It always seems to fail us when we need to remember the names of our bosses kids, that nice neighbors first name, or where that great restaurant in Chicago is located. And as we age, our memory just seems to get worse and worse.

But there’s good news, because our memory doesn’t have to fail us …

First, let’s remember (no pun intended) that memory is a skill. Just like any other skill, the more we practice it, the stronger it becomes. To practice the skill of memory, we need to challenge and engage our brain to not only retain information, but recall it on demand.

Here are three plans of action to not only help keep your memory sharp, but improve your brain’s health and your overall well being too …

Use Acronyms To Help You Remember

Let’s suppose you’re about to go out and do some errands (and you haven’t made a list).

Further, let’s imagine you have to buy eggs, bread, and get the dry cleaning. Create an acronym to help you remember. Maybe in this case it’s BED, which of course would represent bread, eggs, dry cleaning.

Now granted, that’s a simple example, but you can see how it can help, because you essentially only have to remember one word instead of three.

And Speaking Of Bed …

Did you know that “power naps” are a great way to recharge your brain and refresh your memory? It’s true … 10-20 minute naps are ideal for regaining your focus and staying mentally sharp.

Once you nap longer than 1/2 hour or 45 minutes though, you run the risk of being groggy for a while. If you find you need to nap for longer periods of time, it’s a sure sign you aren’t getting enough restful sleep during your normal sleep hours.

Add “This” To Your Diet

Dark green leafy vegetables are good for you on so many levels, but they are particularly nourishing for your brain. And anything that’s nourishing for your brain is good for your memory skills.

Vegetables like spinach, chard, kale, and bok choy are absolutely loaded with helpful anti oxidants. Add these to your diet as much as possible!

Summary

These are just three of many tips to improve memory. For dozens more tips you can use starting today, be sure to access our guide to help you drastically improve memory.

As we age, a certain amount of memory loss is to be expected. Just as we physically decline over time, the same is true with our memory. Over the last several years, the topic has generated a great deal of interest, particularly with our aging society.

Just like any other skills, an exceptional memory is a product of a healthy brain. If you think in terms of physical abilities, you realize there is a certain amount of training required to perform certain skills. For example, to run a 10k race, you need to train and build up your abilities. The same holds true for brain related skills, but the field of brain training is still in its infancy.

Taking Care Of Your Brain

Since your brain is a part of your physical self, it is important to ensure it receives the same care you devote to your muscles, organs, and joints. Fortunately, good health habits represent the common denominator.

Things like getting ample sleep, good nutrition, drinking a lot of water, and consistent exercise are keys to brain health. But what else can we do?

One of the answers can be described with an analogy. If we revisit out running scenario, it’s obvious you need running related workouts to perform at peak efficiency. Simply put, your running muscles need a workout. The exact same concept applies to your brain.

What Are Memory Improvement Games?

Games to improve memory are a fairly recent phenomenon. Many are available online, but others are tried and true brain stiumlators, like crossword puzzles. One thing is certain. If you exercise your brain, in general it will perform better, all things being equal.

Newer brain training games focus on a particular aspect of brain health and training. For example, a popular brain training game tests your reaction time by asking you to match certain images.

For memory improvement, there are games that require you to recall increasingly complex visual or word patterns. This particular game is designed to stretch your abilities and challenge your brain.

Are Games To Improve Memory Effective?

Measurement of memory improvement, while concrete and specific in some instances, can be very subjective. Because you can name all of the United States presidents in order from Washington to Obama doesn’t mean you’ll remember your sisters birthday. The concept is best measured in overall terms and in conjunction with overall mental health.

Brain Games: Improve Memory With Scientifically Designed Games

However, there is no question memory improvement games help stimulate thinking and cognitive ability. An equally underrated aspect of these games is that they are fun! In effect, they provide a challenging, fun workout for your brain which leads to an improved mental state and a sense of accomplishment.

