Quantum Memory Power Page 6
Here’s another example. The number 27 translates to BG. I think of the Bee Gees, and I associate them with wearing tight, white flares with one arm in the air, and singing “Night Fever.” (If I tried to get in a pair of flares these days, I’d be impotent in two minutes flat, but that’s the image.)
If you take the number 7227, that relates to 2 sets of people. George Bush is 72, GB, and 27 is the Bee Gees. Now, can you see where I’m coming from here? George Bush is going to take on the Bee Gees’ action. You picture George Bush wearing tight white flares, one arm in the arm, singing “Night Fever.”
This is where it starts to get fun. Let’s take another 4-digit number. How about 3615? Well, 36 is, to me, Claudia Schiffer, 36, CS, and 15 is Albert Einstein, AE. I associate Claudia Schiffer with walking on a catwalk, Albert Einstein with chalking a formula on a blackboard. If you had 3615, it would be Claudia Schiffer chalking a formula on a blackboard.
What would you have with 1527? You’d have Albert Einstein singing “Night Fever.” Or you could have 7236: George Bush striding up and down a catwalk. If you’re keen on sports, to you 72 wouldn’t be George Bush. It could be William “Refrigerator” Perry from the Chicago Bears, because he wore jersey number 72. Imagine him wearing tight, white flares singing “Night Fever.” Instead of Bing Crosby for 23, you could have Michael Jordan, the basketball player, because he wears shirt number 23.
As you can see, you can use these characters to remember a whole range of numerical information. Can you see how suddenly you’ve breathed life into the numbers? They’re animated, they’re colorful.
Apart from anything else, this is an extremely beneficial exercise for the whole of your brain and for your creative imagination. Maybe thinking of all these details is beginning to strain your brain a little bit, but remember the adage, “If it’s not hurting, it’s not working,” so keep at it.
APPOINTMENTS
Let’s get on to appointments. Say you want to remember that you have an appointment with your dental hygienist on July 18. In this case, you would take the month, which would be 07, followed by 18. That gives you 2 characters again: 0–7, James Bond, and Alfred Hitchcock, 1–8.
What’s the first thing you do? You think of the location, so think of the location of your dentist right now. Think of the place, the location. Got it?
Now it’s up to you, how you devise your scene. It’s going to be a miniepic. Maybe you could have James Bond chasing Alfred Hitchcock around the dental hygienist, or perhaps you go in there, and there’s James Bond having a shower, which is Alfred Hitchcock’s action.
Here’s another for you. Let’s say you bump into your lawyer in the street, and he says in a hurry, “Look, that court case has come up. It’s November 23.” You don’t have a pen or paper on you, so how are you going to remember it? Just stay calm. Go through these techniques again step-by-step. What’s the first thing you do?
Look at the subject of the conversation. It’s court, so it has to be a courtroom. Now think of your own law courts. Do you have that? Now look at the date, November 23, and that translates into 1123. By this time, of course, you would have had an automatic association with people. Immediately I see tennis player Andre Agassi, which is 11, and 23 is Bing Crosby. So you could have Andre Agassi in the judge’s seat, and maybe Bing Crosby is in the witness box.
It doesn’t really matter how you get there, but now that you have that date turned into images, you will never forget it. Life is so much easier when you don’t have to write things down.
ANOTHER JOURNEY EXERCISE
Before we get on to telephone numbers, I want to take you through an exercise. We did the journey through your house. I want you now extend that journey from your house out into the main road. A typical journey could start from your front door, for example. Then you go to your front gate, if you have one. The third stage could be the sidewalk. After that, maybe you have the bus stop. Perhaps you have a doughnut stand, and then finally, traffic lights. So this time, I just want 6 stages, so work that out.
Now that you have all 6 stages, we can lay down some more information. As always, the journey will preserve the order of the information that you’re about to learn. We’ll go through this one together. This time I’m going to give you a series of characters, so don’t worry about the numbers for the time being. Just think about the characters.
Imagine that you’re standing at the front door. You’ve just opened the door, and in front of you is Charles Atlas. Remember, he’s the bodybuilder, so he’s standing there lifting up a pair of weights.
