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Memorizing does not have to be as hard as most people make it. The problem is that most people only know how to memorize by reading the same thing over and over again. You have to learn to memorize. In this post we are going to look at how the brain remembers and then show how to use that knowledge to come up with a method for memorizing verbatim text. Any tip or trick that will improve your memory even slightly is well worth the effort.
In this article we are going to focus on a technique that will let you easily:
- Memorize a speech
- Memorize the Bible
- Memorize lines
- Memorize Scripture
At the end of this article is a Javascript tool that makes it easy to implement this method. If you are reading the RSS or Email version, the tool may not show up.
Synapses and Neurons and How to Memorize
In the simplified model of the brain in this discussion, we’ll be looking at neurons and synapses. Neurons are parts of the brain that can send and receive electrical signals. Synapses are the paths between neurons.
When you remember something neurons fire signals down particular synapse pathways to other neurons which in turn fire signals to other neurons. The particular sequence represents a memory. In fact, scientists have been able to make people “re live” experiences from the past by poking around in their brain with an electric probe and starting this interaction.
Strong Pathways
Synapses appear to exhibit plasticity. The strength of the signal they convey is determined by use. The more a particular synapse is used, the stronger the signal it conveys.
For example, consider remembering your home telephone number. Since this is a number you use on a regular basis it probably comes very easily to mind. When you try to recall the number some neurons fire of a signal down some synapses that carry a very strong signal to other neurons which do the same thing. The number comes with very little effort.
Now consider a number that you will have trouble remembering. Lets say your driver’s license number. For most people an attempt to recall this number will cause neurons to fire down very weak synapses. If you are like me, the signal is so weak that it will probably not create the necessary chain reaction to recall the number. In fact all I get is a vague impression that the first letter is an S or E. To improve your memory of this number it is necessary to fire a signal down the synapses that will trigger this memory.
How to Memorize – Practice Recalling not Repeating
This is the crucial concept of any type of memorization. The act of reading something you want to memorize fires different connections than the act of recalling. This is how you learn to memorize–your practice recalling, not repeating. This means that simply reading a particular piece of text over and over again is going to be the long road to memorization. You need to let your brain practice recalling the data so it can strengthen the same pathways that will fire when you need to remember the information later on. You can’t practice recalling until the information is at least partially contained in your short term memory.
Now lets look at coming up with a method for memorizing text using our understanding of how the brain works. So lets say we are trying to memorize the Gettysburg Address by Lincoln.
Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.
Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.
But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate — we can not consecrate — we can not hallow — this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us — that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion — that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain — that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom — and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.
The 278 word speech is not a particularly long oration, but it will work for our demonstration purposes. Our goal is to create a method that will force our brain to practice recalling the speech–even before we have it fully memorized. So first of all we need to get it into our mind so our brain has it–even if we can’t recall it. Here are a few methods that will work:
- Read through it aloud.
- Copy the text by hand.
- Read through the text and create a short outline.
- Have someone else read it to you.
There are other methods as well, just do something to get a general familiarity with the piece. Now we need to come up with a method to give our brain, just enough information to recall the original text without simply reading the original.
F s a s y a o f b f o t c, a n n, c i L, a d t t p t a m a c e.
N w a e i a g c w, t w t n, o a n s c a s d, c l e. W a m o a g b-f o t w. W h c t d a p o t f, a a f r p f t w h g t l t t n m l. I i a f a p t w s d t.
B, i a l s, w c n d — w c n c — w c n h — t g. T b m, l a d, w s h, h c i, f a o p p t a o d. T w w l n, n l r w w s h, b i c n f w t d h. I i f u t l, r, t b d h t t u w w t w f h h t f s n a. I i r f u t b h d t t g t r b u — t f t h d w t i d t t c f w t g t l f m o d — t w h h r t t d s n h d i v — t t n, u G, s h a n b o f — a t g o t p, b t p, f t p, s n p f t e.
What we’ve done is taken the first letter of each word. Now try to recite the speech while looking at the text above. You’ll probably get part way into it and get confused. Backup a few letters and look beyond the letter you are struggling with to see if you can figure it out. Remember you are trying to help your brain find the right connections. If you have to consult the original, make note of what confused you and start over.
I have found this method to be much more productive for memorizing verbatim text than just about anything else. I used it extensively in school when I was trying to find how to memorize scripture quickly. It will help improve your memory by giving you a way to practice. However, keep in mind that it is simply one method. When you need to memorize something, think about how to help your brain practice recalling the information–not merely reading it over and over again. Your goal is to quickly get the information into your short term memory so you can start practicing the recall process and move the information into long term memory.