Summary

Memory improvement games, a relatively new development, are primarily focused on overall brain health and mental stimulation. While their specific effect on memory differs from person to person, they are effective in providing a useful brain workout.

Many of these games are available online. We recommend an overall approach of measuring brain fitness and ability before starting, and then following up with skill measurement after a period of participating in games to improve memory. Following this approach will allow you to determine their specific effectiveness for your personal situation.

Your Auditory System And How It Affects Memory

You are probably aware that all five senses are used in the memory process. You recall what things look like, what they taste like, what they smell like. You also use your sense of touch or feeling, for example to remember the sensation of jumping into a cold swimming pool.

The final sense, hearing, is another name for your brain’s auditory system. Hearing is critical to memory because it processes speech, music, and other sounds into and out of your brain. As a result, improving your auditory system will help you remember more things you hear, like instructions, directions, names, and so on.

In order to sharpen this aspect of your brain, you need to exercise it. Specific computer based training exercises have now become the accepted standard. Typically, they involve a set of activities that target different aspects of listening.

The ultimate goal of computer based auditory skills training is simple. It is designed to help you improve the amount and clarity of information your brain gets from your ears. Like any skill, improvement takes practice, but not simple repetition. Mental skills are much more complex than physical skills, so your brain needs to be trained in several different approaches.

What Type Of Activities Are Involved In Auditory Skills Training?

There is a series of about ten exercises that are used in computer based programs. Some involve distinguishing between different but similar sounds to sharpen your memory of speech. Another focuses on processing sounds faster to aid short term memory, which are normally crucial in daily task completion. Still others target your brain’s ability to remember sounds in order, which help communication and conversational abilities.

Computer based brain training programs designed to improve your memory are administered on a building block approach. The recommended time per day is about fifteen to thirty minutes in order not to overwhelm the participant. All told, a thorough PC based memory skills improvement program will have between thirty and forty hours of training material.

Summary

If you are struggling with common memory skill problems, like not being able to find the word on the tip of your tongue, you will benefit from improving your auditory skills. The best way to do this is to train your brain to process and retain information more effectively. Personal computer based brain training programs help you work on a variety of skills designed to improve your memory skills quickly and efficiently.

Your Brain And Your Memory

As you might expect, your ability to remember correlates to your brain’s ability to process and recall information. If your brain isn’t functioning properly or is otherwise unhealthy, it stands to reason your memory skills will suffer.

Actually, the brain works in conjunction with your five senses to comprise memory and the ability to remember. Think about each of your five senses and how they relate to memory. The five senses of hearing, tasting, seeing, smelling, and touching all play an important part in memory skills.

For example, let’s consider the sense of smell. You remember what it smells like to be in the midst of an apple orchard in autumn. Similarly, you recall the aroma inside your favorite pizza restaurant, with pizza baking in brick ovens. You recall that familiar new car scent when you drove your last new vehicle off the lot.

Your brain works directly with your senses to process and recall information. But in order for your brain to function properly, it needs to be fit and healthy. Without a doubt, a highly functioning and healthy brain is the very best memory improvement technique.

Here are five tips to help keep your brain healthy:

Tip #1: Add Dark Chocolate To Your Diet

Yes, it is true what they say about dark chocolate. In moderation, it is very good for you. Dark chocolate contains important minerals that help produce dopamine in your brain. Dopamine is a chemical which helps your brain function at full capacity and improves cognitive skills. So go ahead, enjoy that dark chocolate dessert!

Tip #2: Improve Your Listening Skills

A fun way to improve your listening skills is to pick a song you like and try to memorize the lyrics. To do it, listen to the song as many times as needed and then write down the lyrics in one sitting.

The actual practice of listening with a high degree of focus will sharpen your memory skills over time. You will be amazed at how much sharper your memory becomes if you try this with one song a week.

Tip #3: Learn (Or Re-Learn) A Musical Instrument

Admit it, you’ve always wanted to play guitar, right? Mastering a musical instrument sharpens your brain by using hand eye coordination and translating visuals into music. To play a new piece of music, you are required to read notes in a song book, then apply that information with your fingers on the guitar strings.