Again, use all your cortical skills: touch, taste, sight, smell, sound. Use humor, exaggeration, color. Okay? Logic as well. What’s he doing there? A bit of a shock, isn’t it?
Now leave Charles alone. Go to the second stage of your journey. Maybe you’re at the front gate. Whom do you meet there? This time you’re going to meet Dan Aykroyd of Ghostbusters fame. What would you associate him with? Maybe he has that big power pack on, and he’s shooting some ectoplasm, that slimy stuff. Got the picture there? A nice colorful picture.
You pass by Dan and go to the next stage. Maybe you’re on the sidewalk. Make sure it’s a nice, convenient stop. This time you’re going to meet that famous character from the past, Emperor Nero. I see him with one hand sticking out, and he has his thumb down. He’s giving you the thumb’s down, for whatever reason. Look at him; now pass him by and go to the next stage of the journey. Maybe it’s a bus stop. Wherever you are now, who’s the next character? You’re going to meet Bram Stoker, the author of Dracula. His action would be driving a stake in. This is happening at the fourth stage, wherever that is.
OK, just two more to go. At this point, you’re at the fourth stage, which may be a doughnut stand. This time you’re going to see Eric Clapton. Obviously now you’re going to use sound. He’s playing his guitar. What sort of music is he playing? Is it an electric guitar? Acoustic? Maybe he’s playing “Layla.”
OK, say goodbye to Eric. Now go to the last stage, wherever that is. You may be at the traffic light now. This time you meet author Ernest Hemingway. I associate him with reading a book. Again, use your imaginative skills. Use a bit of exaggeration. Make the book a really big one, an outsized book, so it stands out in your mind.
Now we have 6 characters. Return and review the scenes in your mind. Don’t rush into this. What happened at the front door? A guy with some weights. Yes, it’s Charles Atlas. Now go to the front gate. Who is it? Somebody shooting ectoplasm. It has to be Dan Aykroyd.
OK, move on. Who can you see now? Emperor Nero, the guy with the thumbs down. Moving on, you see Bram Stoker driving a stake in. Second to last, we have somebody playing something. It has to be Eric Clapton playing the guitar. Finally is the guy with the book: Ernest Hemingway.
If you think about that, you could probably go backwards or forwards. Did you notice anything about those people? What I’ve done, whether you like it or not, is trick you into memorizing the first eleven places to pi. Pi is that infinite number, and what you’ve just memorized by translating them back into numbers is this: 3.1, that gives you Charles Atlas, 31; 41 is Dan Aykroyd, DA; 59, EN, Emperor Nero; 26. which is Bram Stoker; 53, Eric Clapton; 58, Ernest Hemingway.
Now you can begin to see how it’s possible to memorize gigantic numbers. You only have to go through that little journey a couple of times and translate them back into numbers, and you have 3.14159265358. That didn’t take long to do, did it? Just imagine how far you think you could take that.
If you work it out, all you need is just enough stages, and once you have those characters sorted out, you could go on and on. You could easily do 100 digits. Not surprisingly, other people have already caught on to this, and at the time of this writing, the world record stands at 70,030 decimal places to pi. This is held by Suresh Kumar Sharma from India. I reckon he’s using this technique. He has to be using some sort of journey to do this.
REMEMBERING PHONE NUMBERS
Now you can see how powerful this method is. Of course you can use it for telephone numbers. Supposing your boss asks you to book a room at the Waldorf Astoria Hotel. You’re on your cell phone, you have no pen, and he gives you the number.
What’s the first thing you do? You think of the hotel. That’s the location. That’s where you’re going to map the images that are about to come up. All right, I’m going to give you the number: 234-3289 (it’s not the actual number).
As soon as I read those numbers, I think of these characters. So 23 is Bing Crosby. We could have him at the front entrance of the hotel. He’s the doorman. (We’re making up a little story here.)
