Forums IMPORTANT: PLEASE READ PhotoReading, Memory Optimizer Learning

They tend to be pretty responsive on the other forums. Doesn't seem like this forum is monitored as closely. I'm sure someone will come through.

mgrego2:
Say you have formulated some key points from studying a new topic for you like journalism.

You would take an ABC list from something very familiar to you say gardening. Or, you develop a few analograffiti words from gardening that you like. Could be the names of some flowers that are your favorites or terms like planting or summertime flowers.

Then you hang your new material on the letters of the ABC list or the terms like summertime flowers. You exaggerate it so as to be able to recall it easily.

Last night i programmed for a dream that would offer me info for a problem. I awakened w/ recalling the dream. Before getting too awake, i just narrowed the over all feeling of the problem w/ the dream to one word: committment. I used the letters of the word committment to work on the dream. I did 2 different things here: 1. i used my Anchorman list. C=camping=i've never been camping so i think there is some resistence to change in me that is holding up being committed here. O=office building & i would feel safe on the 15th floor. Ok, that shows me i'm really not too keen on the needed change i'm seeking or trying to implement. M=mystery & again the mystery book needs to be read fully to solve the mystery, so i just have to plow ahead here.

The amazing thing is i did this before waking up fully & i can easily recall it. You have to do it to believe it.

Then 2. i just did word association w/ the letters of the word committment. C=change, O=open, M=manage, M=ake it happen, I= interest, etc. Like a free association but w/ a word that could lie at the root of my problem here.

I am also thinking that it would be possible to use a trigger word as the center of a MM & then just use the letters to generate ideas from the material. Haven't done that yet.

Hope this helps...

[This message has been edited by Margaret (edited November 13, 2001).]

[This message has been edited by Margaret (edited November 13, 2001).]

mgrego2,

I'll give it a try. I listened to the learning tricks today. I think it was the second time I listened to it because the first time through, I must have just totally spaced out and/or fallen asleep. This whole new learning system has been at times overwhelming, but it's settling down in me.

Anyway, I'll try to give an example. I've been studying specific bone fractures as part of my learning in my profession. You have to know the names and where the fracture is. In medicine, I've always had a harder time memorizing orthopedic material because it's one of the more uninteresting topics for me. Therefore, I find myself having fewer threads compared to other topics in medicine.

The other day, I was trying to memorize what a massoneuve fracture is. Hard word for me and I don't know french, which is what it sounds like. Anyway, instead of being like Star-Trek Geek boy (as you so astutely pointed out), I remembered my own episode of life. I thought to myself, what does massoneuve most sound like to me. I thought of mayonnaise. I knew that the massoneuve fracture involved a fracture of the proximal fibula in your leg, but I needed to remember it. So I associated mayonnaise with eggs (I have an allergy to them). Then immediately, I saw myself in the third grade with Mrs. DiNonno (who I didn't like) wanting us to tell her what we had for breakfast as part of an exercise to eat healthy. Whatever. Anyway, I imagined myself "fibbing" (for fibula) to her that I had eggs (associated with mayonnaise and therefore massoneuve fracture) because I didn't want to get a failing grade. In honesty, I had NOTHING for breakfast that day. So that was my auxiliary thread of an episode in my own life. If I were a Deep Space Nine fan, I might remember a particular episode with certain details in it, like in my own life as a 3rd grader, to help me remember what a massoneuve fracture it.

Another example. I wanted to remember Ranson's criteria for pancreatitis (inflammation of the pancreas). Firstly, I had difficulty remembering the name Ranson. Then I thought of Mel Gibson in Ransom (at least I think that was the name of the movie, but it works anyway) who's kid was kidnapped. He was naturally upset and in my version, after he's all emotional and yelling, he started to have bad belly pains. Now I cannot forget the name Ranson. Without going into details, I also devised a way to remember all the numbers associated with Ranson's criteria for prognosis of pancreatitis. Before, I was always so dumbfounded when another person was able to rattle it off so easily. Now I can too.

It's great that once you start building new threads, you can use those new threads to hook on newer stuff instead of only using auxiliary threads from other topics you know like your autobiography or your own ABC/Anchorman PEG lists. I think that's how the exponential learning takes place. We don't always need to rely on the Pegs once our learning curve starts to take off exponentially. When we combine it with asking questions about material which is so key, we make more and more associations and our reconstructions become easier and easier.

Margaret and Imagineez,

I like and appreciate your examples. Perhaps I'm trying to make more out of this than it deserves. I think you both touch on effective uses of her techniques for learning. Perhaps you each have taken a different approach to Learning-Trick #2 on pages 27-28 of the manual.

Margaret, I'm still processing your suggestions. They seem appropriate within the context but I'm still searching for a meaningful example of my own. Imagineez, the technique you suggested is one I've used to learn foreign words in the past and it is EXTREMELY effective.

Still resisting here and I'm not sure why. I'll give the session another listen. It may well be that your ideas will provide a useful structure for a second listening.

Thanks for your patient assistance.

mgrego2:
Ok, i went & read that trick #2 & got confused.

p. 11 = def. of Auxiliary Threads: My technique for creating auxiliary helper threads to tie something new into the existing memory web requires your "personal" involvement. YOu will create a personal episode, an autobiographical experience that functions as an auxiliary thread until the new info has become part of the fabric of all you know, part of your memory web.

Based on this definition, Imagineeze has given very worthwhile examples of this definition of Vera's.

My descriptions of what i did were not correct examples for this trick #2. The way i understand it is we need to create clear easily recallable personal experience episodes to serve as auxiliary threads.

Example: I cut the grass all summer. Ok i have the lawnmower, gas, i use stabil in it, & have 6 different parts to cut. I can use this auxiliary thread: gloves, lawnmower, gas, oil, top part around the beech, bottom part, back w/ the bench, side along the driveway, down part around the maple roots, middle part around the blue spruce.

