Once you learned this Memory Planner technique, you will be ready to create/store and recall appointment dates and times throughout the year. Your brain is a powerful tool, so why not use it instead of technology?
I love the Memory Planner technique because once learnt, it’s simple to create new appointment dates. To recall an appointment, in your mind, run through the days of the current month, or future months of the year. And you’re free to do it whenever, without the need of your phone or computer.
As with all memory techniques, the more you use them, the easier they become to use. It won’t be long before you’re doing it seamlessly without effort.
So, how does it work?
The Memory Planner technique incorporates a couple of previous lessons.
The first and most important lesson to learn is the powerful and flexible method called the Major System. Most of the posts on Memrecall build on the Major System.
Think of the Major System as an immense oak tree, and most of the other lessons branch off from that.
Second, follow up with this post below. ‘Build a mental filing cabinet’. This builds on the Major System, allowing you to develop a mental filing cabinet. I use my mental filing cabinet on a daily basic. Looking through the kitchen cupboards, adding items I need to my mental list, then easily recall in the shop or days later until you overwrite with another list!
You will find many uses for the Mental Filing Cabinet, so really get to grips with it. It will not disappoint you. In the Mental Filing Cabinet post below, I show you how to remember 20 items, but once you know the Major System, you can make the filing cabinet as large as you want. My mental filing cabinet holds 100 items. More than enough for my purpose.
Also, get a good visual mind reference for each month. It’s quite easy to do and will help to nail down the Memory Planner technique. The ‘Convert the months into objects for easy visual reference’ post will help with that. I do I explain this below, if you wish to skip this post for now.
Once you have both the ‘Major System’ and ‘Mental Filing Cabinet’ techniques under your belt, you can implement the Memory Planner technique outlined below.
Below, you will find a few working examples stored in my Memory Planner for April.
To start, we’ll divide any event we wish to save into the following headers:
Event Title
Event Date
Event Month
Event Time
I’ve broken it down into these headers as it helps explain the process of visualisation for each section.
Next, we’ll create and store the event. When I say ‘create and store’, I really mean thinking about the event based on the headers above. After going through the process, which I’ll outline with a few examples below, you’ll realise you have done enough to ‘create’ the event in your mind, and also ‘stored’ it ready for recall.
Event example 1. I rang my garage and booked my car in for some ‘MOT Advisory’ work to have the rear brake pads replaced.
Let’s set the event details up. Initially, you can jot down the event, then mentally store the details by working through each header.
Event Title: Take the car to the garage for rear brake pads.
Event Date: 19th
Event Month: April
Event Time: Early Morning
Ok, let’s break it down. And watch how the visualisation develops as we add more information.
Event Title: Take the car to the garage for rear brake pads.
Visualise: See yourself driving to the garage.
Event Date: 19th
Numbers are notoriously hard to remember, so this is where the Major System comes into play. The Major System can translate numbers into words. The number 19 translates to many words, such as ‘Top,’ ‘tip,’ ‘tap,’ and many more. This will make total sense when you’ve learned the Major System. I decided on the translation ‘Tap‘.
Visualise: Your car in the garage, on the ramp. There is a bath tap on each back wheel where the brake pads should go. This is odd, I know. Memories created with oddities are easier to recall. So make the visualisation odd, colourful and vivid. Make them animated.
Event Month: April
The month of April is easy, as it reminds me instantly of April showers. I use rhyming slang for August, which is sawdust. For May, I visualise a maypole. Dec a Christmas tree. Month names are like numbers, hard to remember, but as objects, or phrases much easier to visualise. Create your own object or phrase for each month. Recall them from time to time to keep them fresh in your mind.
Visualise: Someone turns on the taps on the rear wheels, causing the garage to flood. The water runs outside, mixing with the April showers – well, it’s more of an April flood – both inside and outside the garage.
Event Time: Early Morning
Visualise: Not required. Because we don’t have a set time for this event, we can ignore this.
Recall the event.
You will now find you have created a solid memory for the event. All that’s needed now is for you to run through the days of the month in your mind, and a created event will jump out at you.
Again, for this to work, you should be familiar with the Major System, so you can translate numbers to letters and words.
In my mind, as I go through the dates in April, I recall 1 as Tea, 2 as Noah, 3 as May and so on, until I reach 19, which translates to Tap, and boom, I remember the event. Cool isn’t it?
You need to put the earlier work in from the other posts before you can successfully use the Memory Planner technique. But once learned, you will have this Memory Planner for life!
Event example 2. Getting my new shed put up.
So let’s set the event details up. Initially, you can jot down the event, then mentally store the details by working through each header.
Event Title: Two chaps bringing and putting up a new shed I bought online.
