The Young Designer’s Guide

If you are like me than you likely never received a user’s manual on how the brain works when you were born. If you are a guy like me than let’s face it, we wouldn’t have read the manual anyway. If we had though, we would have learned some interesting and not well publicized things about how our memories and our minds actual do work.

To begin with, you, the reader of this report, have an absolutely astounding computer system that you likely haven’t thought much about in some time. This computer is not made by Toshiba, or Gateway, or Dell. This computer of yours has an absolutely immense hard drive. It computes at lightning fast speeds, and it could do tremendous things to improve the quality of your life with its immense power if only you understood how to operate it. The computer I’m speaking of is the incredible super computer in between your ears called the human mind. Specifically, I’m speaking of your mind’s memory and the systems by which your mind stores and retrieves the data that is essentially your life.

In today’s age of modern technology we have largely done ourselves a great disservice. We have forgotten about memory systems. We use our cell phones, palm pilots, laptops, and good old fashion day planners to keep our tasks and records and responsibilities straight. These gadgets are fine, but why use expensive gadgets when we have this perfectly good processor in between our ears.

To begin with, we need to understand that our memory is organized into a memory system. If you think about it, it seems reasonable enough. After all, we have a nervous system, a respiratory system, a skeletal system, a circulatory system, a digestive system, etc. The human body is comprised of systems. Why, then, have we never been taught about memory systems?

This news that our memory is a system that can be studied, understood, and utilized to our advantage is really good news. It means that when we want to learn something we don’t have to just try harder to remember it. We can try smart instead and blow the competition away.

The first step to understand is the language of the memory itself. Just as a computer is a processor that works with software of various programming languages, our memory has its language. If we do not speak in the language of our memory than we are doomed before we even begin. So what is this language I’m speaking of? Well, take this little test with me and discover it for yourself.

First, answer this question. Do you have a photographic memory? Most likely your answer is no. Well, let’s think about this for a minute. I’d like you to think about the refrigerator in your kitchen. Think about the items on the inside. Do you have ketchup? How many shelves are on the inside? Is there dust on the top of the refrigerator? … Ok, come back to me now.

A moment ago when I asked you to think about your refrigerator something should have happened in your mind’s eye. One, you saw the word refrigerator or two you saw an image of a refrigerator. Think now to which one you were. If you are like 99.99% of all other human beings than you likely saw a picture.

This brings me back to my original question. Do you have a photographic memory? The answer is unequivocally yes. Put simply, the mind thinks in pictures. This is a really important and often misunderstood element of our memory system. You see, I didn’t ask you to visualize your refrigerator. I didn’t use the word imagine or anything else that would suggest imagery. I said think. When I said think your brain new instinctively to create a picture in the mind and to lock that picture in place for further reference. This is a necessary first step to remembering things. We must understand that our minds are visual no matter who we are and we can remember much more easily if we speak the same language of our mind.

With an understanding of this fundamental truth, we can begin to form a system for remembering that can serve us. From here you can use association and processing to create incredible power with your memory and to even do things you never believed were humanly possible. A this time the Guinness World Record for the category greatest memory is held by a gentleman in Canada for memorizing 59 decks of playing cards in a row. That is a total of 3068 cards. Are you amazed by this feat? Well, if so consider this. Anyone, and yes I mean anyone can learn to do this too. And that means you.
For more information on memory skills and memory systems contact Lonny Hogan directly at 847-489-5132. Lonny delivers entertaining and interactive seminars and keynotes on organized memory systems and on the powers of the human mind. Contact Lonny to determine if his talk is a good fit for one of your upcoming sales meeting.