"Sorry, What's Your Name Again?" - Six Steps to Relieve the Most Common Memory Worry

by Roger Seip
Author of Memory Training for Students

If you live in fear of forgetting prospects' names, sometimes within mere seconds of being introduced to them, you're not alone. Surveys show that 83% of the population worries about their inability to recall people's names. Ironically, while most of us hate having our names forgotten or mispronounced, the majority of us claim we just "aren't good at remembering names" or putting faces together with names when we meet people again.

If you have difficulty recalling names, you know that the two most common scenarios are forgetting the name instantaneously upon being introduced to someone new, and failing to recall the name of someone you've met and interacted with in the past and should know but just can't pull up from your memory bank.

Forgetting names becomes more than just an embarrassing social faux pas in sales. Straining to recall a name can so preoccupy you that you are unable to fully pay attention to your client or prospect. He or she may perceive you not only as unfocused and easily distracted, but also as not very bright if you're unable to devote your full attention to him or her. Even worse, if you forget the name of a client with whom you've worked in the past, he or she may view your memory lapse as a betrayal of trust, which can cost you a great deal of money if that client severs the relationship.

Integrating Learning Styles to Improve Name Recall

While common, this frustrating phenomenon can be relatively easy to overcome when you commit to taking steps to improve your memory. The most important key to really effective learning of any kind is understanding that there are three learning styles: visual, auditory, and kinesthetic (physically interactive). The more you can apply all three of these styles to a task, the more quickly and solidly you will learn anything.

Practice each of the following steps to improve your name recollection in every sales and social situation.

When you're first introduced to someone, look closely at his or her face and try to find something unique about it. Whether you find a distinctive quality or not is irrelevant; by really looking for a memorable characteristic in a new face, you're incorporating the visual learning style. And a word of advice: if you do find something that really stands out about someone's face, don't say anything! Within minutes of meeting someone new, it's generally a bad idea to exclaim, "Whoa! That's a huge nose!"

The next step utilizes both auditory and kinesthetic learning styles. When you meet someone, slow down for five seconds, and concentrate on listening to him or her. Focus on the prospect and repeat his or her name back in a conversational manner, such as "Susan. Nice to meet you, Susan." Also make sure to give a good firm handshake, which establishes a physical connection with the prospect.

Creating a mental picture of someone's name incorporates the visual sense again. Many people have names that already are pictures: consider Robin, Jay, Matt, or Dawn to name just a few. Some names will require you to play with them a bit to create a picture. Ken, for example, may not bring an immediate image to your mind, but a "can" is very close. Or you might envision a Ken doll. The point is not to create the best, most creative mental image ever, so don't get caught up in your head during this step of the process, thinking, "Oh, that's not a very good picture. What's a better one?" The worst thing you can do when learning is to stress yourself out and overthink the process. If an image doesn't come to you right away, skip it and do it later. You'll undo all of your good efforts if you're staring dumbly at your prospect, insisting, "Hey. Hold still for a minute while I try to turn your name into a picture!"

Once you've identified a mental image that you associate with a person's name, the next step is to "glue" that image to the person's face or upper body. This bridges that gap many people experience between being able to recall faces but not the names that belong to those faces. If you met a new prospect named Rosalind, for example, you might have broken her name down into the memorable image of "rose on land." Now you must create a mental picture that will stick with you as long as you need it and pop into your head every time you meet her; this should be something fun, even a little odd, that will bring "rose on land" to mind when you see her face. You might imagine her buried up to her neck in earth, with roses scattered around her, for example. Because you created the image, it will come up next time you see her and enable you to recall her name.

At the end of the conversation, integrate auditory learning by repeating the prospect's name one more time, but don't ever overuse someone's name in an effort to place it more firmly in your mind. Use the prospect's name only right at the beginning of the conversation, and then again at the end; if you feel like you can do so naturally, you might insert someone's name once or twice in a natural fashion during the course of the conversation, too. But if you've ever had a stereotypically pushy salesperson use your name a dozen times in a five minute conversation, you know how annoying, even weird, this can be, so don't overdo it.