Below is a tool to help you produce first letter text as shown above. Simply paste the original text in the top box and hit the button. All the letters other than the first one of each word will be stripped out and placed in the bottom box. You can then copy this into a document for printing.
This was an extremely helpful and insightful post! Thanks! And the tool at the end is great!
This is a brilliant article and too. I am a “memory expert” (have taught it on and off for years, use mnemonics constantly) and really appreciate what you have written. I have not used this particular tool in the past, and “verbatim memory” has been one of my weaker skills. I’ll certainly be using this method more, now that I’ve learned it here.
Have you done any research into “mnemonizing” the string of letters into word, and linking them?
I think I’d like to explore that.
In the meantime I’ll be “digg”-ing and “del.ic.ious”-ing this great article! Thanks!
@Brian – So can you give me an example of what you mean by “mnemonizing”? If I assign a new word to each letter, it seems like that would be more confusing. Maybe I’m not understanding what you mean.
One way of mnemonizing could be to associate something with something so ridiculous that it is unforgettable. You then cannot forget the mnemonic and just need to make sure that you can get back from there to the original items. If you can associate the words with concepts that you can easily picture in your head – then words can flow into the next word with a kind of imagined animation of very silly stuff…
Great article. Is there anyway you could help me get that Java tool extracted and self-contained? I have vast amounts of stuff to learn verbatim and having the tool on my desktop would really useful and save me having to come back to this website. Cheers
@Nathan – Ah but you see the whole point of writing the tool was to get people like you to come back to the website. :) If you want something for you desktop, you can make word do the same thing using search and replace with regular expressions. You’ll just want to tell it to find a word and replace the word with the first letter. You can probably find some examples on web pages that talk about regular expressions. Another thing to do would be to look for an expression that replaces the first letter with a capital. Something like that should be easy to modify to removing everything but the first letter.
Good luck with your memorization.
This is wonderful! I am familiar with quite a few memory techniques. They are good for getting the gist of something, but they are too cumbersome for learning something word for word.
Nathan, you ask, we deliver. I have written a .NET application for Windows desktops that does just that, please visit http://www.twomilessolutions.com/upurmemory to purchase ($10+sales tax) application which sits on your desktop and allows you to employ these techniques. Unfortunately for you Mac users, it is a windows application. You can run it using parallels or other virtual machine type applications, but I do not own a mac so I have not tested it on one. It has been tested and works on both Windows Vista and Windows XP and should work all the way back to Windows 98.
This article didn’t make any sense. I can’t figure out what those letters in the box are suppose to represent. When I cut and pasted into the box and “hit the button” ( guess you meant “convert”) nothing happened other than it recopied itself in the new box – just as it had been.
Glad this silliness helped someone, but I have absolutely not idea what any of the example meant. Understood about the brain, but other than that, a waste of my time. Too bad too, I have many lyrics to learn in a short time and having a tool to use would have been helpful.
Sorry you feel it is a waste of your time. It is possible that you just didn’t understand how it worked. Let me try to explain with a shorter example.
The way it works is like this. Lets say you want to memorize the following:
My Dog Has Fleas. (This is what you’d put in the top box)
The tool would convert it to:
M D H F (This is what would appear in the bottom box.)
You can then use the letters to help make sure you are right as you practice repeating it. If you get off, you’ll realize it because the letters won’t match up with what you are reciting. So it gives you a way to check yourself without showing you the word you are trying to remember.
interesting article, but i’m still confused.
does this mean that your attempt to recall something at this moment will improve your ability to recall in the future simply because you are strengthening that pathway in your brain?
@Edwin – Giving your mind the chance to practice recalling something and giving yourself a way to check your accuracy without reverting to the original text will help strengthen the pathways for remembering that piece of text.
It isn’t just that the attempt to recall something will help you remember it. You need to actually remember it–even if that means using your cheat sheet of the first letters. If you revert to the actually text you may end up practicing NOT remembering it, which isn’t going to give you the desired results.
this is great i have to memorize some romeo and juliet for english this will help alot
I need to learn drink recipes quick for bartending do you think this could help me?
@Knia – Using flashcards with the name of the drink on the front and the instructions on the back is probably a better way. You don’t really need to memorize drink recipes verbatim.
This is a very simple bit of Javascript code, based on a one-line regular expression, and nobody should be charging $10 for something like this.
Go here:
http://www.downes.ca/memorization.htm
and view the source. Better yet, save a copy to your desktop and open it there.