Next step is to memorize the parts of this auxiliary thread. That's easy, b/c i'm so clear on this grass cutting proceedure. And, the trees can serve my memory b/c all those trees are different as well as the areas.

Lastly i would tie new material into each part of this auxiliary thread. Once i fully integrated the new material, i can just drop the use of this auxiliary thread b/c now it has its own web. I can then use this auxiliary for some other new material if i want.

Or, using personal experiences like Imagineeze mentions w/ the teacher in school asking the same question every day.

hope this helps some...

Hi Margaret,

I listened to the CD again today and thought I had clarity for a moment. The suggestion was made that once we have 55 or so auxilary threads, we've developed a web that can then stand on its own and further information can be related directly to this new structure. No problem.

Imagineez's examples are excellent. My problem continues to be that I'm trying to build a procedure based on comments on the CD. Building threads based on personal experience seems reasonable and "doable." Applying a coherent structure to new information based on Klingons, animals, or fugues just isn't registering well.

I can comprehend how you might use your lawnmowing example to remember things you want to buy or to remember topics for a speech. What I can't figure out is how you might use those elements to learn an entirely new topic. Say you want to learn to play the violin (with no previous musical background) or you had the desire to learn calculus, how would you then use your lawnmower example? Doesn't there need to be some correspondence between the topics? How does linking the integral to Stabil or the area under a curve to the oil provide a useful thread? Perhaps you could link the area under a curve to one of the areas you mow, but even that seems a bit iffy.

Am I making any sense here or have I gone off on a tangent that serves only to confuse?

mgrego2,

I don't think the connection you make always has to make sense. It can be really stupid. Who cares as long as it is something even outlandish that will stick in your mind long enough for you to learn that new thread and assimilate it as part of your memory web. Perhaps you have a fear of using your creativity, or lack of belief in it. That was the first thing that came to mind when I read your most recent comments. Remember, you downplayed things when Margaret complimented you on your ABC list for photoreading. Just a thought, anyway. And remember, you have what it takes to come up with your own stuff. I cringe when I think of Mike's use of fugues or Star Trek stuff as auxiliary threads because that's NOT me. Of course you're NOT going to relate to it because it's not a part of your own MEMORY, and therefore not a part of you're PERSONALITY.

For me, I could imagine pouring oil into the area under the curve to make it more real and practical, and less theoretical and abstract. If I was learning how to calculate the area in a funnel, I might pour the oil through the funnel and somehow link the particular formula with that whole scenario. I don't know if this is calculus, but it's math nonetheless. My main point is to at least make something new that you're learning familiar enough to continue with, thereby generating interest and doing it with greater ease.

Have you been listening to the MO paraliminal? That probably will help too. If you have the Belief paraliminal, that one is good too. Or personal genius.

Hope this helps.

Hi, mgrego2,
I was listening to the B side of tape 2 which corresponds to cd 2. I think this is where your question is answered. She explains the use of auxiliary threads clearly.

I wasn't trying to find the answer to your question; i was just listening to the tapes for the 2nd time.

She mentions how unfamiliar terms can be hung on very familiar terms in order to learn them. She gave the example of how she taught a computer language course to Germans who were unfamiliar w/ the English language. The goal was for them to just get a handle on some words to make the learning of the pc language move along faster.

So, say, you are learning calculus. I guess you'd just get a some of the terms that are new & have no threads in your memory web & hang them on an auxiliary thread or personal experience that is easy to recall. Auxiliary threads would be used as a peg list & personal experience used as a story.

It was my understanding that the auxiliary threads was not used to learn some new material but to jump-start you into it. I think in any new learning, vocabulary terms are the first things that need to be grasped. Once those terms are understood & memorized, then we begin to get more of a feel for the new project.

Check out cd 2 b/c it really does help explain trick #2.

I haven't started building any auxiliary threads yet though. I'm all wrapped up in doing abc lists. I'd like to get around 50 done in the next couple weeks.

Good luck

Imagineez,

Thanks again for some good points. I'm beginning to think it's just laziness. It'll take time and effort to create those first links... I've only listened to the MO paraliminal once so far. I know I should do more but time has been tight.

Margaret,

Thanks for reminding me of the story related to Basic. That does bring a little more context in that is useful. It supports Imagineez's prior posting from Nov 13 but "resonates" a little more for me because my web has a lot of old programming stuff in it. It's surprising that I had forgotten that story.

Thanks again, everyone.

I read something in "The Einstein Factor" by Win Wenger and Richard Poe that seems to apply to this topic. The example seems more effective (for me) than the Klingon example. I figured I would post it because things are so slow on this forum.

The text appears on page 208, during a discussion of freenoting.

"...Freenoting will automatically increase your memory of the lecture by associating key points with your own expressive thoughts. The crazier, funnier, and more bizarre those thoughts are, the more memorable they will be.

In a chemistry lecture, you might imagine those atoms that combine easily with hydrogen to be covered with fur in which the little hydrogen atoms tend to get caught. Picture the strange, varied coats of fur that would distinguish each type of hydrogen-trapping atom. Oxygen, for example, might have very wet looking fur."

Why do I care? Because, unintentionally, Dr. Wenger provided a better example of applying things you already know. By applying visual properties of fur to the atoms, you are putting it into a framework that makes sense to you. This just seems a little more clear than Vera's example. Now I have a clearer sense of how something from the Klingon world might be applied to law. I was looking for a direct correspondence (sort of a 1-to-1 relationship that very likely doesn't exist -- torts are like the Klingon practice of such and such...).

Does this make any sense or was it a waste of bits? Sorry for restating the obvious, since everyone else seems to be getting it already anyway...