Writing is a form of kinesthetic learning - you're getting a part of your body involved in the learning process - so if you're really serious about wanting to remember people's names for the long term, keep a name journal or a log of important people you meet, and review it periodically.
Forget Me Not: It's the Effort That Matters Most

The most important thing to know about this memory process is that even when it doesn't work, it still works! For example, if you get stuck trying to make a picture out of someone's name, skip it for now. The next day, when you have a chance, give the matter a few minutes of concentrated thought. If you still can't get a picture, stop and take up the matter a week later. Even if you're still unsuccessful at creating a mental image, you've thought about the prospect's name so much, there's now no way you'll ever forget it! So you've actually accomplished what you set to do in the first place.

People can't remember names for one main reason: they're just not paying attention. This process forces you to think. If, for example, you struggle with the step of creating a mental picture, the other steps - looking at the prospect closely, shaking his or her hand confidently and repeating the name a few times - are easy to do, will solidify the name in your memory, and will ultimately convey a positive image of you to clients and prospects. That positive image will certainly make you memorable to prospects, enabling you to close more deals and increase your bottom line.

Various Speed Reading Techniques

by Melvin Ng
Author of 16 Minute Speed Reading Program

The ability to speed read is an important skill in today's world, where - whether we are students or at work - we are often expected to read hefty amounts of materials on a daily basis. As a result, improving your speed reading technique is something each and every one of us should not only do, but maintain. What, then, are speed reading techniques?

Speed reading - the essential elements

Before you start to learn any particular speed reading technique, you need to consider that all speed reading techniques rely on three essential elements:

1. A desire to improve you reading speed;

2. A willingness to give new ideas a chance; and

3. Motivation, discipline and continued practice.

Without these three key elements, no speed reading technique is going to succeed.

Speeding reading technique (1) - Skimming

Almost all successful speed readers will attest to the fact that they are a successful speed reader because they have a form of peripheral vision that allows them to see large amount of data on a page and to "skim" what they are reading. In short, speed reading like this means that one is not reading each and every word on the page, but merely scanning through the material. Using this speed reading technique, every now and then you will come across a keyword or phrase and it is this that will provide you with the essence of what is being written. The rest of the information on the page is discarded.

Although this speed reading technique would seem to indicate that the reader does not fully comprehend what has been written, in fact studies have shown this is not the case - majority of speed readers using this technique actually increased their comprehension of the reading materials!

Speed reading technique (2) - first sentence reading

Unlike speed reading technique (1), in speed reading technique (2), the reader will read the first sentence of each paragraph, in order to get the crux (main idea) of the idea behind the paragraph and will then skim read the remainder of the paragraph. This process is then repeated on down the page until such time as all the reading material has been exhausted.

Using speed reading technique (2), it is generally understood that the reader will glean enough information from the first sentence not to be overly concerned about the information contained in the remainder of the paragraph, where the writer will merely be reinforcing the notion set out in sentence one. However, this technique does fall-down on one major point - it pre-supposes that a paragraph only has one idea, which is clearly not always the case! If you find that you are reading material where the writer has used multiple ideas in the same paragraph, you may need to adapt your speed reading technique to one of the other speed reading techniques.

Speed reading technique (3) - Group wording

There is a term in speed reading circles that is seen as being one of the major demons of reading: "subvocalization". Subvocalization is a clinical term for word-for-word reading - and it's a huge no-no in speed reading techniques. Subvocalization slows reading down, without providing any upswing in comprehension to counter the lost reading time.

Group wording, as the name suggests, is where the reader looks at a group of words and phrases at the same time. Using the group wording technique, speed readers are able to read large chunks of information at the same time - thus, saving time.

Additional speed reading techniques

Aside from the specific speed reading techniques in 1 to 3 above, there are a number of habits/practices that are generally considered counter-productive to speed reading - thus will have an affect on your speed reading abilities. In no particular order, these include:

* subvocalization - as already stated, this is where you speak out the words you read. It's a major cause of slow reading. Unfortunately, as most of us are taught to speak out the words we read when we learn to read as children, it is also one of the hardest habits to break. All that can be said is that you keep plugging away at trying to eradicate this habit.