@Stephen – The desktop version the guy is selling does some additional things that you won’t get from a single line of javascript. Personally I applaud his resourcefulness to see something people were asking for and create a solution (even if it isn’t something you would use).
It is also worth pointing out that anyone could view the source of what I have published here if they want. However, there are some people who read this blog who don’t necessarily have as much web experience as you do and an installable version is much more in line with what they would prefer.
Hey, this is an interesting blog, well I’m a law student and so far as memorizing is concerned our school seems to driill us in understanding and in memorizing though we were not taught how to memorize. This is a wonderful, but i would like to recommend that you experiment with your method and the method used in wikihow on memorizing. :3.. so far I think it will work well in combination.
(We’re not allowed but to recite without holding anything every single day of our classes. Therefore the most embarassing moments of my life)
Ex. Article 13. Mitigating Circumstances. The following are mitigating circumstances:
Read Article 13 then close your eyes, say it out loud (article 13)
Read Mitigating Circumstances then close your eyes, say it out loud (Article 13. Mitigating Circumstances) Just keep adding words till you finish the provision you want to memorize. :3..
haha. it’s not fast but so far this has been the only method working for me in memorization. :3.. and your method is a good way to remind myself of the corrections. :3..
This is a great technique. I use it to memorize thousands of words each month and it’s very effective. There’s enough missing in the words to make your brain work to recall the information, and yet there is enough there to ensure that you will do so. I will always use this method for speeches and long passages of information.
OMG!!! I have been having to pass up tons of acting roles that have been offered to me because I was TOTALLY UNABLE TO MEMORIZE ANYTHING LONGER THAN 10 WORDS (i share my brain with a demon called Dyslexia) With 55 years of practice, I have overcome a full 95-98% of this demon’s trickery – but until today – NOTHING worked when it came to verbatim memorization. I can’t thank you enough for this MIRACLE – in less than 30 minutes I was able to recite the entire writing – ALL 278 Words!!!!!
I cannot tell you how liberated I am feeling right now! Thank you! And May GOD Richly Bless you as you have Blessed Others!!!
Thank you! Thank you!! Thank you!!!
This is excellent, as a Freemason I am required to learn several pages of text word for word. It took me nearly a whole month to learn a half a page of some text and after finding this page last night, I learnt the other half over night! and for someone like me with a very bad memory, its an amazing feat.
thank you for showing us this.
Great little article, and a very practical and super tool at the end. Thanks so much, man!!!
Please,can you give me clues or techniques on how to boost my recall in biochemistry-the chemical stuctures,the pathways,the strange biochemical names?
Fantastic, should be required to learn this in grade school.
GREAT! I used this for a 50 line piece of shakespeare, and I got it done in under 2 hours!
Thanks sooo much!
@Julian – I’m glad it helped you.
Hi. I’m currently repeating a unit at university as I failed it first time around. So here I am again and I thought I’d try and find some ways to help me learn. So, I googled Learning verbatim and found this website.
I really like the look of how this memory tool works so I’m going to give it a try. I have stacks of definitions to learn as this is an exercise and sport science unit. So I’m really hoping it will help in memory and recall for when the exams come up.
I’ll come back after my first quiz to let you know how I went.
Thanks so much
Hi Mark! This is fantastic!! I do a lot of memorizing – firstly, as a pianist and, secondly as a Baha’i teacher and presenter. In fact, it was while researching for a workshop on memorizing Baha’i texts that I found your article. I am completely blown away by the simplicity of your system and also by the explanation with regard to why reading alone is not the best way to memorize. People always complain that they read and read and read………… and nothing sticks! Anyway, I am writing to ask for permission to incorporate your brilliant concepts into my workshop on memorization. Of course, all the people who use your system will be directed to your site – and hopefully will use the tool. THANK YOU! Kindest regards Ann (www.candelabra.co.za)
@Ann – Thanks for your kind words. I still haven’t found a great way to memorize piano music. During college I just reverted to the play-it-as-many-times-as-possible method. Some of the things I tried were: 1. Memorizing the sheet music until I could recreate it on paper. 2. Covering up the music for the left or right hand. 3. Covering up all but the first note of each measure.
Have you found anything that works well for you?
Hi Mark! Yes absolutely! For music, the way to go is definitely by learning it in an active intellectual process – as you describe. Working away from the keyboard is good, too. Once one has a piece memorized and up to speed, a good way to consolidate is to work with each hand alone, at the keyboard. A couple of run-throughs a week keeps the memorization intact.
By the way – is it OK for me to introduce your ideas at my workshop? You didn’t say anything about that…
Kindest regards
Ann
@Ann Cloete – Sure you can use these ideas at your workshop. I’m guessing that they aren’t original to me anyway.
great tool…i need some help from the author, can I get the email id.
