I’m a fan of Harry Lorayne too. He took ancient memory techniques and brought them to millions of people who probably would have never heard of them otherwise. He is such an entertaining teacher. :-)

The use of mnemonics in foreign language learning is extremely powerful – as you demonstrated while learning Japanese. I would love to hear more about your experience!

Thanks for stopping by! Erin

I love your site and this is a subject that I’m really interested in.

About 15 years ago I was heading to Japan to study acupuncture and before I went, I happened to see Harry Lorayne on a daytime t.v show. The thing that impressed me most was that he introduced himself to every guest in the studio as they came in and halfway through the show he had everyone stand up and he went through the entire audience without forgetting one single name. He also named every person on the set.

I was talking to a friend about it and she had his book and she gave it to me before going to Japan…it had a massive impact on how quickly I was able to learn the Japanese language.

In his book, Super Power Memory, he talks about tip #4, it really does work like a charm.

When I went to Japan I spent quite some time trying to figure out exactly how apply Harry’s peg memory system to the Japanese language. My teacher and other people said I was crazy and should just learn the words as I needed to but I didn’t listen…

Within a year I could write the college graduates list of Japanese characters from my head in one sitting (2042 characters). Each character in the book had a number and I could hand people this book and tell them to give me a number and I would be able to write character and say the word without hesitation. After 10 or so goes to try and trick me most people would just shake their heads and call me a freak :) (I loved that).

In the acupuncture clinic people couldn’t understand how my language abilities progressed at what seemed unusual speeds, I would just grin and say it was my super power memory.

Memory power is a wonderful thing and the more we exercise our brains the better they get.

I love your site and will return often. You’ve reminded me how much I love this subject, thanks!

Steve Anderson
.-= Steve Anderson´s last blog ..Admiration Greeting Card =-.

Cheers~

Mark

So true. Most of us don’t realize that we’re just not paying attention when someone introduces themselves to us. Making that effort and then repeating the name goes a long way.

Hi Brina,

I couldn’t agree with you more. That technique has always worked for me, and I detail it in the second part of this series: “The Ultimate Trick To Remembering Names” – http://www.braintraining101.com/the-ultimate-name-trick/

Stan,

I know. It’s such a horrible feeling to be standing in front of someone whose name you should know. It is so worth the tiny bit of effort to put name training techniques in use.

Brina

Cheers Erin.

I took baby steps. I started by choosing just one thing – like repeating the name – and I worked on doing that as much as possible until it became a natural thing.

Then I moved on to associating the names with famous people because that came pretty easily for me.

And you just go from there. Start with the easy stuff.