* digressing - digressing is where the reader will read a passage, then return to re-read it, usually in the mistaken belief that they will be able to comprehend better what has been written on a second read. Again, in speed reading circles this is seen as a major no-no, bad habit, which needs to be broken!

Conclusion

So, if you want to improve your speed reading skills, you need to remember not to subvocalize or re-read passages, and to read great chunks at one time by broadening your eye-span. Simple really! Actually, in fairness, it will take time to learn, and don't expect to get it right the first time. Don't push this issue too much, as pushing it may prove to be counter-productive.

What To Do If You “Bomb” A School Test Or Exam

by Dr Marc R. Dussault
Author of Speed Studying Techniques

Everyone’s had the unfortunate experience of studying endlessly for a test and yet still failing thanks to sheer anxiousness or some other outside problem.

You might be planning and hoping on becoming a great scholar in your chosen area of study, but human nature and past experience tells us that you will make some blunders along the way, you’re only human you have to expect this and not be deterred when it happens, but rather allow your failures to make you more determined.

Failure moves us closer to our goals, as that is when we cross analyse and study where we went wrong.

A baby doesn’t give up on learning to walk, it tries over and over again until it succeeds no matter what. Young adults and adults, however, often tend to give something only a few tries before abandoning hope, and we shouldn’t. Learn from mistakes, don’t be discouraged by them; you will succeed by putting thought into your efforts, and that ability can only come with experience. So in a way, you achieve success simply by making enough mistakes.

If you beat yourself more, you will only feel worse. When you feel miserable, your energy and motivation go down and you get trapped in a downward spiral. The only way to move out of this trap is to take a decision that you will not let yourself down and get mad and also that you will not give up thus letting you down.

No one will be drowned if they fall down in a puddle of water face down, unless they remained in that position; this is the mental make up you need to carry within yourself.

If you subscribe to the mindset that what is initially deemed as “failure” can actually lead to bigger and better successes in the future, you will find yourself motivated at times when all seems to be lost. For example, if you bomb an exam you spent weeks studying for, you should remind yourself that even though the results were not what you expected, you tried your best, and learned from the experience.

Thinking like this, you will never really fail a test, because mentally you will know that you’ve come out ahead whatever your grades say. So put yourself in a headspace where everything is progress towards eventual success, and you will be able to reach that success more easily no matter what you aim for.

When you feel especially vulnerable, you’re also more likely to feel as though you don’t measure up to others, as though your inadequacies loom large in comparison to your peers. But I can assure you that although others may sometimes count your areas of weakness as their areas of strength, you shouldn’t infer that you’re in any way inferior. On the contrary; you have your own unique set of strengths which cannot be duplicated. The only comparisons that are necessary to make are with your own personal best.

If you are absolutely committed to a goal, you will find a way to make it happen. Think of a recent accomplishment you’ve had that you worked hard to achieve. Was there any doubt that you’d get what you wanted? Is it not true, if you are really honest with yourself, that when you have come up short in the past it’s in part, because you really didn’t give it your all?

You have to be honest with yourself and match your level of intensity and effort with your results. Nothing ventured, nothing gained. If you don’t try very hard, don’t expect miracles overnight and sometimes even when you do try hard, the miracles still don’t come I once heard that miracles are hidden amongst a lot of hard work, determination and failure Pressure under fire creates diamonds and that will be your result also if you persist and long enough, study success and aspire to success, you will become your own miracle!

Maximizing Your Study Time for Better Results

by Roger Seip
Author of Memory Training for Students

The daily schedule for many young students today could rival that of several top-level executives. With soccer practice, dance, scouts and clarinet lessons taking up much of the evening, when do students get to focus on their studies? Too often students get overwhelmed with the amount of work left over at the end of the day.