Event Date: 25th
Event Month: April
Event Time: Any time in day
Event Title: Two chaps delivering and putting up a new shed I bought online.
Visualise: See your shed out for delivery. Note: This part isn’t really necessary since you know your shed is getting delivered and built, but it adds to your mind story.
Event Date: 25th
As mentioned in the previous example, the Major System translates numbers into letters and words. The number 25 broken down into letters is ‘2’ = ‘N’ and ‘5’ = ‘L’ then simply add a vowel or two. So a significant word for 25 is ‘’Nail’.
Visualise: Your shed is being erected and the delivery chaps are using a huge ‘Nail’ on one corner. The nail is so big it will ruin the shed! Remember, using bold images or videos in your mind makes the memory stronger.
Event Month: April
The month of April is easy. As mentioned earlier, it reminds me instantly of April showers.
Visualise: Your shed is being erected and the delivery chaps are using a huge ‘Nail’ on one corner. Not only that, but they are getting soaked by the April showers.
Event Time: Any time in day
Visualise: Not required. Because we don’t have a set time for this event, we can ignore this.
Recall the event.
You will now find you have created a solid memory for the event. All that’s needed now is for you to run through the days of the month in your mind, and the created event will jump out at you. As soon as you get to 25 – Major System translation = ‘Nail’ in your mind, this event will jump right out at you in vivid detail.
Event example 3. My dentist appointment
So let’s set the event details up. Initially, you can jot down the event, then mentally store the details by working through each header.
Event Title: My dentist appointment
Event Date: 3rd
Event Month: May
Event Time: 2.30. I’m really not kidding. That was the time they booked me in for! Get the joke? Say the time out load if not. 😂😂😂
Event Title: My dentist appointment.
Visualise: I’m walking to my dentist. I’m not rushed and in good time. Note: This part isn’t really necessary since you know you’re going to dentist, but it adds to your mind story, and prepares you to arrive early as a bonus. 😃
Event Date: 3rd
As mentioned in the previous example, the Major System translates numbers into letters and words. The letter for the number ‘3’ is ‘M’. So the word ‘May’ is a good word to choose. Note: The vowels in the word ‘May’, don’t translate to numbers in the Major System, so ‘May’ simply translates to the number ‘3’.
Visualise: You are sitting in the dentist’s chair. Not the best place to be, I know. It’s the 3rd of May and I’ve translated the ‘3’ into ‘May’ and it’s the month of May as well. Hmm, could cause confusion.
Ok, let’s tweak the visualisation to avoid any confusion: You are sitting in the dentist’s chair. You have a WW2 Spitfire radio on your lap, and you push the switch up to get a flickering green light. You shout into it ‘Mayday, mayday, mayday.’ Saying ‘Mayday’ three times over the radio in an emergency was a standard procedure. If sitting in a dentist chair isn’t an emergency, then what is?
See how you’ve got the date 3rd of May from this visualisation? There are many ways to visualise an event, and being creative helps the memory stay with you.
Event Time: 2.30. Tooth Hurty at the dentist. I don’t need to say more.
To illustrate incorporating a less obvious time into the event, let’s change the time.
Event Time: 4.00.
The Major System comes into play again. The letter for the number ‘4’ is ‘R’. So let’s use the word ‘Ray’ is a good word to choose. Note: The vowels in the word ‘Ray’, don’t translate to numbers in the Major System, so ‘Ray’ simply translates to the number ‘3’.
Visualise: You are sitting in the dentist’s chair. You have a WW2 Spitfire radio on your lap, and you push the switch up to get a flickering green light. You shout into it ‘Mayday, mayday, mayday.’ The dentist is nowhere to be seen, and suddenly a machine at the back of the room springs to life and a thin red ‘Ray’ of laser light aims at the floor, slowly creeping across the room to the bottom of your chair. You can see the carpet burning as the ‘Ray’ passes over it. The scene now has a dramatic James bond feel to it.
Recall the event.
You will now find you have created a solid memory for the event. All that’s needed now is for you to run through the days of the month of May in your mind, and the created event will jump out at you. As soon as you get to 3 – Major System translation = ‘May’ in your mind, this event will jump right out at you in vivid detail.
This will be so vivid that you will instantly recall the ‘dentist chair’, the radio with the ‘3 Maydays’ call and the ‘Ray of laser light’ coming for you.
Dentist, 3rd of May at 4 o’clock.
Side Note: The written word when explaining a ‘conversion to visualisation’ sounds long winded, but when you do this mentally, it is far quicker. After you have practised a few times, it will become second nature.
Remember, make your visualisation as clear in your mind as you can. You can exaggerate things, make them colourful. Animate them. Just experiment with the Major System and your imagination until you get a sense of what works well for you.
