The Journey Method
In this chapter, I’m going to teach you a powerful method for learning a list of information. It could be anything from a shopping list to the elements of the periodic table.
First of all, I want you to go back to 1987, because that’s when my life changed. Before then, if you’d have presented me with a 10-digit number, I probably would have gotten about 6 or 7 digits right. As for cards, I probably couldn’t have memorized more than about 4 or 5 in sequence. So what happened in 1987 to change all that?
One day I was channel-surfing, and I saw an amazing man called Creighton Carvello, who was on a program called Record Breakers. He was attempting to memorize a deck of cards, which he did in just under 3 minutes.
Had I not seen that, I wouldn’t have thought it was humanly possible, because the cards were dealt out one at a time, one on top of each other. I figured, “He’s not actually photographically memorizing the cards; he must have a system for connecting one card to the next.” But I really should have had more faith in his natural abilities.
So armed with a deck of cards, I went up to my room, and I decided to try it out for myself. I couldn’t connect more than about 4 or 5 cards together. This got me thinking. I’d heard about making up a story, like the one I described in chapter 1, and using mnemonics, so I decided to give the cards a symbol, but first of all I thought, “I wonder if Creighton is using a trick here. Maybe he’s using his body to store the information.” Maybe he had a system by which, if the first card was the 2 of clubs, he would move his left foot to 2 o’clock. If the next card was the 3 of diamonds, he would move his right foot to 3 o’clock, so he’d gradually work his way up his body. Every time he dealt a card, one part of his body would have to move. The mind boggles, because 52 parts of his body would have to move in 52 separate ways.
I’d recently been on a business trip to Khartoum, in the Sudan, and I’d been sitting around in a place called the Sudan Club, waiting for businessmen to come along (which they never did). In five weeks there, I got used to the layout of the Sudan Club. I knew exactly the layout of the restaurant, the swimming pool area, the squash court, and so on.
I thought that maybe if I turned each card into a person or an object, I could connect them by imagining them sitting around the swimming pool or in the restaurant. Then I thought, “Well, it’s going to get a bit crowded, isn’t it? If I have 52 objects, and 52 people are all mingling around in a big party, how am I going to get the sequence right?”
Then it suddenly hit me. Why didn’t I just put them on a journey? Make up a journey of 52 stops or stages, right around the city of Khartoum, and then just walk through it and imagine seeing each card as a person or an object. This really was the eureka factor. This was my development of the journey method.
Here’s what I want you to do. I don’t want you to start thinking about memorizing anything. All I want you to do is form your own journey around your house. Start with the place where you wake up in the morning, your bedroom: that could be the first stage. Where do you go next? Maybe you go to the bathroom, so that would be the second stage; the spare room would be the third stage; the fourth stage, the staircase; and so on.
I don’t know what your house is like, so you have to make up the journey yourself, but just count off 10 stages on your fingers.
If you really want to maximize the benefit of this, close your eyes and imagine the journey that way, because you avoid distractions. When I’m recording information or memorizing a spoken digit number, I always have my eyes closed. Try this with your eyes closed, because that will keep you from being distracted by the outside world. It helps you to focus on the information that you’re receiving.
Imagine that you’re floating through the house. Just get the feel of the house, as though you’re there now, looking at all the familiar knickknacks. Gradually count off 10 stages on your fingers. If you run out of rooms, go into the yard. Maybe call the front gate one of the stages. If you run out of yard, go into the street or to the next-door neighbor’s house. It doesn’t really matter, but it is important that you keep an order through the journey. You wouldn’t go from your bedroom to the garden shed to the upstairs bathroom (unless it was a Friday night and you had too much to drink).
When you have 10 stages, then we’re ready to implement the journey method. It’s most important that you lay down this order of stages. So prepare the journey, and the best way to do that is to put down this book now. When you have your stages ready, then open it up again.
If you have your 10 stages, then we’re ready to lay down the information. I must say at the start that this is not a test of memory. This is going to be a demonstration of imagination, so don’t consciously try to memorize anything at all. All I want you to do is just use your vibrant imagination, and just picture the images that come along.
Now when I say imagination, I don’t simply mean forming images in your mind. I want you to use all the cortical skills that you have at your disposal. Use all your senses: sight, sound, smell, taste, and touch. Try to introduce movement; use exaggeration, humor, sex, anything you like so that your imagination can work.
Now move gradually from stage to stage, and I’m going to feed you some objects. Start at the beginning. You’re in your bedroom. The first object I’m going to give you is a wallet.
Now use exaggeration. Give it position. What’s it doing? Where is it? Perhaps it’s a huge wallet, bulging with dollars, right at the end of your bed. Try to picture that. What’s the wallet made of? Is it leather? Can you smell it? Use your senses.
Leave the wallet alone and move on to the second stage, wherever that might be. It could be your bathroom. The next object is a snake. Maybe you hate snakes, but it’s a snake. Perhaps it’s in the bath. What type of snake is it? Give it a color. Is it slimy? Just picture that. Use movement, exaggeration.