They look at study time in one big sum and get distracted and exhausted before they even begin. To solve this problem, you may not be able to adjust your child’s schedule, but they can change their study techniques. Here are 3 study techniques that will help any student maximize their study time.

ß They should start by separating and segmenting their study time. Break it up into smaller bits. No matter how brilliant you are a concentrated attention span lasts only about 20 minutes. So break your 2 or 4 hours study sessions into groups of 15 or 20 minutes. During the break, stand-up, walk around, grab a bit to eat or something to drink and then get back to the grind for another 15 or 20 minutes. This not only helps create spaced repetition, which is crucial for retention, but helps make study sessions less stressful and daunting.

ß Another tool to help in maximizing study time is to use random practice. When reviewing lists or concepts don’t go in order. Skip around to force your brain to pull from an entire group of information. This aids in understanding the purpose or meaning behind a concept instead of merely its place in line. The simplest way to implement random practice is through the use of a study partner.

ß Use a Study Partner. When at all possible, it is very beneficial to study with another student who shares the same educational goals and motivation. A study partner can help identify areas of weakness and ensure that topics don’t get skipped. It’s also beneficial to witness how another student takes in and stores information. For this reason and others, it is better for the study partner to be another student, but parent don’t be afraid to fill this position. The progress gained from working with a partner is general is worth it.

Proper and efficient study techniques will follow a student through all levels of education and learning. Establishing good habits and skill sets, no matter how small or insignificant they may seem at the time, will prove to reap massive rewards in the long run. So while little Johnny and Suzy might need their first day planners before the third grade, don’t let it stop them from becoming the best students they can.

Roger Seip is a nationally known memory trainer. He has helped thousands of students across the country improve their memory as well as study habits. His new program, The Student’s Winning Edge - Memory Training, teaches students how to train their memory to study more effectively and get better grades.

Improve Your Memory by Arousing Your State of Mind

by Martin Mak
Author of "Unleash Your Mighty Memory"

Being mentally alert is a state of mind and we are obviously not always alert. Our mood and general level of physiological arousal will tend to range from deep sleep through drowsiness to a normal waking state; occasionally we experience a state of high agitation or excitement, and under extreme conditions, terror and panic.

High arousal tends to be accompanied by changes in the electrical activity of the brain as recorded by electroencephalogram (EEG), and by an increase in heart rate, palm sweating and electrical conductivity of the skin. Arousal can also be altered by manipulating the environment or through drugs. Hence loud noises will tend to increase arousal, whereas the deprivation of sleep will tend to decrease it. Amphetamines or the caffeine in a cup of coffee will tend to lead to higher arousal, while a tranquilizer will tend to reduce it. Other drugs such as alcohol have more complex effects, initially increasing but then decreasing arousal.

Do our state of arousal influence our memory? Clearly in an extreme case, it has a profound effect; a subject who is asleep has a very limited performance repertoire. It has been suggested that we are able to learn when we are asleep. Unfortunately objective tests of the effectiveness of sleep teaching suggest that nothing is learned except the few bits of information that are registered during the occasional periods during the night when we approach a waking moment, in between long periods of deeper sleep. If you wish to learn, it is advisable to be conscious at the time.

Any individual can have a very wide range of levels of arousal at any moment, and there is no doubt that performance is sensitive to arousal level. In general, performance improves as arousal increases up to some peak, beyond which it deteriorates, a relationship known as the Yerkes-Dodson law after the two people who first pointed it out Taking the two extremes, neither the moment prior to falling asleep nor the moment of blind panic are likely to be particularly efficient states of mind for the performance of any task. Different tasks are optimally performed at the different levels of arousal. For example, the level at which you are likely to run fastest or hit hardest will be higher than that which is best for knitting a sweater or solving a crossword puzzle.

How can we determine the optimal arousal level for memory? Like much else in human memory, this is not an easy question to answer. It depends crucially on when the learned material is subsequently recalled. If recall is immediate, then performance is best when level of arousal is relatively low; higher levels of arousal lead to poor initial performance, but in the long run they produce better learning.

