Young and old alike, our lives are the sum total of our memories and the experience and knowledge that we are able to retain from them. Memories often operate primarily in one of two ways – either they are active and form part of your autopilot system and others are more subdued and only surface when you actively recall them. Even the brightest and most well adjusted person has a memory lapse every now and then and the reasons are as varied as the day is long. Think of your memory as just another muscle akin to any other in your body that you need to flex and exercise. If you don’t stimulate your mind and stretch your memory to the limit, you risk the chance of it becoming dormant and ineffective. This however is not a green light for you to start panicking if you forget where you put your car keys. For the most part, everyday memory lapses are the result of stress, an inability to concentrate due to stress or other solvable, manageable issues.
As far as health products to help your memory are concerned there are a number of preparations that claim to stimulate brain activity and thereby, stimulate memory. A particularly prominent forerunner in the supplement market for memory issues is ginkgo biloba. It is an herb that is supposed to be able to boost the power of your memory and to give you renewed concentration abilities. Many preparations for memory healthy contain this herb along with others and some vitamins and minerals. Using these supplements in only one part, however in making sure you can hold onto your thoughts for a long time to come. Again, we must reiterate that treating memory like a muscle is one of the best ways to conceptualize what needs to be done – you have to exercise your recall or bear losing it all together!
Use the following tip to help you give your memory a good hearty stretch!
Seek out patterns in your everyday life and then start creating your own: A super great way to remember big number clusters and large phrases is to begin by looking for patterns in their basic formation. What exactly are you looking for? With the numbers, are they in any way sequential? In the phrases, can you affix and acronym using words and meanings that are closer to things you are already retaining? Another great way to remember things is by putting them to music. Go with songs that are themselves easy to remember or that you already know by heart – the birthday song or some Christmas carols are very popular and make for easy tunes for you to add your numeric of syllabic patterns to. Be creative! Sometimes it help to get others involved, like a friend or spouse – have them sing the song to you and then you have the challenge of remembering what it is referencing. Have fun with this and pretty soon, you’ll remember everything you’ve ever set eyes or ears on!