Master of Memory: Accelerated learning, education, memorization - MMem 0401: How to remember names for the long term

Episode Date: September 21, 2015

Rob is interested in remembering names using mnemonics, but he wants a technique that will stick with him for the long term in case he sees someone months or years after their first meeting. What should he do to remember names for the long term? What do you want to learn? Leave your question at http://MasterOfMemory.com/. Music […]

Master of Memory 401. Welcome to Master of Memory. I'm Timothy, and I'm here to answer your accelerated learning questions every day and to inspire and empower you to learn anything you want to learn faster than ever. Rob wrote in an email, My question, like loads of others I'm sure, is about name and face memory. In my business, I see multiple people every day. They all know me,

but I may only see them once or twice a year. I try picking facial features using action and their name, as in your previous podcasts, to remember, and this is okay short term sometimes. People's faces are just too similar to get great long-term memory triggers. Is there anything else I can try to do to get people into my long-term memory? If I could do this, it would make a huge difference. Like it's been said before, there's nothing sweeter sounding to a person than calling them by their own name. So Rob, yes, you're absolutely right. It's extremely valuable to know people by their names and to give people their names when you meet them and greet them and in conversations. So this is really important and a very important application of mnemonics and memory. This is something you can't just, you know, look up all the time.

It's something you really want to know and be able to remember. So obviously, first, we have the mnemonics for the names, which I've mentioned in episode two and many other episodes. So you can just search master of memory names for various episodes about how to remember people's names. But Rob, you're already beyond that because you know how to remember people's names in the short term. For you, Rob, I'm going to mention a few things that I have in mind. First of all, something that I did before a conference once is I just did a little bit of

homework. I went on Facebook. We had a private group of everybody who was going to be at the conference. It was a sort of private conference of just about 50 or 60 people. And I just learned everybody's names ahead of time. I turned the names into images. I tried to tie them to their faces for everyone who had profile pictures on Facebook. And then I also stored those names in a palace to try to remember who had which businesses and which types of businesses. A little bit of homework can go a long way. And so I think that in general, what you should do is not just try to remember at the moment that you meet them, which as you say, is pretty good for the short term,

but also do a little bit of homework in between just for the case that you meet that person again. Now, here's what I do personally. Aside from that conference, I move around between different cities. I spend time in San Diego, New York, Tulsa, and Buenos Aires. And I like to remember people and really know them in between and not just have to reacquaint myself with everybody when I arrive. So I have my acquaintances in different Facebook lists for the different cities that I live in. And basically for a month after and a month before seeing the people in one of these cities, I'll kind of focus on these people on Facebook and I'll interact with them quite a bit. Now, you can write me an email, Rob, if you're interested or anybody really, if you're interested in some really powerful Facebook hacks.

I've had multiple interviews on other podcasts recently that have focused on my networking skills, and it largely has to do with some things that I do with Facebook just to keep my friends organized and to stay in touch with everyone. But at any rate, it's going to come down to finding some way to review these people in between seeing them. There's no simple magic way to write something in your brain forever, it does take a little bit of maintenance. So you might come up with a review system, maybe reviewing all of your palaces of different people's names every single month. So you go through the names of all the people that you want to remember once a month just

for an hour or something like that. And it can be more than worth it. Try to quiz occasionally using images of their faces. So if you have a picture of their face, store that and quiz yourself by looking at their face and remembering their name. That admittedly is something I've never really done myself, although I think it would help a lot. So I mean that is the trigger and the result that you want is to look at their face and remember what the name is. Bottom line is it's not just about the mnemonics, it's about doing a little bit of homework and reviewing in between seeing these people because it pays off when you do see them,

you can remember their name. Thanks for the question Rob, and for everyone listening, what do you want to learn? The world's knowledge can be yours. Leave your learning request at masterofmemory.com slash question and I'll talk to you again soon.