Train Your Brain For Success

by Roger Seip

  Action and Emotion

  The more action and emotion involved with your images, the better they will stick to your files.

  Here's a good example of this: Can you remember every time you've driven your car? Of course not,but you can remember the times you got in an accident or got pulled over, right? Why? Lots of action and emotion. Can you remember where you were or what you were doing on August 11, 2001? Probably not, but I bet you can remember your life in vivid detail on September 11, 2001. Why? Lots of action and emotion.

  How do you harness this? When you're creating mental images and gluing them to your files, make the images as action-oriented as possible. Make them as vivid, crazy, and outlandish as possible. Images that are doing something are much more effective than images that are just sitting there. A client of mine once said “Your brain remembers videos better than snapshots.” Images that make you laugh, gross you out, seem totally ridiculous, or are even kind of racy work much better than images that make logical sense but are boring or normal. Every world champion memory athlete (yes, there are memory championships, and the competitors are amazing in what they can do) will tell you that when it comes to creating images that are memorable, “It's helpful to have kind of a dirty mind.” So incorporate as much action and emotion into your images as possible.

  You'll see examples of this vivid action and emotion as we progress.

  Your First Filing System—Your Body

  What did we say can be used as a file? Anything you can see with your eyes or visualize with your mind. The first file system we usually create in our workshops is called your body files. It's a great first system because:

  You can see it.

  It's always with you.

  You know the parts of your body without much thought, so it's easy.

  Right here you're going to get the same body files we create in our live workshops, using the exact same order and the exact same terminology. Just because of space limitations, I won't go into all the specific reasons why we use this order and this terminology, but rest assured there is a specific reason. Again, don't judge the process, do evaluate your results. You'll use 10 body files, in the following order:

  1. Your soles (of your feet)

  2. Your shins

  3. Your legs

  4. Your butt

  5. Your tummy

  Note: Your tummy creates what we call a center or midpoint file. We're halfway through this list of 10 files. Notice you are also approximately halfway up your body. This creation of a center file is not necessary, but it's really helpful as it takes advantage of the principle of chunking. We recommend it every time you create a filing system. Onward:

  6. Your ribs

  7. Your collarbone

  8. Your mouth

  9. Your nose

  10. Your forehead

  Take a moment to review these in your mind, even physically touch each one of them in order. Now, to lock them in, go to the next page and write them down. Do it without looking back, and do the best you can. If you get stuck on the name of one or two files, don't worry. Just skip over those and get the ones you can. Once you're to the end, see if your brain gave you the ones you may have missed. If you're just blank, come back to this page for the answers.

  Body File #1 _____

  Body File #2 _____

  Body File #3 _____

  Body File #4 _____

  Body File #5 _____

  Body File #6 _____

  Body File #7 _____

  Body File #8 _____

  Body File #9 _____

  Body File #10 _____

  Just to double-lock them in, please write them down in reverse order. This time no looking back at all.

  10

  9

  8

  7

  6

  5

  4

  3

  2

  1

  Nice work! You've now got an excellent filing system in place! I've seen our clients use their body files as a terrific place to store all kinds of important information—grocery lists, to-do lists, huge charts full of numerical data, foreign languages, you name it. In Chapter 3 we'll be using your body files (along with another filing system you've already developed but probably didn't realize it) to visually learn all the main points found here in Train Your Brain for Success, as well as some other applications that will boost your mental capacity on a number of different levels.

  Before we move on, I wanted to give you a little encouragement about learning in general. I'm aware that what you're doing right now is probably quite a bit different from what you're accustomed to doing with a book. Because it's different, you may feel a little awkward or uncomfortable with the process at this point. That may even continue for a little while. So here are four things to wrap up this chapter.

  1. If you're feeling a little awkward, understand that is a normal and required part of learning something new.

  2. I told you this awkwardness and discomfort could happen, and I also told you that you will break through. Don't judge the process; do evaluate your results. Sometimes results come quickly, sometimes they take a little longer. Everyone learns at their own pace.

  3. I'm sure you've heard the saying that anything worth doing is worth doing well. Brian Tracy taught me that anything worth doing is worth doing poorly, at first. Seriously, think about anything you're good at now and that you love. You had to go through a learning curve with it just like anything else. If learning more effectively is important to you, embrace that learning curve when it comes to improving your recall and your life.

  4. Depending on your learning style, you may just learn some skills better from seeing something done than by reading it in a book. That's why we've created the Reinforcement and Bonuses. Don't hesitate to use those for a fully interactive visual training reinforcement.

  I also think it's appropriate to give you and your brain a little recognition. If you've done this chapter in the way that I've asked, you've likely spent somewhere between 30 and 60 minutes working through it. That's not much time, and look at how much improvement you've already made! The first time you tested yourself on the unicorn list, you got a handful of correct answers. Now, just from this one chapter, you've probably got:

  All 20 items on the unicorn list.