This was shown most clearly in a series of experiments conducted by Kleinsmith and Kaplan in 1963 in which subjects were presented with the task of learning to associate numbers with words. The words were selected as being either relatively neutral (swim, dance) or as having emotional overtones (rape, vomit). Three groups of subjects were tested, the first recalling after a delay of two minutes, the second after a 20-minute delay, and the third after a delay of one week. The low-arousal words were initially well recalled but showed marked forgetting. Recall of the high-arousal words actually improved with time. Kleinsmith and Kaplan argue that high levels of arousal help the memory trace to consolidate, but that during the early stages of consolidation they make retrieval difficult. The high-arousal items therefore have a short-term they benefit from good consolidation.

Taking these findings a step further, we can therefore remember things better with we attached vivid imagery to it. For example, if you want to remember a dental appointment at 10 in the morning, you can picture a bowling ball coming towards your mouth and your teeth become bowling pins (10-pins - 10 am).

Memory strategies have come up that can help people improve memory, learn complex mathematical formula, foreign languages etc. Such memory techniques and memory training are useful not only for school work, but also in our daily and professional lives to help us cope.

Martin Mak has developed a new program to help you improve your memory and enhance your learning experience. Find out more with his popular and free ecourse

Get better grades by harnessing the power of the "80/20 Rule

by Dr Marc R. Dussault

Author of Speed Studying Techniques

Did you know that there's a principle whereby you can actually achieve 80% of your results with 20% of the work? This is called the Pareto Principle, and it really does work. In short, it states that we get 80% of results from 20% of our effort. To expand on this further, we can also apply this principle to academic success.

Most students don't have the essential study skills they need. Because of this, they spend most of their time preparing for exams less efficiently than they need to, which means that most of their time is wasted. Why should they do this when they could study in a highly targeted fashion and obtain 80% of their study success with only 20% of the effort?

School success does not necessarily rely on intelligence, but on knowing how to play the game. A student of average intelligence who has learned study skills is far more likely to succeed than a highly intelligent student who hasn't. When applied to academic success, the Pareto Principle is not just about effort but about focus.

Most students don't have the specific and strong focus needed while they study. In fact, only 20% of total study efforts are usually focused, which means that 80% of the time spent studying is wasted.

You need to focus on the right material when you prepare for exams, but when you have so much study material, how do you know what you should focus on?

Australian State education departments have syllabus documents written for each subject in your course of study. Those who are most successful will focus their study on outcomes specified in the documents. Most often, these documents are available online and can be downloaded to your own computer. These will often also include glossary of terms essential to understanding and completing the course of study.

If you need help covering essential material, you can also purchase study guides specific to the state you live in for reasonable prices. These guides can save you time by providing important headings and sub-headings with summaries of essential information for exam success. These books can also fill in gaps in information that can occur as a result of absences and variations from school education standards.

Marks are based on meeting course outcomes and marking criteria. This means that successful results can't be separated from curriculum expectations. Oftentimes, parents don't understand how the education system is so different these days compared with when they were at school. They believe that their children's grades are a direct reflection of their academic abilities.

However, more often than not, children have not learned how to produce work that will produce good grades. Once they know how to play the game, they are able to get better grades. They are also able to save a lot of wasted time reading over course material.

You can also use the Pareto Principle as part of your university study. In this case, you are given initial course documents that outline the topics you will cover in the semester's course. You may also be given initial course documents that tell you what readings and other textbooks you may have to utilise. In addition, you'll be given assignments and due dates at the beginning of your coursework, so that you can plan your study time accordingly.

Most university courses, especially those in the humanities, require students to do a lot of essay writing and reading. This means that good planning and summaries are mandatory. If you read the essay questions ahead of time and then make notes from your readings, your study time can be greatly reduced by up to 80%. In other words, 20% of your effort can give you much greater results. If you apply targeted effort above this, you can further improve your marks.

