Before you set about reading a book, article or document, try to guess from its title what is written in it (or what you would write in the author’s place). The same “forecasting” applies to the heads of
chapters and the first paragraphs of the text.
Before reading (listening and glancing through) think of what information you want to derive, and what for. This will stimulate your interest and prepare you for its cognition.
Where the author, citing a number of arguments, is going to draw a conclusion, make a deduction yourself first and only then continue to read.
Before reading recall all relevant information known to you. In other words, “brush up” your knowledge.
Try to imitate Ancient Roman orators, who learned their speeches pacing up and down and “establishing connections” between the text and the atmosphere of their homes and then would recall the speech by taking “mental strolls”.
If you want to memorise a text in detail don’t learn it piecemeal. Learn the whole text, and learn it in its natural sequence.
To avoid forgetting the name of a new acquaintance, strengthen the first impression left by him by repeating his name aloud (“Excuse me, have I heard you right?”), using it in the conversation and when parting. Write down this name, if only with your finger in the air. imagine in whose honour this man may have been named, etc.
Try to evoke the strongest possible emotions connected with the information you memorise. Incidentally, this is exactly what Lenin did. The margins of the books he read bristle with categorical and profoundly emotional notes: “True!”, “What nonsense!”, “Ha-ha!”, and “You’ve hit the nail on the head!”
When preparing for intensive mental efforts consider the state you are in at the moment. Sadness, irritation, uncertainty and fear are enemies of memory.
Never write down things without an attempt to grasp and memorise them!
To these rules you may add a host of your own, based on the laws of memory. In short, the knowledge of these laws will enable you to memorise much more than before even if you had complaints about
your memory.