  A working knowledge of the language of your memory.

  A basic understanding of the mental file folder system.

  Three things needed to remember anything: File, Image, Glue.

  Ten body files that are primed and ready to store information.

  That's 35 separate pieces of information, in a relatively short period of time. Congratulations! You may be realizing that your brain is capable of way more than you thought just a few hours ago. As a brain training tool, we strongly encourage you to frequently catch yourself doing things right. Don't BS yourself, but when you give yourself little mental pats on the back, you're activating the reward centers in your brain in a way that boosts your energy and makes you crave more learning. You'll learn all about “Little Victories” in Chapter 17, but reinforce those reward centers starting now—you deserve it!

  With that in mind, let's start loading useful information into those files!

  Reinforcement and Bonuses: This chapter has been Memory Optimized™ for your benefit. For your brief lesson and some great bonuses, visit www.planetfreedom.com/trainyourbrain with the access code in the About the Author section. Enjoy!

  Chapter 3

  Using Your New Mental Files with This Book and Beyond

  Now that you've got some places to store information, it's time to get your brain revved up and store some information there. We'll start with one of the simplest examples we teach, which is a simple shopping list. It's a good one to start with, because the items are concrete and tangible, plus you'll be able to use the technique lots of times.

  You need to hit the grocery store, and here's what you need to get.

  Oil (specifically, fish oil and flax oil)


  Avocados

  Walnuts

  Salmon

  Spinach

  Blueberries

  Beans

  Broccoli

  Some form of superfruit (pomegranate, acai, mangosteen, or the like; more on this in a bit)

  Green tea

  Yogurt

  Vitamins

  Before we do this exercise, here are two keys to maximizing the effectiveness and efficiency of any mental filing system:

  Key #1—Always start from the same file, and always go in the same order. Don't waste even one iota of energy trying to determine where the most logical place to file something is. Your brain doesn't care! Whatever is first on the list goes on the first file. One of the keys to developing speed is to streamline your thinking. So just do it in order.

  Key #2—Use strong glue, and lots of it. The more action you give your images, the more vivid and crazy you make them, the stickier they will be.

  Since it's your first shot, I'll guide you up your files. Here we go.

  1. On your soles—see oil (specifically fish oil and flax oil) gooshing all over them.

  2. On your shins—take an avocado and smoosh it all over them.

  3. On your legs—crush some walnuts between them.

  4. On your butt—see yourself sitting on a salmon.

  5. On your tummy—fill up your tummy with spinach.

  (By now you should know that halfway through is a great time to review, so take a moment and mentally review the images you have on those files.)

  6. On your ribs—see enormous blueberries jumping around staining your ribs purple.

  7. On your collarbone—see beans jumping all around.

  8. On your mouth—jam a stalk of broccoli in it.

  9. On your nose—see Superman eating some fruit.

  10. On your forehead—sits a green teapot full of yogurt and vitamins.

  Take a moment and review what you see on those files and now quiz yourself:

  Body Files Grocery List Quiz: What did you store on your:

  1. (Soles) _____

  2. (Shins) _____

  3. (Legs) _____

  4. (Butt) _____

  5. (Tummy)_____

  6. (Ribs) _____

  7. (Collarbone) _____

  8. (Mouth) _____

  9. (Nose) _____

  10. (Forehead) _____

  Good job! Notice how even without any logical association, the images that you vividly visualize with action and emotion stick to those files really well. When we teach this technique in our live courses, the same questions always come up. Let's answer the most common ones before we move into some more applications.

  Question #1: What if I have more than 10 or 12 items?

  Two answers:

  First off, notice how easy it is to see multiple items on one given file (your soles and your forehead each had multiples). As long as you visualize well, it's not difficult for your brain to handle this. So even with just these ten body files, you could literally store dozens, even hundreds of pieces of information. For example, I helped teach a Sunday School class of 40 middle-schoolers all 66 books of the Bible using just 10 files.

  The other possibility is that you can certainly create more files for yourself. Ten is just a great number of files to start with; you may want to expand it. See the bonus material at the end of this chapter for some great tips.

  Question #2: How do I delete information?

  Honestly, I just wouldn't worry about this too much. There are occasions where you might find it counterproductive to retain information beyond a certain time frame, but natural processes just take care of it. In a case like this, simply do not review your list. Because of the principles of primacy and recency, you will default to having the easiest recall of the most recent information you've filed. If you really feel the need to not remember something, you can just visualize an item being taken off a file and it shouldn't bother you anymore.

