The Power of Forgetting (17 page)

Once you’ve gotten the name through your eardrums, the second tactic is to see if you can create a similar-sounding word or sentence using the sounds of the name. For instance, Karasek could sound like “carrot on a stick.” My name, Byster, could sound like “by the stairs.” In each case, you’d picture the individual embodying the phrase. So you’d picture Mr. Karasek holding a carrot on a stick, and you’d picture me standing by a staircase. As with any association you make when you want to remember something, it’s important to create the link in the moment—the very instant you’re first hearing the name (and perhaps shaking hands). And like most anything else, it will become easier and easier to apply this tactic as you practice it. Soon enough, you’ll be able to turn names like Kraszynski (pronounced “kra-zin-ski”) into phrases such as “crazy zin on skis” (“zin” for a bottle of zinfandel), or make the zin a “sin”; Djokovic (pronounced “joke-a-vich”) becomes “joke and fetch,” and Gutierrez becomes “gut in tiara.” If you’re familiar with more advanced vocabulary or the romance languages in particular, you might have noticed that the second part of Gutierrez contains sounds that are close to the word
tierra
, which means
earth or land. So alternatively, you could associate this name with “gut in the earth.” As you can see, absurdity is allowed here, and the phrase you create needn’t contain every sound or syllable in the name. You just need to have enough sounds to give you the gist of it—then you can figure it out. Your memory will fill in the blanks.

The third strategy is to identify a feature or characteristic about the person and link it to their name. The mere act of seeking an outstanding feature will force you to be aware of the person in a conscious manner, creating original awareness. Such a unique feature can be any number of things—crooked teeth, ears that stick out, a high forehead, a puggish nose, a mole on the cheek, acne, freckles. First impressions count! That is to say, first impressions tend to be lasting ones, so try to make your association the moment you meet. Use the first thing that comes to mind. The feature you choose doesn’t necessarily have to be something permanent. Let’s say you meet someone named Barry who happens to be wearing a blue shirt. Say to yourself, “Blueberry.” This word will trigger your memory the next time you see him and need to recall his name. Or let’s say you meet a Tamara who has a toothy grin. It’s not a name you’ve heard before, and it’s not easy to pronounce; you’re not sure if it’s closer to the word “tomorrow” or “tomato.” Assuming that it sounds more like “tomorrow,” with the second
a
sounding like the
a
in “car,” you could come up with “going to the dentist tomorrow” or something similar. The point is to single out a specific feature to which you can link a word or phrase and instantly associate that person with it. Even if it’s challenging to find a link that’s good and strong enough to permanently interlock a name and face in your memory, just trying will improve your
memory. Face it: You’re doing what so few people do when they meet someone—and that’s paying attention!

I should add here that you do not need to know everyone’s name and face. Focus on just the ones you need or want to recall and forget the others. Practice these strategies in situations where you’re not feeling the pressure to remember. I started connecting names with features when I was twelve or thirteen years old so I could memorize the people on my Little League team. There was Richie Lieberman, the big kid who was taller than all of us. I associated his last name with “taller than the rest of us when he lies down,” and the “lie” part gave me enough clues to retrieve “Lieberman” from my memory. Richie was also a funny guy whose behavior was very liberating. The word “liberating” was another code word I’d use to remember the name Lieberman. Then we had Mark Mendelson, who had a habit of whistling all the time. He was such a musical sensation on the field that I’d associate his last name with Felix Mendelssohn, the nineteenth-century German composer. Larry Axelrod, another Little League teammate of mine, had the misfortune of possessing an unbelievably scratchy throat, as if he’d smoked two packs of cigarettes a day since birth. His name suited him perfectly: “axe in throat” signaled “Axelrod” anytime I needed to recall it. I’ll give you one more: Steve Kost, who happens to still be a good friend of mine, was the only guy among my friends who had any money back then. He earned money doing odd jobs in the neighborhood and liked to spend it on nice things. His last name to me meant “cost” because money was no object to him. For a twelve-year-old, Steve was probably ahead of all of us when it came to the notion of “cost.” But he did well for himself, ending up owning his own business.

If you practice making associations as much as possible, then when you’re meeting a roomful of people and are under pressure to remember them all, the method will come to you naturally. Don’t give up if the first couple of times you try this technique it doesn’t work. This can be a challenging strategy to apply in everyday life, and it takes practice. Remember, we’re trying to change habits here. Habits aren’t just hard to break—they’re hard to establish! Just recall the day you were learning how to type. Now it comes automatically to you, but not that first time. Back then it was tedious, overwhelming, and far from automatic. But look at you today: You don’t even have to think about it anymore, whether you’re typing in Word or firing off a text message. The mind is an incredible machine if you let tasks become natural. Then they stay with you forever.

You’re at the grocery store and realize that you forgot your list. Or you’ve just driven out of your driveway for a long day of running errands and realize that you left your list on the kitchen counter. Do you go back for it?

At the beginning of the book, I asked you to take a quiz that tested your ability to remember ten items (see
this page
). How well did you do? If you scored a perfect ten, then my bet is you employed a memory trick of some sort; otherwise, my guess is you were able to recall about six or seven of the things listed. Don’t panic: This is the average for most people. During my presentations to both adults and kids, I give people the same list aloud and ask them to sit and listen to the list. They are not allowed to write anything down. Then, after a few seconds, I ask audience members to get out a piece of paper and try to recall all ten items. The vast majority of people get at least half of the items, but few can recall eight or nine. Once in a blue moon someone manages to come up with all ten. But that’s a rare moment, and as I said, when it happens it’s usually because that person applied some kind of strategy. Would you like to learn a reliable strategy for achieving such a feat and scoring a flawless ten?

I sometimes hesitate to teach how I memorize specific things because I feel that every person is different. What works best for me may not work for you. So what I’m going to do is illustrate the main concept by sharing how I would remember these ten items. But you will have to modify this tactic so it makes sense to you and, most important, has meaning to you.

The main technique to use here is storytelling. It helps to make up a story as you hear the words, and if you can fabricate a funny and eccentric story, that’s all the better. I’ll share with you the story that I’ve fashioned out of these words as an example. First let’s review the list again:

In my brain, the story I like to tell goes like this:

This story is totally wacky and ridiculous, but it’s memorable for the person who made it up. Whenever I tell this story and then have my audience members try to recall those ten items a few minutes later, guess what? The vast majority of them can get all ten. Their minds finally have a few scenes they can mentally flip through like a movie to retrieve the words. The words have context—and that’s exactly what you can do with any list you’re given, no matter how random it is. What you’re essentially doing is concretizing the words, making them less abstract, and adding meaning to them to make them memorable. At the same time, you’re essentially
forgetting
the list and turning the items into thematic vignettes that you can remember. Your perceptual intuition is also at work here. As you transform the words into mini scenes, you’re drawing on your brain’s ability to intuitively perceive (and retrieve) the actual words without your having to really think about it too much.

I first figured out that storytelling could be a powerful tool for memorizing long lists when my mom used to put the onus on me to remember forty or so things to buy at the supermarket. It took me a while to get used to telling stories in my head based on a random list of items, but eventually I was able to take her long list of groceries, commit the items to memory while still at home, and then go with her
to the market—leaving the list behind. At first I could only deal with ten things. Then, as I got better at creating stories to accommodate an entire list, I was able to pack more items into my brain and make room for longer and longer lists. You, too, will need to practice this technique on your own over time, and you may have to start with a few short lists until you get used to the task of quickly crafting stories and linking words to items that you want to remember. So don’t get frustrated. Just continue to practice, which in and of itself will speed up your brain and make room for more information.