Why do we not remember every little eent in our life? The answer is quite easy. The brain cannot cope with that ammount of information. Sure you might say that autistic individuals have that capability, but that is the case at the expense of other traits of the brain such as recognising facial features that express emotions as the parts of the brain that picks up on these alterations are not activated in autists. In any case, the brain classifies the information it absorbs at any moment and categorizes it into relevant or not. Some of this information is available in the subconscious also so we have to databases (conscious and subconscious) to draw information from. There have been a number of exercises developed in order to help us recall past events or just lists of items.

The Memory Palace

This is one of the preferred techniques used in memory competitions as it is also the most effective when it comes to premeditated memorization. In essence it is easy enough. We associate a number of objects that are of little significance to us or just of mundane nature and we associate them to images in our mind that are more entertaining. Joshua Foer displays this perfectly in his speech at the TED conference.

A book summary

Summarizing stories or strings of events is a great way to do ttwo things. Firstly it give you an indication of how well your memory is serving you, and secondly it is a way of improving the performance of those neurons that interact with eachother to store information. The most efficient method is to make a summary every chapter or so in order to incorpoate as much detail as possible in to the summary. Once you get better you can do it every two chapters and so on. A great way to approach summarizing is to mind map the plot, themes, characters , etc.

Relive Childhood Memories

Believe it or not. Most of our memories are still accessible with onough training and repetition. Sure there are ways to cheat this through drugs such as LSD which were developed for to help patients with traumas and others with schizophrenia. However, if every day we sit down for five or ten minutes to go back in our head to a moment in time of our choosing and try to recall as many details of that moment as possible such as colours, smells, tastes, etc. we will gradually polish those neural paths in our brain that are responsible for your memory.

Help a child with their homework

No you are not to doe their homework for them, but rather sit with them and assist in problems they may have. Basic knowledge like maths and literature have not changed that much over the years and this will help you bring back information that was probably put in the bin as soon as you had taken the exam all those years ago.

I hope this has helped.