What is your question venkat?
Dear Mr Mark Shead, I have an agenda of memorizing about 4000 songs in praise of God, which is our tradition. I am practicing them and almost completed 3000 songs and learning balance through a teacher. maintaing and mastering the songs which i have completed so far is a herculean task. i tried some samples in the method you have suggested and it is working out. but i have to manually note down the first letter of the words and practise. those songs are in our monther tongue and i have the soft copy of those songs as pdf acrobat documents. i request your help in using the above tool to convert them. also suggest some tips for memorising new songs and to maintain them.
@Venkat – If the PDF is text (and not just an image) you should be able to copy and paste the words into the tool and then push the convert button. If it is an image, the only way to use the tool is to type it in–it might be just as fast for you to write down the first word of each letter as you are doing.
Hi Mark. THANK YOU!!! This is awesome! I will be using this system, in addition to others, to memorize the King James Bible. I am very excited about the results I have already achieved using this technique just since finding this article. This is brilliant and makes perfect sense to me. I really appreciate the tool as well. What a fantastic use of software. I love it. I will be sharing this resource with others I know. Thank you so much.
this really works, i just memorized the lyrics to a song that i like, it was a lot faster than some other memorization methods i’ve used
Dear Mark Shead, i have four different PDFs, by any chance can you help me in converting them, if I email those documents to you? sorry for bothering you..
mark … through ann cloete’s workshop and your converter, my memorising life is absolutely transformed! i just can’t thank you both enough. is there any way that i can transfer the actual converter onto my own computer so that i don’t have to travel into the website each time?
Hi Mark,
I am studying for my real estate test.Would this be my best option
to remember?
Thankyou,
Shelley Mathes
I think what he meant was that the string of seemingly random letters that is outputted by this process could be memorized and then the list would always be there for recalling the specific text.
In response to his idea, I’d say that there is real point in memorizing the list of letters unless you already have developed the a mnemonic for letters. If you have developed a mnemonic for letters (as I’m sure professor homunculus has) then this strategy I imagine will make memorizing a speech much easier since instead of looking at the letters on the page to jog your memory, they come with your brain for ready use.
@Not Brian – I think the idea of trying to memorize the list of letters is crazy! Humans can memorize things much better when there is meaning behind it. The letters only give you an inbetween step to help you memorize the text by forcing your brain to recall the word. You can check to see if you are getting off course by looking at the letters without reverting to reading the original text.
@Shelley – If you have to memorize a bunch of things verbatim then this is a good option. If you just need to remember the answer to a bunch of questions, I think I’d use flashcards with a question on one side and the answer on the back.
@Celia – The idea is to keep you coming back here. :) Someone added some comments on how to do this. There is also a program you can buy (from someone else) that was created based on my ideas on this post. You can find out about it here: http://www.twomilessolutions.com/upurmemory
hello sir.. this s great tool.. actually i want to memorize the meanings of the words for ex am learning complex words.. please let me know is there any way around. i think i cant use this tool for that purpose please help
I came back to this site, b//c I use it for memorizing stuff, and the box that converts it was gone! Where is it?
@Ashley – Sorry. I had a brief technical glitch. It should be there and working now.
@Arul – This probalby isn’t the best tool for that. I’d look at using flash cards or something similar for memorizing definitions of words.
Thanx! It’s working now!
hi thanks presently am using flash cards for memorizing the meanings.. but for next time when am reviewin the word for its meaning my mind struggles to get it. thanks
@arul – my wife is a teacher and one thing she does when teaching language/meaning is to associate some sort of picture to help you remember the meaning, or find some sort of memory hook like building a sentence with the word that helps you remember the meaning.
I was looking thru at the other comments and it said something about getting Word to do the same thing, but I didn’t really get it. How do you do it?
@Ashley – I think you can probably use the search and replace function in Word to do the same thing that the app on the page does. I don’t know for sure if it is possible, but you might be able to get it to work with enough fiddling.
thanks jeff miles !!!…. is there any other way please tell. i mean to say like the software or any technique used with reference to actions in brain… thanks a lot
I’ll try it, but I might just stick to this site :-P
@Ashley – Well that was kind of the idea–make something easy to use without going through all the trouble to do it with something else. I use to do it by hand on paper. It wasn’t that bad and it makes you think about each letter, but it is easy to make a mistake and that kind of defeats the purpose.
Where has the tool gone?
It should be back. Sorry about that WordPress likes to eat the tool. :)