Now move on to the third stage of the journey, wherever you are now; it could be your spare room. The next object is a screwdriver. Use exaggeration. Make it outsized. Give it a position in the room. Use logic. Why is it there? Maybe you’re doing some repairs in that particular room. What’s the color of the screwdriver’s handle? Maybe it’s striped yellow and black.
Great. Leave the screwdriver. Move on to the next stage of the journey. This time the word is peach. Imagine a giant peach wherever you’re standing now in your house. Pick it up. How heavy is it? Imagine tasting it. Maybe it has a little bit of fur on the side. Is it a fresh peach? Is it bruised, damaged? What does it taste of? Again, use all your senses.
Put the peach down, and move to the next stage. This time I want you to make a mental note that this is the fifth stage. The object is a drum. Obviously this time you’re going to use sound. Imagine picking up a stick and banging the drum. How loud is it? Is it going to disturb the neighbors? Whereabouts is the drum in that particular room?
Again, use all your senses; sound and touch the drum, and remember that it’s the fifth stage. You’re halfway through the journey now.
Now move on to the next stage of the journey. The word here is book. Why would a book be in that particular place in your house? Maybe you’re in the yard now. What sort of book is it? Is it a hardback? Is it softback? What color is it? What’s the title?
Put the book down and move to the next stage. This time I want you to imagine a piano. Maybe you play the piano, or maybe there’s a famous pianist playing it, maybe Liberace. What’s he doing there? Use sound. What sort of music is he playing?
Move on to the next stage now. We’re nearly at the end of the journey. This time I want you to imagine a goat. Just see it there. Walk up to it, touch it, feel it. Is it soft? Does it make a noise? Is it chewing? What color is it? What’s it doing? Why should it be there? Use logic as well.
OK, leave the goat behind. This time, on the next stage of the journey, you see a mirror. What do you see in the mirror? Why is it there? Is it cracked? Do you make it crack?
Finally, at the very last stage of the journey, you see a tank. What is it? Is it an army tank or a water tank? I’ll leave that up to you.
Great. As I said at the beginning, this is a demonstration of imagination. This is not a test of memory, but as I said, the three keys of memory are imagination, association, and location. I’m willing to bet if that you used all three, you should now be able to recall all 10 of those objects. (Don’t worry if you can’t to begin with. We’ll ease you into this.)
Go back now to the first stage of your journey. Where were you? You were in the bedroom. There was something at the end of the bed. What was it? Maybe it’s made of leather. That’s right. It’s the wallet, that thing oozing with dollars.
Then we went to the next stage. Maybe it’s the bathroom. There was something in there. What was it? Something slimy. A snake. Great.
Next stage, wherever that is. What’s in it? Maybe something having to do with repairs you were doing in the room. It’s a screwdriver.
Move on to the next stage. Something that you tasted. A peach. Great.
Again, move on to the next stage. This has something to do with sound. Maybe you’re worried about disturbing the neighbors. It’s a big drum. What stage of the journey is it? Do you remember that I said to note that it’s halfway through, so it’s the fifth stage of the journey?
Move on. Wherever you are now, there was something that you were reading. It’s a book.
Moving on. Who’s there? Liberace. What’s he doing there? Playing the piano.
Leave Liberace alone. Move on to the next stage, and you can see what? Clue: it’s an animal. That’s it. It’s the goat.
We’re nearly there. The next stage involves something to do with you, maybe a reflection. OK, that’s the mirror.
Finally, the very last stage. What was it? Was it an army tank or a water tank?
How did you get on? Maybe you missed out on a few of the words, but don’t worry if you did. All it means is that you didn’t really make the images strong or stimulating enough. The answer is just to go back, review each scene, or reshoot it if you like. Don’t blame the projectionist when the recording is faulty. Just go back and change a few of the images. Reshoot the scene.
Have you noticed that the journey beautifully preserves the order of the objects? So if I said to you, “What’s the sixth object?” all you have to do is go back to the journey. You know where the fifth is, so you go one forward, and it’s the book. We can do it the other way around. If I say to you, “Where on the list did the snake come?” you think back a minute. You had the wallet, and then you went to the bathroom, so it has to be the second on the list.
In fact, by using the journey, you could easily reverse the order of the items. Just reverse the journey. What was the last item? Think about it. Tank. Go back: mirror, goat, piano, book, and so on.
So all three aspects of memory are working beautifully together. Imagination—you’re using plenty of that. You were associating the objects; you were thinking of them, exaggerating them, and putting them into locations, so all three qualities have worked together. That’s why you can use them to great effect.
Obviously there are practical benefits to this process, but apart from anything else, it is a wonderful exercise for the whole of your brain. We’ll be looking at brain function in later chapters.
I suggest you try an experiment: Write down a random list of 10 objects. You can get your family or friends to do this. Have them to call the objects out slowly, and see if you can memorize or just imagine each of them along a journey.
Of course, speed comes with practice, and after a while, you will be amazed at how easy this is to do. You won’t be looking at 10 objects. You’ll be wanting to do 20, 30, 50, maybe 100. These are all benefits of the journey method.