  The bigger question here is usually the opposite: “How do I retain information for the long term?” Long-term recall is important enough that we've devoted a whole section of this chapter to it: See it under “The key to long-term recall” toward the end of this chapter.

  Question #3: Can I use the same filing system to hold multiple sets of information simultaneously?

  Answer: Absolutely—you just need to give your list a title. We're going to do it in the next exercise. Just watch.

  Let's tie these questions together with another application of your body files. We did “body files shopping list.” Now we'll do “body files to-do list.” It will be a little smaller list (we'll do just six items), but you'll get the point. This time, just see these images vividly. I'll give you the meaning of the images once you've got them.

  1. On your soles, see an oxygen mask.

  2. On your shins, see running shoes.

  3. On your legs, see a balance beam with someone doing yoga on it.

  4. On your butt, see a brain doing push-ups, jumping jacks, and other forms of exercise.

  5. On your tummy, see a chalkboard.

  6. On your ribs, see a pillow.

  Now without looking, take the short quiz:

  Body Files To-Do List Quiz: What did you store on your:

  1. (Soles)_____

  2. (Shins)_____

  3. (Legs)_____

  4. (Butt)_____

  5. (Tummy)_____

  6. (Ribs)_____

  Did you get most of them? I bet you did, and I want you to notice something else. With each exercise, are you seeing where I'm giving you fewer clues? Pay attention to that; your brain is already experiencing a training effect where it's doing more and more on its own, without help.

  So to directly answer Question #4 above, just try this little quiz:

  On the grocery list, where would you find walnuts? _____

  To-do list, where would you find a balance beam? _____

  Grocery list, what's in your mouth? _____

  To-do list, what's on your ribs? _____

  Grocery list, where would you find spinach? _____

  To-do list, what's on your tummy? _____

  We could do this all day, couldn't we? Notice how, as long as you've titled your lists, your brain does an excellent job of keeping them separate. We've used your body files twice; you can do the same thing dozens of times simultaneously without fear of getting crossed up.

  Taking Optimal Care of Your Brain

  Part of why you're getting these particular lists is that they point up a critical aspect of training your brain: proper maintenance and feeding of the organ itself. We've taught for years that your mind and your brain are much like a muscle. The better you exercise and feed it, the stronger it gets and the longer it stays healthy. There's an enormous body of research that now explains why and how this works. I'll give you the short version here; not everyone reading this book cares to know all the science.

  (Some of you will find it fascinating. If you crave a more detailed explanation of the science, see the Reinforcement and Bonus section at the end of this chapter.)

  Take a look at the items on the grocery list. What you've got are 13 foods that are known to have a positive impact on brain health. The first five (the two kinds of oil, avocado, walnuts, and salmon) contain high levels of the Omega 3 fatty acids, which essentially insulate the electrical circuitry in your brain. The rest of them—spinach, blueberries, beans of all kinds, broccoli, the superfruits, green tea, yogurt, and vitamins contain high levels of various antioxidants, which not only impact your brain but your cardiovascular system. Proportionally, your brain uses about 10 times more oxygen than any other part of your body, so anything that's good for your heart is also good for your brain. Yogurt also happens to be one of the best sources of healthy bacteria in your digestive system. Dr. Mark Hyman was one of the first to uncover the massive connection between digestive health and brain health, and more is being learned about this connection all the time.

  The same concept applies
to your to-do list. You've got images there that represent activities that are known to boost brainpower.

  The oxygen mask for good breathing. We've already talked about how one or two deep breaths alleviate that fight or flight response that shuts off learning. Regular deep breathing oxygenates the blood and boosts the overall capacity of your brain.

  The running shoes represent aerobic exercise. What's good for the heart is good for the brain.

  The balance beam with the yogi on it. We now know that any form of physical exercise involving balancing (yoga is the most popular form, and there are many others) does specific things to strengthen neural pathways.

  That brain doing exercise just symbolizes mental exercise. Activities that challenge your mind (think crosswords, sudoku, Words with Friends, etc.) literally are like weight workouts for your brain.

  The chalkboard represents overall learning. Research on healthy people in their eighties and beyond shows that they share two common traits. They have a strong sense of community with other people, and they are still learning new things. A life commitment to personal development—reading, listening to educational audios, sharing ideas with successful people, and so on—actually makes your brain healthier.

  The pillow represents sleep. We now know that being poorly rested and sleep deprived has some of the same effects on mental performance as excess alcohol. A good night's rest is one of the very best ways to boost brain health.

  Again, entire volumes have been devoted to each one of the points listed above. Our “resident expert” on the issue of optimal brain maintenance is also our top-rated instructor, Tom Weber. If you'd like more science, check out Tom's video. If you don't care about the science and just want a stronger brain, simply start incorporating more of the above foods and activities into your life. Your brain will thank you for it.