Any instrument will do because it involves the same concepts. It is no wonder why many musicians are known for their sharp sense of recall.

Tip #4: Play Catch

Yes, with a ball! If you don’t have someone to play catch with, just toss a ball into the air and practice catching it. Why? Because it improves your coordination skills and your ability to focus. Both skills have a positive influence on your brain.

For an advanced skill, try juggling.

Tip #5: Use Your Other Hand

Suppose you are right handed. Try using your left hand to do tasks you normally complete with your dominant hand, like combing your hair or using a fork. Do it until you become proficient, or at least until it doesn’t feel totally awkward.

The reason to do this is to help your brain adapt to changes. Just like the muscles in your body, it is important for your brain to be limber, flexible, and responsive. Any activity that is counter to your normal approach can help your brain process new information, and thereby improve your memory.

Summary

If you improve the overall health of your brain, you will realize far reaching benefits. Enhancing your brain health is one of the very best memory improvement techniques. Follow these five tips for a few months and you will notice a positive difference!

Awaken Your Photographic Memory

As you might expect, your ability to remember correlates to your brain’s ability to process and recall information. If your brain isn’t functioning properly or is otherwise unhealthy, it stands to reason your memory skills will suffer.

Actually, the brain works in conjunction with your five senses to comprise memory and the ability to remember. Think about each of your five senses and how they relate to memory. The five senses of hearing, tasting, seeing, smelling, and touching all play an important part in memory skills.

For example, let’s consider the sense of smell. You remember what it smells like to be in the midst of an apple orchard in autumn. Similarly, you recall the aroma inside your favorite pizza restaurant, with pizza baking in brick ovens. You recall that familiar new car scent when you drove your last new vehicle off the lot.

Your brain works directly with your senses to process and recall information. But in order for your brain to function properly, it needs to be fit and healthy. Without a doubt, a highly functioning and healthy brain is the very best memory improvement technique.

Here are five tips to help keep your brain healthy:

Tip #1: Add Dark Chocolate To Your Diet

Yes, it is true what they say about dark chocolate. In moderation, it is very good for you. Dark chocolate contains important minerals that help produce dopamine in your brain. Dopamine is a chemical which helps your brain function at full capacity and improves cognitive skills. So go ahead, enjoy that dark chocolate dessert!

Tip #2: Improve Your Listening Skills

A fun way to improve your listening skills is to pick a song you like and try to memorize the lyrics. To do it, listen to the song as many times as needed and then write down the lyrics in one sitting.

The actual practice of listening with a high degree of focus will sharpen your memory skills over time. You will be amazed at how much sharper your memory becomes if you try this with one song a week.

Tip #3: Learn (Or Re-Learn) A Musical Instrument

Admit it, you’ve always wanted to play guitar, right? Mastering a musical instrument sharpens your brain by using hand eye coordination and translating visuals into music. To play a new piece of music, you are required to read notes in a song book, then apply that information with your fingers on the guitar strings.

Any instrument will do because it involves the same concepts. It is no wonder why many musicians are known for their sharp sense of recall.

Tip #4: Play Catch

Yes, with a ball. If you don’t have someone to play catch with, just toss a ball into the air and practice catching it. Why? Because it improves your coordination skills and your ability to focus. Both skills have a positive influence on your brain.

For an advanced skill, try juggling.

Tip #5: Use Your Other Hand

Suppose you are right handed. Try using your left hand to do tasks you normally complete with your dominant hand, like combing your hair or using a fork. Do it until you become proficient, or at least until it doesn’t feel totally awkward.

The reason to do this is to help your brain adapt to changes. Just like the muscles in your body, it is important for your brain to be limber, flexible, and responsive. Any activity that is counter to your normal approach can help your brain process new information, and thereby improve your memory.

Summary

If you improve the overall health of your brain, you will realize far reaching benefits. Enhancing your brain health is one of the very best memory improvement techniques. Follow these five tips for a few months and you will notice a positive difference!

