How to deliberately remember lots of info? Here are two immodest masters of the game, telling how they do it. Both use variations on the time-honored method: associate each thing to be remembered with something colorful.
Shannon Schunicht’s web site explains:
While in the Army, Mr. Schunicht was involved in a mid-air collision rendering him unconscious for three weeks, everything had to be relearned as nursing actions are reported as having been displayed upon awakening from the extended unconsciousness (19 days). Studies in recovery brought about some pragmatic discoveries to compensate for the residual memory deficits. The most valuable discovery was having each vowel represent a mathematical sign… [his handy reference guide is reproduced here]
Here’s a video of Mr. Schunicht explaining in more detail:
Joshua Foer encountered some competitive rememberists, and then tried to learn their techniques well enough that he could win the next year’s USA Memory Championshiop. He succeeded, then wrote a book —called Moonwalking With Einstein— about it. Here’s video of Mr. Foer at the championships, and then explaining his story:
You can also see him explaining it to Stephen Colbert. Here’s the book [which we recommend, having read it and still remembering much of it]:
