just talk. It must become a way of life. In the memory world this means not obsessing over an item spending too much time memorizing it. This lesson was recently reinforced to me by Nelson Dellis who set the record for the most digits memorized in 5 minutes in the USA at 248 consecutive digits! WOW! That is almost 100 more than my personal best. His secret? Yep, you guessed it. He trusts his memory. He is not obsessing over every image in his mind. Instead, he places it in his memory banks and then moves on to the next. Firt of all this is allowing him to move fastest and memorize more information and secondly it is sending a powerful message to his brain. The message is saying, ‘Hey brain….guess what? I trust you!’
When you trust your brain you reduce your stress and anxiety and this also helps your memory. Stress and anxiety are the worst enemies to your memory. Whenever I give a speech on memory I will meet up to 300 people before I speak (actually my record is 301) and then when I get up on the speaking platform I will ask those people to stand up and I will repeat the names from stage. Here is a video of that
If I get to a person and I can’t think of their name, I do not stay there and try to think of it. Instead, I skip them and repeat the names that I do know. If I stay on a name that I don’t know it will stress out my brain. Instead, I skip it and keep moving. As I keep moving my brain is staying relaxed and then when I am complete I will come back to the name. This is a good memory technique to use not only when trying to remember names but how to remember anything. Keep your stress level low and trust your memory!
My suggestion to you is to get a list of items and try to memorize it but go faster than you think is possible. You will need to learn a good memory training method on how to memorize and I suggest the method of loci. Once you learn the loci method, then push your memory to move faster than you think possible. Trust your memory and you will be amazed with the results!