Achieve Peak Brain Performance From Your Home: Scientifically Proven Brain Fitness Program With Expert Coaching.

Memory Improvement And Your Brain

The bad news is this. Almost every CD, ebook, or audio tape teaches you theory, but fails to teach you how to consistently put the theory into practice. Let’s use a practical example.

Suppose you wanted to be a great guitar player. You could read a magazine about playing guitar, or perhaps go to an Eric Clapton concert. But what it would really take to be a great guitar player is practicing a certain set of defined skills and making them a part of your everyday life.

To improve your memory, you have to understand how it works first. It is not a part of your brain, it is the end result of many factors. Memory is having great attentive skills. It’s also about being able to visualize, like remembering where to turn when you’re driving. And memory skills require being able to think quickly, like remembering a person’s name.

And so, since the power of memory is actually determined by several brain functions, it makes perfect sense to improve your skills by improving your overall brain function.

How Your Brain Can Be Trained

As you might imagine, your brain is exceptionally powerful. It has great capacity, but much like a muscle, if it is not challenged, it won’t perform when needed.

In order to train your brain, first you should examine how you learn. Humans learn by engaging all five senses. Think about it. At some point in your life, you’ve learned by seeing, hearing, touching, smell, and tasting. That is not only how you learn, it’s also how you remember.

By engaging all your senses in the learning process, you engage your entire brain. In essence, you give it a workout and it performs better. You can see where we’re going here. The end result of highly engaged brain capacity is a better memory.

Your brain can be trained by using techniques which engage all the senses at one point or another. It is not about memorizing a deck of cards, for example. These techniques are more about a comprehensive, thorough training of your brain to work at its fullest capacity. The only way to do this is by practice.

Summary

Training your brain to use it’s fullest potential is the best memory improvement technique, because memory skills stem from all your senses. Just using one sense, for example, your sense of hearing by listening to a memory tutorial CD, is not enough.

Bottom line, there are hundreds of memory improvement techniques on the market. Be cautious of any that merely ask you to use one of your senses and expect results.

But it’s really the combination of foods you eat that will ultimately make a positive difference in your memory capacity. Let’s break it down to the day’s three main meals, breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

Breakfast:

The best breakfast to have is one without artificial sugars, like sweet rolls or donuts. Why? The answer might be different than you think. Foods with high amounts of starch and sugar lead to an increase of serotonin in the brain. Without getting too technical, serotonin is a chemical that causes a slow down of your organs and brain activity.

That’s why when you eat a lot of sweets you find yourself in more of a restful, even tired state. You’re much better off with a small amount of carbohydrates for energy along with natural sugars from fruit, which don’t cause an increase in serotonin.

At the risk of taking all the fun out of breakfast, stay away from high fat breakfast sandwiches with sausage, ham, processed cheese, etc. High fat foods take longer to digest. That means more blood is directed to the stomach to help the digestion process. And yes, you guessed it, less blood to the brain. When the brain isn’t functioning fully, you won’t be working at full capacity.

Lunch:

Are you often tired after lunch? It’s almost always as a result of what you’ve eaten.

Let’s keep this as simple as possible. Eat a lot of protein at lunch. Chicken (not fried chicken!) and fish are excellent choices.

You’ve probably heard that certain types of fish rich in Omega compounds are good for your heart and brain. That’s true, so try to consume fish like salmon once or twice a week. Lean chicken is always an excellent choice. It’s high in protein and low in fat.

If this sounds like a diet plan instead of ways to improve your memory, well, there is a direct correlation. Almost always, what’s good for your body is good for your brain. And great memory skills start and end with a healthy brain.

Dinner:

The best approach for dinner is a combination of foods. And there’s nothing wrong with a reasonable amount of sweets after dinner. Refer back to the comments about breakfast – sweets release serotonin which puts the brain in a more restful state.

