all in the mind

Your natural memory is the result of an exceedingly intricate
network of retention of facts, ideas, and physical activity--all of which
are learned through sensory perception, and then stored in your mind
and limitlessly cross-referenced, for future use. This is how it
happens:
Facts
“Camembert just had six kittens.” That sentence tells you, first of all,
the fact that six kittens have begun to exist. It also reveals, in the
word “just,” the fact that their birth was quite recent. But, because of
your mind’s retention of other facts, previously learned, the sentence
tells you even more-you know that Camembert is a cat, and that the
kittens are her offspring, and that she is a lady cat. You know these
things because of your previous knowledge that kittens--baby cats-are
descended from female cats... information which comes from your
mind’s ability to register facts.

Abstract Ideas:

Now, what is a cat? Can you picture one in your mind? Unless you
know Camembert, your impression of “cat” will probably not be an
accurate picture of Camembert herself ... but still, you have a very
good idea of her basic parts, at least. This impression is the image of
an abstract idea, one built on a whole slew of impressions in your past
involving cats and cat-ness. Then, too, how many are “six”? One more
than you have toes on a foot, three and three, one less than days in a
week, half-a-dozen... another abstract idea that is so well documented
in your mind that you need give the word- and the concept- no more
thought than it takes you to think of what letter follows “G” in the
alphabet.

Motor activity

If you swim, or ride a bicycle, or climb up a step ladder to get
things off a high shelf, or move you arm to avoid putting your hand
into flame, or walk, I’m sure that you don’t spend every active
moment thinking about these things; they come to you so naturally
that you don’t even have to give them thought. If you type, no doubt
you can now type many more words in a minute than was the case the
very first time you tried a typewriter. But that took time and practice.
Through repeated experience, effort and practice, your mind comes to
retain memory of motor activity.
But all this mental memory-activity is only a part of the total picture.
Remember, our definition of memory plainly calls for all means of
making information available.

Your artificial memory:

Even if you were going to be able to devote full time to the task of
feeding your natural memory’s supply of information, you couldn’t
possibly begin to nourish it nearly enough to satisfy your needs. When
you come right down to it, you simply haven’t got the time to
remember all of the things you need to know every now and then. It
doesn’t pay to memorize the entire San Francisco telephone directory
on the chance that you’ll one day have occasion to call someone then
... when you need to, you can always look the number up. And when
the time comes that you must call someone in San Francisco, the
directory becomes a device for reinforcing your natural memory.
Few people can awaken themselves automatically each morning at
specifically desired times, unless waking time remains constant
(waking then becomes a habit, as long as retiring time is constant).
But if you usually wake up at 8:00, and on one special morning you
must rise at 7:00, you’ve got to rely upon outside assistance--an
alarm clock. This is a device.
Suppose you have approximately 100 accounts in your sales
territory, or 100 members in the club of which you’re secretary, or 100
relatives and friends to whom you must send wedding invitations. If
you’ve come to know them gradually, one or two at a time over a
period of years, the odds are that you remember the addresses of
most of them, or at least of those to whom you write most frequently.
But what if you take over a new territory, what if you join a new club,
what if you take on the task of sending invitations to the guests of the
groom? You couldn’t possibly expect to remember all those new names
and addresses right off, and it really wouldn’t pay to set yourself to the
task of memorizing them at the first possible moment, for, to make
their recall habitual would be quite a difficult and time-consuming
undertaking. So you condense the task in a very simple way: you
prepare your own little address book, writing in it the names and
addresses that you need. When you no longer require the bundle of
information which it contains, you can put it away; or, if the
information is continually needed, you simply make a habit of carrying
it with you, or keeping it convenient. That book, too, is a device.
Do you get the picture? First, your mind is able to feed your
memory directly--ideas, facts and motor information (physical
activity)--from its own storehouse of knowledge. Because your
memory is serviced by the mind alone in such cases, we refer to this
activity as your natural memory.
And when your mind is unable to furnish the information which you
seek, you can aid your natural memory with external devices: your
alarm clock is such a device; so are your address book, your shopping
list, the dictionary, your wristwatch, timetables, cookbooks, the letters
on the typewriter’s keyboard whenever you have to look, etc. All of
this we call your artificial memory.

Memory-minimizers

All sources of information--your own perceptions, books and
newspapers, people, and in fact nearly every single thing with which
you come in contact--can both supply information to your natural
memory, and perform as artificial memory-minimizers. Why should
you bother to memorize the population figures of Bechuanaland, when
the almanac is right on your book shelf? No need to memorize travel
directions you’ll need only once, when one of the passengers in your
car can tell you what turns to make while you’re driving there.
But when the information you want to make available is of so
specialized a nature that no standard reference works or handy
authorities are at your service, you’ll want to contrive memoryminimizers
that are precisely suited to your needs. For instance, the
salesman’s address book; the student’s lecture notes and class
schedule; the housewife’s clippings of favorite recipes.
by : noureddine . Source : memory improvement .