Memory tip for 6th of April 2011

Yesterday I discussed importance of structuring and organizing information in order to remember better. Today I want to stress how important rehearsing of information is. In order to store and keep information in your long term memory you need to rehearse information (from time to time) that you have learnt by heart. If you use some mnemonic technique you will learn any information pretty fast, however, it does not mean that the information you learnt using this or that mnemonic technique will immediately go to your long term memory. 

You have to rehearse the information you have read at least a few times more to be sure it is stored into your long term memory. It does not mean you need to cram the material. As I said yesterday, you start revising from key concepts and terms, then go to less important details and end up with the least important ones. So, you spend most of the time revising the most important ideas and brushing up the least important ones. After a few revisions the material sinks into your long term memory and next time you decide to revise it, you will spend much less time doing that. 

Read my previous posts:

Organize information to remember it better

Importance of healthy diet for your memory

Memory tip for 5th of April 2011

Yesterday I told you about importance of what you eat in terms of improving your memory. Today I want to give you a tip that would help you to memorize materials which you want to learn for exams or similar stuff. The tip is: try to organize the stuff you are learning. When you study you will start noticing that there are some similar ideas, concepts and notions in the text. What you have to do is try to group, structure and organize these things into units and then try to remember them.

You need to organize the things according to the level of importance. Some information in the text will be very important, some less, some absolutely unimportant. So, you start putting the most important information with all of its’ ideas and concepts as number one in your mind, then going to less important and finishing with the least important. Sequencing is very important if you want to remember things better. Try to develop your own system of remembering and putting things in chunks or a sequence. In this way you will learn how to remember one thing after another. 

Read my previous posts:

Importance of healthy diet for your memory

Safeguard your memory by avoiding stress

Memory tip for 4th of April 2011

Yesterday my tip for improving your memory was to avoid stress by all means. Today I want to say a few words how important healthy diet is for your brains and your memory. You should know that lots of vegetables is a very good stimulator of your brains. What you might not have known is that they are also very good for your memory too. Fruits and vegetables contain a lot of antioxidants and other very useful substances that protect your brain cells from damage and such dangerous stuff as free radicals. 

You should also be very careful about red meat and other foods that contain a lot of fat: cheese, butter, sour cream and etc. They not only clog your veins, but also can cause dementia and could cause a tremendous damage to your ability to concentrate and remember things. Not all fats are bad. You can use Omega 3 acids which are very good for your brains. These acids are bountiful in fish such as: herring, sardines, tuna, salmon and etc. So, if you want to keep your memory functioning well, be very attentive to what you eat, because ‘you are what you eat’. 

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Bad influence of stress on your memory

Laughter and memory

Memory tip for 3rd of April 2011

Yesterday I told you how laughter can boost your memory abilities. Today my tip for improving your memory is: try to avoid stress. I hope you have read and heard a lot about tremendous damage that stress does to your brains. It really does. In the long run, it starts destroying your brain cells and makes a huge damage to some part of the brains that is responsible for creation of new memories and keeping the old ones in check. I hope you can see why so many old people lose their memories. They have had so much stress in their lives that had destroyed a lot of their brain cells and did an awful damage to their memories.

If you are prone to irritation and nervous outbreaks you should start learning how to avoid that and how to keep stress in control. When temptation to get angry or nervous comes you could go out for a few minutes and start breathing deeply. You also could close somewhere for a few minutes and calm down your mind by stopping all mental processes and then meditating on something peaceful. Visualization could also help you to achieve that. Try to look at the far distance because it will help you to change your focus from problems to your dreams. Good luck in coping with your stress and safeguarding your memory.

Read my previous posts:

Importance of laughter for improving your memory

Positive effect of relationships on your memory

Memory tip for 2nd of April 2011

Yesterday I wrote how important good relationships for improving your memory are. Today’s tip is: laugh a lot to make your memory function better. Laughter is a very powerful medicine. It increases your immunity system by forty percent. It produces vitamin C. It is very good for your heart. And it is very good for your memory. Like any other function in our body it needs a lot of good emotions, because lots of good ‘happy chemicals’ (endorphins) are released when we are laughing. 

They give a tremendous boost for our brains and especially our memory. Just try to check yourself after a good laugh. Try to observe how you feel. You feel very relaxed, with clear mind and very fresh. Your brains work much better after you have a doze of these kind of emotions. Grownups laugh too little and that is one of the explanations why older people start losing their memories. The older we get the less we laugh. But it should not be that way. We can choose to behave differently and we should do that if we want to retain good memories till the day we die. So, have a good portion of laugh every day to keep your memory running well. 

Read my previous posts:

Effect of relationships on your memory

Get enough sleep to keep your memory in good shape

Memory tip for 1st of April 2011

Yesterday my tip for improving your memory was to get enough sleep. Today I want to write a few ideas on positive effect of relationships for your memory and brains. Humans are social beings. We cannot live alone all the time. We need people around. Relationships have tremendous influence on our brains and memories. When we communicate we also exercise our brains. And the research shows that people who lead an active social life have fewer problems with their memories than people who are loners.

So, if you find yourself having problems with your memory try to do a little bit more socializing. Go out more often, join clubs of your interest, attend social events and spend more time with your friends. Although I do not support the idea that a dog is the best friend of a human, I still believe that a pet is still a company if you do not have any human around. It could provide you with some social satisfaction, although it will be very limited (at least I think so). Anyway, if you want stability in your memory do more socializing and keep your relationships going. 

Read my previous posts:

Sleep well to improve your memory

How to remember if you forgot something