The next set of numbers is 43. To me, that’s David Copperfield, so maybe he’s in the foyer, performing some sort of magic. Then, maybe at reception, 28, that’s comedian Benny Hill. The last digit is 9. If you remember from the number shapes, 9 is a balloon and string. It doesn’t take much imagination to picture Benny Hill there, acting the clown and holding a balloon and string.
So for the few seconds it takes to translate those numbers into pictures, you have the telephone number for a long, long time. All you have to do is review it a couple of times, and it’s there for life.
Just to recap: Try to turn pairs of numbers into people. Think of associations, maybe Joe Montana from the 49ers for 49, or James Bond for 07. Use the Dominic system to convert numbers into letters; these letters then become initials of famous people or friends. Then you connect these people in a little story or short scene, but anchor it to the associated location.
Let’s say you want to remember the number of a computer store. What’s the first thing you do? Think of a computer store that you already know; just think of one now. Here’s the number: 53-08-15. We won’t worry about the seventh digit.
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sp; Immediately I think, 53, that’s Eric Clapton, so you can have him in the parking lot. Next number, 08; I think of Oliver Hardy. Maybe he’s at the front entrance swinging his plank. The, the last digits: 15, Albert Einstein. We could have him at the checkout desk. Of course, he doesn’t need any electronic checkout. He has his own chalkboard.
You see what’s happening here. You’re turning dull, inanimate, unimaginative information, meaningless numbers, into colorful, lively, meaningful, and memorable images.
Here’s another for you. Your boss wants you to arrange a lunch with an important client. He says, “Look, can you take this guy to Dino’s Italian restaurant?” Think of an Italian restaurant. That’s the first thing. You have the location.
He says, “This is the number: 66”—so you think, “Sylvester Stallone. We’ll have him as the waiter in the restaurant: 94.” That translates to Neil Diamond. We’ll have him at the bar serving drinks. Then 72 is the last pair of digits, so we’ll have George Bush in the kitchen cooking up something. So 669472. Just those three people enable you to remember the number.
For the little time it takes, it could save you your job. It could even make your career. Sure, you could always write it down, but isn’t it nice to have that facility, to have that little extra backup should you need it?
I’m going to give you one more. Let’s say you got an urgent phone call from your wife or your husband, and they’re at the airport. Here’s the number: 36-84-87. What do you do? It’s the airport. Well, you think of any location there.
Think of the runway, and 36 is Claudia Schiffer; 84, HD, I think of Humpty Dumpty. So we could have Claudia Schiffer falling off a wall, Humpty Dumpty’s action, onto the last pair of digits, 87, Hugh Grant, HG. Claudia Schiffer falling off a wall on top of Hugh Grant. I don’t think Hugh Grant would complain about that.
It’s easy and fun once you’ve practiced the language of numbers. Not only is it a great mental exercise, it’s extremely practical. It’s probably one of the most valuable tools you can have at your disposal for number crunching.
Practice with pairs of numbers. Learn your own language of 100 characters from 00 to 99. See how your telephone number translates into pictures of people, but above all, have fun. I use it every day.
Test yourself on a regular basis until you automatically see numbers as symbolic characters. Soon you’ll find things like telephone numbers, dates, schedules, and so on much easier to remember. Of course, the more you exercise your brain in this way, the more you’re going to release of your quantum memory power.
I’ll bet you can feel your brain getting stronger already. We’ll continue with more exciting quantum memory power techniques in the next chapter.
9
Conquering Your Greatest Fear
What’s your greatest fear? In the U.K. at least, next to spiders, the greatest fear is standing up in public and giving a speech. It doesn’t matter what the occasion is. Even standing up in front of your own family and friends and just saying a few words can be a devastating experience.
You might be an actor, politician, minister, teacher. At some point in your life, you have to stand up and give a speech. It might be a list of complaints that you want to give to your boss. You work it out carefully. The day comes along. You go in there with good intentions. You’re going to get that off your mind, and what happens?
You walk in, and you dry up. Your boss looks at you and says, “What is it?” and all of a sudden you go into a mental blank. The result: opportunity missed.
