To Sharpen Your Memory, You Need To Decide What's Worth Remembering. Here's How.

Memory Loss
Christopher Silas Neal

I often wonder whether my memory is as sharp as it should be, particularly when I read about people like David Thomas, who won the title of 2007 USA Memory Champion by recalling the order of an entire deck of playing cards in just 2½ minutes. I don't expect to compete for his title, but, as a neuroscientist who has spent much of my career studying memory, I should know a couple of tricks that would enable me to go a round or two with him, right?

I certainly hope so. Thomas is obviously an exceptional person, but I do know a thing or two about brain fitness—the habits that keep us sharp. Here's one of my favorites: Know what and when to forget. A daily overload of information often makes us think our memory is declining and we have memory loss, when in fact it's simply glutted with too much useless data.

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The benefits of memory loss and forgetting were demonstrated in a Stanford University study published in Nature Neuroscience. Using fMRI machines to monitor brain activity, the researchers showed that when volunteers searched for a fact they had committed to memory while being distracted by new but irrelevant information, their prefrontal cortex, a part of the brain involved in decision making, was very busy. Once they recalled the information and were easily able to remember it when faced with continued distractions, prefrontal activity slowed considerably—meaning their brain had edited out the info clutter and was now free to do important things like make decisions.

Christopher Silas Neal

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To keep your brain fit, try these simple strategies for improving memory loss:

Choose what you want to remember. Ask yourself whether new information will help you in the future. For example, at a party, learn only the names of people you hope to see again. Read the newspaper with the goal of remembering just what is important to you.

Make the best use of your technology. Keep files and address lists on your computer or cell phone current, and let their data banks do the remembering. Still can't remember your husband's cell phone number because you only hit speed dial? That's the point!

Block unpleasant memories. Lingering bad memories that should have been processed and discarded long ago—of childhood trauma, emotional rejection, or any of life's inevitable disappointments—can blunt your mental sharpness. When you feel a problematic memory arise, replace it with a happy one. Imagine that you're ejecting a DVD and inserting a new one. Recall the joyful occasion in great detail—the sights and sounds of the event—and, in your mind's eye, try to relive it. With a lack of regular reinforcement, the intrusive memories will fade and slink off to a distant corner of your memory bank. You may not end up the next USA Memory Champion, but you will have taken a big step toward brain fitness.

Thomas Crook, PhD, a clinical psychologist, has conducted extensive research to improve our understanding of how the brain works. He is a former research program director at the National Institute of Mental Health and CEO of Cognitive Research Corp. in St. Petersburg, FL.

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