Vegetables are always a good choice, as are a few carbohydrates. Remember, carbohydrates also release serotonin, so there’s nothing wrong with a baked potato, rice, or a dinner roll or two. For a mian course, try to fill in what you may have missed during the day. Balance your dinner to about 40% protein, 30% carbohydrates, and 30% good fat.

Without question, the answer is yes.

Fortunately, many are easily within reach.  Here are a few key memory improvement techniques:

1. Make Sure You’re Getting Enough Sleep
2. Drink Ample Water To Increase Blood Flow
3. Exercise Regularly For Overall Good Health

And then there are a few memory improvement techniques that range behond the simple day to day.

Among the most discussed in the scientific community are brain training programs.

Brain Games: Improve memory with scientifically designed games

Let’s differentiate something right away.  We’re not talking about brain teasers, the kind you find on your cell phone or in a Cracker Jack box.

Rather, we’re referring to legitimate, focused training, similar to athletic traning.  It is a well known fact that the more the brain is used and challenged, the better it will perform.  That, of course, includes your memory.  Much like physical skills, memory is a mental skill.

But how do you improve memory and concentration?

With concentration, it’s a little more clear cut.  Chances are, if we aren’t able to concentrate, our mind is on something else we personally deem more important.  Address that notion head on.  Ask youself some questions.  A good first question to ask is this:  “Is what I’m thinking about more important than what I’m doing right now?”  Hint:  If you’re driving, the answer is NO!

In all seriousness, concentration is in large part a sense of prioritizing.  If you’ve made a personal choice that whatever you’re doing is exactly what you should  be doing right now, chances are great you’ll concentrate.

As for memory, it’s a slightly different story.  But there is still a sense of priority.  Make it a point to exercise your brain.  Instead of blindly plugging phone numbers into your cell phone, try to remember a few of them.  Challenge yoor memory and strengthen your brain.  Puzzles are an excellent way to improve your brain capacity, and with it, your memory.

School of Phenomenal Memory
Phenomenal Memory is not a GIFT…. It’s a skill!

Some memory loss is to be expected as we age.   It’s natural.  Our brain function begins to lower as we reach middle age, so some memory loss is normal.  And yet, we can ward off some of the aging effects in much the same way we’d tackle physical changes.  Exercise, a good diet, ample sleep, and a balanced lifestyle are just a few key factors.

The best thing about memory is the more we use it, the more likely we’ll retain it.  Challenge yourself to have a great memory!

Sounds trite, perhaps.  But your brain is just like any other body part.  It needs to be nourished, taken care of, and challenged to reach its peak potential.

One very underrated and not often discussed way to improve memory is to examine your personal habits and change them if necessary.

For one, are you getting enough sleep?  Lack of sleep is a major cause of lowered brain function and hence, memory loss.  We can’t assign a specific number of hours you need to sleep – only you can determine how much you need.  But it’s well worth examining on your sleep habits to determine if a change is in order.

Further, just as good nutrition plays a key role in physical health, the same is true for brain function and memory.  One of the ways to improve memory is to make sure you’re eating a balanced diet.  Are you getting all the nutrients you need?  Drinking enough water?  All of the oft discussed health habits apply to brain health as well.

We’re not advocates of taking pills, but especially as we age a good multivitamin is useful.  They’re inexpensive and taken consistently, you’ll notice a positive difference in your energy level, day to day performance, and brain capacity.

Finally, another good way to improve memory is to challenge your brain.  Sorry to say, but watching TV doesn’t cut it, with a few notable exceptions.  Playing along with Jeopardy can kick your memory into gear.

Instead of relying on your car’s GPS, make a point to study the route beforehand and challenge yourself to remember it.  You can always write down the directions just in case.  But in today’s gadget driven society, we rely so much on technology instead of using good old fashioned brain power.  The less we’re forced to use the brain and our capacity for memory, the less likely it’ll be there when we need it.

Thnik of your brain like your heart.  Take care of it, use it, give it a workout.  You’ll be rewarded long term with a sharp memory!