Many people who start to experience memory fade, at whatever age this my start, often jump to the mistaken belief they have a serious problem. This is a mistake. Most people who start to experience memory loss or simple forgetfulness can do many simple things before ever going on to thinking there is something serious wrong.

There are indeed many excellent memory exercises that can help you to remember lists and speeches and much else you may feel the need to commit to memory but before entertaining these there are some memory development basics you should think about first.

The first and most important is to acknowledge that if you stop exercising your memory your memory function will start to deteriorate!!

Secondly, although you may not like the message, physical activity and mental agility are closely linked. The message here is clear the more active you are day to day the more effective your memory will be at processing and storing information as memory. The message therefore is simple, get out and about; stop lounging around. Take regular exercise.

Thirdly, the memory retains its vigor the more you use it directly. Why not learn something new such as a new language, or start to play an instrument, or take up an intellectually demanding hobby such as playing bridge or chess, or doing crosswords or Soduko or other similar games. The harder you make the memory work each day whilst enjoying yourself the better will be your capacity to remember things. As another memory tip do make sure that whatever you take up you really do enjoy doing as these activities should be for life, not for a week, so make sure you really do enjoy them.

Then finally, don’t neglect your diet: if you binge out on rubbish foods such as chocolates, chips, high ‘bad cholesterol’ foods and other garbage without a regular intake of fresh vegetables and fruits that enhance your memory your memory will be all the worse for it.

Now having taken a serious stab at addressing each of these basics you can go on to improve your memory by adopting some really simple techniques. For example do you find that you loose things because you can’t remember where you put them? Or do you find yourself going off to do something and then having arrived where you want to be you’ve forgotten what it is you’ve come to do? We may blame our conscious memories for these failures but what is lost, is indeed recorded in our subconscious mind.

If you’ve just arrived in a room having decided to get something, or you put something down a few minutes ago and now can’t find it, its most likely that if you develop a calm state you’ll remember where you put it.

In these instances it’s stress that’s our worst enemy. Take time out, do something relaxing, stop stressing [this makes matters worse], try taking a bath, watch a movie, listen to music; switch on the radio do what ever relaxes you.

Now comes the simple important trick. Tell your subconscious mind to tell you where what ever it is you want to find has been put. Remain calm. Then over the next hour or so expect the location to simply pop into your mind. This really works!

Now of course we can do more to help ourselves in these situations but the most simple technique of all to stop losing things is to adopt new habits. By way of example if we find ourselves losing things then adopt a new habit of always putting things down where they belong and not in the most easy to hand place.

Make this a habit for at least 30 days working and by the end of this time it will have become perfectly natural By doing this simple act most those frustrating moments where you realise yet again that you’ve lost something will disappear.

Do such simple activities really work? Yes, most categorically they do and you can see for yourself how well they work by simply trying them out.

Now to a real area of misunderstanding relating to our brains that you must take on board. The simple question is this. Do our brains naturally deteriorate as we age? Most will say yes of course they do. Not true. This is according to Professor Arthur Kramer of the University of Illinois who says that the long-held belief in the world of neuroscience that the brain is hardwired, fixed and immutable is simply wrong. This turns traditional thinking on its head.

Professor Kramer says that “Changing the size and the function of your brain is as easy as taking a few steps”. He went on to say that “We found in our study that walking will increase the volume of the brain, increase the efficiency of the brain and increase improvements in the number of cognitive functions such as memory and attention”.

As part of his study Professor Kramer imaged the brains of 60 participants before and after six months of walking and saw an increase in crucial areas of the brain responsible for memory and decision making. He commented “I was surprised how much plasticity, how much flexibility older brains have, because the general belief up until a decade ago was that brains deteriorated as we age. That’s not true,” he says. Plasticity is the actual strengthening of connections between neurons, stopping, yes, even reversing memory loss. Physical exercise helps, and so do mental exercises.

Take heed of this simple advice and your memories will go from strength to strength. For more guidelines on improving your memories and using exceptionally effective memory exercises take a look at my blog.

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