This means that focusing your attention for shorter periods of time can make you more successful academically. This is provided, of course, that you focus on the right things. Don't just focus on what teachers tell you in class or what other students tell you. Take a look at the official written material you have in front of you and use it as a guide. Then, write good essays and make sure you cover all of the required course content. In this way, you should be able to improve your academic performance substantially. In addition, you'll do it much more easily than you otherwise might be able to.

About the Author:
About the author: Dr Marc R. Dussault can show you how to get the best grades With the least effort. Visit the "Get Better Grades" website for more helpful tips on acheiving great marks by studying more efficiently.

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Savants: Charting ‘islands of genius’

By David Martin
CNN

FOND DU LAC, Wisconsin (CNN) — Forty-four years after starting work at a children’s psychiatric ward in Wisconsin, Dr. Darold Treffert still struggles to explain how the human brain is capable of producing the remarkable feats he witnessed there.

One boy had memorized Milwaukee’s bus schedule and could say where all the buses were at any moment in the day. Another could put together complicated puzzles without hesitation — even if the pieces were upside down. A third boy could list world events that happened on any given day.

Treffert came to realize these boys have savant syndrome, and thus began a lifelong quest to understand how people with sometimes severe mental disabilities could exhibit what he calls "islands of genius."

Treffert says a savant’s brilliance generally falls into a single category: lightning-fast math skills or calendar calculating or spatial skills or near picture-perfect memory or musical ability.

Such dazzling mental skills defy easy explanation. (Watch the mystery of savants — 3:38)

"I have come to the conclusion that until we can explain the savant we can’t explain ourselves," said Treffert, often considered the world’s leading expert on savants.

Treffert, an adviser on the movie "Rain Man," serves as the unofficial arbiter of who qualifies as a "prodigious savant" — possessing skills that would dazzle even without a disability. There are only about 100 recognized prodigious savants in the world.

Jazz pianist Matt Savage is one of them. The home-schooled New Hampshire teenager was diagnosed with autism as a child and did not like to be exposed to any noise until he was 6. Audio therapy and a toy piano unlocked his gifts.

"Our house had been completely quiet," Matt’s mother, Diane, said. "No music. No sound. And then my husband and I heard ‘London Bridge’ being played perfectly down in the playroom. We looked at each other. Matt had just started playing: from nothing to playing perfectly."

Matt, now 14, releases his seventh album on his parents’ record label this month. Even he does not understand how he is able to play as well as does, improvising effortlessly on the piano.

"It kind of transfers from the brain to the fingers. It goes through your body. That’s how it feels," Matt said.

Stephen Wiltshire is another prodigious savant. His genius is the ability to see something once and draw it in exquisite detail — even something as complicated as a city skyline. (Watch brain scans look for the secrets of genius — 2:05)

George Widener, too, is a prodigious savant. Widener says he has been diagnosed with a mild form of autism called Asperger’s Syndrome. He knows without thinking the day of the week for any year in the past or future. He now uses these calendar skills to produce critically acclaimed artwork, combining his love of numbers and calendars with an astonishing memory of days and dates in history.

Listening to Widener is like flipping through a stream-of-consciousness almanac:

"June 7th, that was the date Robert the Bruce died in 1329. He was the first king of Scotland. That was a Wednesday. I remember reading Daniel Boone, 1769, started a survey on June 7th in Kentucky … King Louis the 14th became king, 1654. That was a Wednesday."

Orlando Serrell did not possess any special skills until he was struck in the head by a baseball when he was 10. He has remembered where he was and what he was doing almost every day since.

Serrell is what Treffert calls an "acquired savant," someone who exhibits savant skills after suffering a head injury or a stroke to the left hemisphere of the brain. Treffert believes the brain injury somehow frees acquired savants from the language and logic that rules our everyday lives. (Listen to a savant’s extraordinary musical gift)

"We tend to think of ourselves as having this blank disc in the marvelous piece of equipment called the brain, and what we become is everything we put on this disc. And I’m saying there is much more to us. That we come with software," Treffert says.

In short, Treffert says, there is genius in all of us. How to unlock that genius remains a mystery.