At some point in our lives, we’re given the opportunity to stand up and make our case while others listen. So imagine this. Imagine you’re going up to a podium, and there are 200 people in the audience. Your boss and your colleagues are sitting there, and one of your friends says, “Wait a minute; he’s forgotten his notes.”
They look a bit anxious, but your confidence is supreme. You start delivering your speech in an animated tone, with no hesitations. You start delivering quotes. You ad-lib, and you start telling jokes. Everybody starts laughing with you. Towards the end, you walk down, and everybody cheers. They’re impressed. Why? Because you’ve had no hesitation, no nerves, and more importantly, no notes.
The method I’m going to give you to enable you to do this is as old as the Greeks. If you found some of the other techniques simple to learn, this is equally easy.
Why do we fear giving a speech? Bob Hope once said, “If they like you, they don’t applaud. They just let you live.” I think it’s probably the fear of all eyes on you. You’re the center of attention, and you’re worried you’re going to be the center of ridicule.
Ron, a friend of mine, said that he went on a company course once, and each person in the room had to stand up and talk about themselves, their life history, for about five minutes. Ron’s turn was right towards the end, and the nearer it got to his turn, the more he broke into a sweat. Eventually, when he did stand up, he said, “I won’t waste your time,” and he sat down again.
It can happen to the best of people. Take Steven Spielberg. Once he was giving a speech to students of American law, and he was so gripped with panic that he forgot how to speak English, his own mother tongue. So he started thinking in French just to get some of the words out. This panic attack lasted about a minute or two. Next to insects, public speaking is his greatest fear.
Once Mark Twain had to give a speech about great leaders. He too hated giving speeches, and he said, “Caesar and Hannibal are dead. Wellington has gone to a better place. Napoleon is under the sod, and to be honest, I don’t feel too well myself,” and he sat down.
The greatest speakers are the ones that have worked at it. I don’t believe anybody is a natural speaker. They’ve had to work at it. Years ago, the thought of having to give a speech would have horrified me, yet now I do it on a regular basis. Can you imagine the World Memory Champion standing up in public with a load of notes? It just wouldn’t work. I’d be a laughingstock.
So I have to give speeches. And I can, because I use very simple techniques, the same techniques that I use for memorizing a deck of cards, which I’m going to pass on to you now. It doesn’t mean that you have to remember your speech word-forword, unless of course, you’re an actor or you’re quoting somebody. An audience wants to hear your interpretation. They want to hear you, warts and all. I’m not trying to say that I give the best delivery in the world, but what I can do is use my memory. It enables me to keep eye contact with the audience. That means I’m always involved, and I have control over the audience.
THE MENTAL SPEECH FILE
In a public speaking course, once you’ve planned your speech, you normally learn to divide it into key points, which you put on cue cards. They could be a list of 10 key points that you can use to keep you on track throughout the speech. This is a lot better than having separate bits of paper that can get all shuffled around, but you can lose the order of cue cards too, or you can lose the cards themselves. The best speakers do it entirely from memory. Enter what I call the mental speech file.
Obviously the first thing you have to do is prepare your speech. There are various techniques. One method that I use is called mind mapping, which was invented by a guy called Tony Buzan. You get a big sheet of white paper, and you jot down a picture of the theme in the center. If it’s a new product, you draw a little picture of it. From there, you chalk out all the ideas. You draw off radiating branches and put in little symbols, little pictures, and try to keep to one word on a branch. Of course, you have subbranches.
At the end of this exercise, you have one sheet of paper with all your thoughts on it. It acts as a sort of mirror for your mind. You can see the whole speech in front of you.
At this point, you can get the structure of the speech; you can see the most important topics. Then you divide them into key points, and guess what you’re going to do next. You’re going to convert those key points into key images, and of course, the key images then go on a journey.
A JOURNEY WITH DUDLEY MOORE AND GEORGE CLOONEY
By now you’re familiar with forming a journey, so I’m going to give you a little exercise. Perhaps you should go back to the journey that you originally devised around your house, because I want you to imagine 10 key images along a journey of 10 stages. If you still have your images from the first exercise in those stages, then put down this book and form another journey, maybe around your place of work.