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Creating Associations Using The Link Method

The basic premise upon which most memory techniques rely is based upon forming ridiculous, crazy, illogical, absurd, impossible images of the thing you want to remember and something you already know. This article picks up from where Association - in the first place left off.

The purpose of this article is to explain how to form ridiculous images between the thing we want to remember and something we already know. In this regard we are going to use the Link method which itself creates the 'thing' we already know. It's self-creating.

Here's a list of items to be remembered and I guarantee that if you apply the techniques as explained you will remember the items with confidence and clarity for as long as you determine you need to remember them. Here's the list: car, tree, ball, aeroplane and bucket.

Using the link method we will remember this list by linking tree to car, ball to tree, aeroplane to ball and bucket to aeroplane. For the sake of brevity I've kept this list to five items but the concept works for as many items that are required to be remembered. How do we remember the first item, car? Well that's a good question but for now, just accept that you know what the first item is (write it down). Other techniques are available to us to remember the first item and they will be explained in later articles. The primary purpose of this article is to explain how things or items are associated, that is, I'm explaining how to emulate the elephant concept as explained in Association - in the first place..

In your minds eye picture a car and tree together. Car is what we know and tree is the thing we want to remember. Now if you pictured a car parked next to a tree that's too logical, too normal and it will not help with trying to remember a tree. The image has to be ridiculous, strange, out of the ordinary, remember we are trying to emulate the elephant concept. Let your mind wander and imagine an illogical image and actually see it, live it, in your minds eye. There is no right or wrong image to be formed but rather the more absurd, ridiculous, illogical the better. Here's what comes to my mind.

I can see a motor car being driven down the road and the driver is one huge green leafed tree. I can see that a branch is on the steering wheel and another branch resting on the door with the window wound down. The tree is so huge that the branches and leaves extend out of all the open windows and are blowing in the wind as the car is speeding.

We should all agree that a tree driving a motor car is ridiculous. Forming this image in your mind, after a little practice, should not take longer than a second. It actually took me longer to type it. The point being, that the more detail you visualize the better will be the recall. In your minds eye actually see the motion, the car speeding down a road, the tree with branches and leaves bursting through the open windows blowing in the wind. Feel it, smell it, imagine it. It's the clarity of the of the image that's important not how long you dwell on it.

The image I visualized is what first came to my mind, that is, first up I thought of a tree being a driver and from there merely added detail to it. It's not the only ridiculous image that could be formed, and I'm sure you can imagine your own.

What has just happened? We've actually forced an original awareness, we've spent not more than a second committing tree to our memory bank. When we think of a car almost immediately our vivid imagination is activated and right there in our mind is that tree driving a motor car.

The next item in the list is ball. In order to remember ball we need to associate it to something we already know. We already know tree because we committed that to memory by associating tree to car. So we'll associate a ball to a tree and we repeat the same process as that for associating tree to car. Can you see how the link method is self creating known items?

In your minds eye, your imagination, conjure up a ridiculous picture (little movie) between a ball and a tree. My initial thought is a tree with balls instead of leaves. All that's required now is to pad it out with a little detail, a little movie in your mind.

I can see a large tree with many branches and balls are growing instead of leaves. It's a windy day and balls are dropping all over the ground and some smacking me in the face.

Again, it took me longer to type it than actually imagine it. My images are my examples, you may have thought of a different first thought and I'd recommend that you develop that thought. Following these examples will be easier if using your own ridiculous images. If for some reason you can't conjure up your own then by all means use my examples for the purposes of demonstration.

The next item on the list is aeroplane. Since we are using the link method we will link aeroplane to something we already know, a ball. We know ball because that was associated to tree which was associated to car.

My first thought is to substitute a ball on a football pitch for an aeroplane.

I can see a team of football players dribbling a ball but the ball is not rolling properly as it has wings on either side. As a player kicks the ball long and high the ball with wings keeps on going out of the stadium.

Associate aeroplane to bucket.

I can see an aeroplane flying high and the engine cuts out, the propellors stop and then the pilot activates a bucket parachute system. A big red bucket is attached to the plane by ropes and is acting as a parachute but not doing a very good job as the aeroplane plummets to the ground, crashes with the bucket still attached.

We have now committed the list of items to memory. Admittedly five items is not a huge list but if for some reason you are struggling to remember an item the number one reason would be that your initial association was not strong enough. It's just a matter of practice. If you're taking five seconds to create an association, so be it, but it's fives seconds of your time well spent, with practice it won't take as long. It's the clarity of image to strive for.

To recall the list of items the only item you may struggle with is the first one as we didn't associate it to anything (that will be addressed in later articles). The first item is a car. Think of car and what does that remind you of? Tree, of course. Think of tree, what does that remind you of? Ball. Think of ball, what does that remind you of? Aeroplane. Think of aeroplane, what does that remind you of? Bucket.

Create your own list of 10 or 20 items, follow the rules above and I guarantee you will easily recite the list of items in the correct order, even in reverse.

Even if you think the system doesn't work, it does. By at least attempting you are forcing an original awareness, a necessary requirement in memory retention for subsequent recall.

About the Author

Steven A Taylor
Improve Memory

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