Meaning of memory
Cicero said, 'Memory is the treasury and guardian of all things.'
Plato said, 'All knowledge is but remembrance'.
'Harry Lorayne' is one my favourite world's memory experts. He said 'Habit is the Memory. An accurate and retentive memory is the basis of all success'.
You will get different meaning and definitions of 'Memory'. But simply, whatever we experience and retain in our five senses (touch, taste, smell, sight and sound) is called ‘Memory’.
There are certain factors which lead to Good Memory:
- Interest
- Concentration
- Observation
- Understanding
- Revision
- System / Techniques
- Faith / Confidence / Will
If you think you can not remember something well, you will not remember well.
Understand Your Memory Power
Study reveals that we forget 50% after 1 hour; 60% after 9 hours; 70% after 24 hours; 80% after 30 days. That is why, you need to make revision whatever you study. Revision is known as mother of study. You will have to make periodic revision to store the things in your permanent memory. The period of revision will be as follows:
1st Revision: Within 24 hours
2nd Revision: Within 7 days
3rd Revision: Within 1 month
4th Revision: Within 6 month
5th Revision: Whenever possible
The memory is considered like a muscle. As you can develop your muscle by doing exercise regularly, so you can develop your memory power also and can have a trained memory. Whatever you have remembered, these have been associated subconsciously with something else that you already knew or remembered. What you have not been associated strongly, will be forgotten. You can learn how you can associate anything you want to, consciously. There are various sources to learn the techniques. Here, I am going to discuss what I have learnt.
Example 1:
We often make mistake in writing the spelling of ‘believe’. If you learn the phrase, “Never Believe a Lie”, you will never make any mistake in writing the spelling of ‘believe’. The word ‘lie’ will give you the clue.
Example 2:
You probably know the seven colours of ‘rainbow’, but forget the right order of the colours. So, remember the word ‘VIBJYOR’ you will be able to tell it perfectly.
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Example 3:
Rabindranath Tagore (1861 – 1941) was awarded Nobel Prize for literature in 1913. You can remember the year very easily if you make a mental picture as follows:
“Rabindranath Tagore sitting on a tomb (the code for 13 is ‘ToMb’) and doing his literary works.”
To remember the digits, if you can translate these into words and form a mental picture it becomes easy to remember it. In the example discussed above we have translated the digit ‘13’ into ‘ToMb’. (1 = t and 3 = m).
In order to convert the figures / digits to some meaningful words, it is important to know the ‘Peg system’. The Peg system is given below:
1 = t / d (the letter ‘t’ / ‘d’ has one down stroke)
2 = n (the letter ‘n’ has two down strokes)
3 = m (the letter ‘m’ has three down strokes)
4 = r (the final sound of the letter ‘r’ is ‘four’)
5 = L (Roman numeral for ‘50’ is ‘L’)
6 = j (the letter ‘j’ turned around is almost like the number 6)
7 = k (the number ‘7’ can be used to form a ‘K’. One seven right side up, and the other upside down.)
8 = f / v (written f and figure 8 both have two loops, one above the other)
9 = p / b (the number ‘9’ when turned around looks like ‘P’)
0 = s / z (first sound of the word is ‘zero’)
So, whenever you want to translate some digits, take the help of the ‘Peg System’. For example,
19 = tub, Here the word is ‘tub’ is a meaningful word. Use only the consonants to re-translate it or sometimes the sound that it produces.
Similarly, 25 = nail; 32 = moon; 49 = rope and so on.
Use of Peg system to remember Public Libraries Acts in India
An accurate and retentive memory is the basis of all success. All our knowledge is based on our memories. Before going to the steps, I must say that your trained memory will be based almost entirely on mental pictures or images. These mental pictures will be easily recalled if they are made as ridiculous as you can possibly make them.
Here’s how to remember Public Libraries Acts in India with its years of enactment. Let’s develop memory codes and personalised memory pictures to remember these.
In order to do it, you will have to make use of two systems. One is ‘Peg system’ and the other is ‘Rhyming word system’. You have already come to know the peg system and different codes. Following are the rhyming word system:
1 = Sun, the rhyming word of ‘one’. Similarly, 2 = Shoe, 3 = Tree, 4 = Door, 5 = Hive, 6 = Vix, 7 = Heaven, 8 = Plate, 9 = Wine, 10 = Hen and so on.
Now take the example of Tamil Nadu (Madras) Public Libraries Act (1948). Here, you will have to consider three things; firstly, the ‘serial number’; secondly, the ‘state’ and thirdly, the ‘year’ of enactment.
Let’s make the codes,
Serial no.: 1 and the code is ‘Sun’
State: ‘Tamil Nadu’ and the code is ‘Tam’ (means copper) and
Year: 1948 and the code is ‘RooF’ (4 = R and F = 8)
Now, make a mental picture: Visualise a RooF (=48) of a public library which is made of Copper (Tam=Tamil Nadu) and it is shining under the bright Sun (=One).
Try to see the picture through your own eyes and you are ready to consciously associate the things creating a live picture.
That’s it. You have made it.
If you are asked to name the first state which had enacted the first Public Libraries Act in India, you will have to bring the picture associated with ‘sun’ (One). Then you will see the Roof (48) made of Tam (Tamil Nadu). You will be able to retrieve the information with three different aspects: Serial number, State and the Year
For the beginners, you may find it difficult but once you learn the technique and practice you can develop your own system to remember the things very easily.
If you have understood the above example, then let’s go for the next state.
The 2nd is Andhra Pradesh (Hyderabad) Public Libraries Act (1960).
Let’s make the codes for it,
Serial no.: 2 and the code is ‘Shoe’
State: ‘Andhra Pradesh’ and the code is ‘Blind’ (instead of ‘Andhra’ to mean Andha) and
Year: 1960 and the code is ‘CheeSe’ (6 = Ch and S = 0)
Now, make a mental picture: Imagine a Blind (Andha) library user who is wearing a pair of oversized Shoe (=Two) eating a big piece of CHeeSe (=60) while sitting in a reading room of a public library.
That’s it.
You can create your own mental picture. These two examples will help you to remember all the public library acts in India in its order.
