Question for y'all

[SolitaryPenguin]

So I got to thinking this morning, which is both dangerous and frightening, but hear me out.

How do you guys/gals remember things? I am talking everything, like where you put stuff, people's faces, phone numbers, important dates, etcetera.

For me, I find that each of these has their own sense tied to how I remember them.

For instance, if I watch myself set my car keys down somewhere, I know exactly where they are the next time I need to find them, even if it is a week later. As long as I have that visual picture in my mind, I can remember. I am screwed if I don't though.

Also, I have a photographic memory when it comes to phone numbers, as long as I can see them writtin down. I don't have to do the writing, but I have to see it written, and then POOF, stuck there forever.

Lastly, I can remember most people by smell. Not necessarily a perfume type smell, but just something that comes off them when I meet them for longer than 2 minutes. The smell somehow translates in my head to a visual of the face it belongs to.

Do you have any strange or interesting ways that you process memory this way?

[Kleinheiko]

I simply don't remember things. I know when I'm forgetting something, but I cannot for the life of me remember what that thing is.

As for things like car keys, I'm very tactile about them. If I set them down while sitting in this chair, even if they are under a pile of crap, my body still knows how to find them. Just repeat the motion of putting the keys down backwards.

Sometimes I think that my brain has a photographic memory, but it doesn't let me look at the pictures.

[SolitaryPenguin]

LOL, that's awesome, and unfortunate.

The tactile thing is interesting though, kind of like reverse engineering your own actions. I doubt I could find anything if there wasn't a visual time stamp in my head.

[Quinlan]

My memory is just appaling, I'm constantly having to ask other people what I have said or done in the past as if I wasn't there at the time, makes me look like a bit of a fool. Using my senses doesn't seem to help but smells, sights and sounds do bring back floods of memory and feelings but I can't seem to use it in a useful way like you do.

[SolitaryPenguin]

Oh it isn't always that useful, sometimes someone smells like pee and I have to see them on a daily basis.

The smell thing has been a lot more evident since I quit smoking. At first it was rather overwhelming, but now I've gotten used to how intense some smells actually are. I've smoked for so long, that now that it is turning fall here in the northeast, the smells are reminding me of my teenage years when I started smoking. It's probably the last time I truly smelled fall in New York.

[Hirsch63]

For instance, if I watch myself set my car keys down somewhere, I know exactly where they are the next time I need to find them...

Yes Me too...so if anyone moves anything, I'm screwed.

Also, I have a photographic memory when it comes to phone numbers, as long as I can see them writtin down.

Yes, some numbers not all...much better at it when I was younger...

Lastly, I can remember most people by smell.

Nope, my sniffer seems to work intermittently....

About five years ago I went through a very challenging period...and my abilities generally and especially these "sort of inherent" ones took a major hit...though I have managed to get some back with time. Used to be able to visualize anything like any object suspended within a gridded cube observable from any angle within my mind since as early as I can remember. Also could just look at a map and "see" myself within it and then leave the map and continue to be able to locate myself or find my way through a visualized inner grid system. I was also unbeatable (when young) at easter egg hunts or finding things.

[wolfy]

I always put my keys and wallet in the same place. Nobody moves them 'cause it's my area.

Because my wallet cellphone and keys are always in the same place that's where I put anything I need to remember to take somewhere.
The "leave it by the door" technique.

I can't remember names well. I can remember what the person likes to do and what music he likes etc but I can't remember the name.
I remember names by imagining them doing something.For example Ian Baker is baking a cake and icing Ian on it. Works OK.

My visual and tactile memory are very good. That's how I try to make up for my various weak points.

[sarah]

Originally Posted by SolitaryPenguin

So I got to thinking this morning, which is both dangerous and frightening, but hear me out.

How do you guys/gals remember things? I am talking everything, like where you put stuff, people's faces, phone numbers, important dates, etcetera.

For me, I find that each of these has their own sense tied to how I remember them.

For instance, if I watch myself set my car keys down somewhere, I know exactly where they are the next time I need to find them, even if it is a week later. As long as I have that visual picture in my mind, I can remember. I am screwed if I don't though.

Also, I have a photographic memory when it comes to phone numbers, as long as I can see them writtin down. I don't have to do the writing, but I have to see it written, and then POOF, stuck there forever.

Lastly, I can remember most people by smell. Not necessarily a perfume type smell, but just something that comes off them when I meet them for longer than 2 minutes. The smell somehow translates in my head to a visual of the face it belongs to.

Do you have any strange or interesting ways that you process memory this way?

Yeah, I take visual "snapshots" of where I put important stuff. I have to put certain things like my purse and my keys in the same spot every time I come into the house or I might just set them down some place and spend forever looking for them later (done that too many times in the past...). Actually, all of my purses are in a cupboard in our living room, so when I want to change purses, I don't have to ever take the stuff in them them anywhere else in the house, which removes the possibility of my setting my wallet down somewhere and then forgetting where I put it. Any facts I have to remember get written in the notes section of my Filofax calendar, and I would be totally screwed if I ever lost that thing. I have to check to make sure I always have it with me at work every day, and I always take it home. I've lost several really good watches due to taking them off when I felt like it and then not remembering where they are, so now I keep my current watch either near my keys, on a dish on a side table near the door, or on my dresser -- I make myself NEVER put it anywhere but in one of those two places. I also NEVER allow myself to put the keys anywhere else when I come home but on that dish near the door (because I've lost them several times and that was no fun)....

As for umbrellas and gloves... *sigh* they still get lost when I take them places and then forget about them. I just don't buy expensive gloves anymore except for one pair that I MAKE myself keep track of whenever I wear them (they're just too nice to get lost).

Faces are easy to remember -- I have a great visual memory -- but remembering the names that go wtih those faces is impossible unless I repeat their name several times in my mind while looking at their face, or I make up a mnemonic device to help me remember. I also find it's easy to remember some people by their gait -- the way they walk registers in my mind as unique, and I make up a word or phrase to go with it that fits their name or their personality, and that helps me remember them the next time I see them.

Sarah
ISFP

[millerm277]

Visual and Tactile for me. Both my desk and workshop are highly disorganized to a person who would look at them. However, I know where everything is.

I am very good with faces and can remember even every place I've seen that person, but names take me at least a month to learn.

I cannot remember anything by hearing it. You could tell me how to do something, ask me an hour later, and I won't remember. If I watch you do it, I'll remember it indefinitely.

[me_plus_one]

When I was little and my grandparents used to tidy up my desk, I couldn't find anything, though everything was there, but when it was untidy, there was nothing I couldn't find.

I have a sort of photographic memory, I can remember school lessons & formulas by visualising their size, aspect, shape on the paper they were written.

However, if I mechanically drop my keys somewhere, without visualising that spot, I'll probably never find them. The same happens with my cell phone, but I can always use another phone to call myself and locate it.