The method of memorizing Cicero bears the name of one of the great Roman politicians, who became famous for never using notes in the process of his outstanding speeches. At the same time, the speaker operated with a lot of numbers, names, facts, and also quite often used quotations.
According to some sources, Cicero's method was very successfully applied long before its official author. In particular, the famous ancient Greek poet Simonides actively and successfully practiced it.
This method is simple and effective at the same time. Its other name is the Roman room system. It is based on the fact that the key units that need to be remembered must be arranged in thoughts in a certain order, representing a familiar room in the head. After such a procedure, it is enough to just restore this room in memory in order to restore everything that you have fixed in memory. Cicero, when he was busy preparing for a public speech, walked around the house and placed in his head the main key points of his speech in various places.
Before you start practicing Cicero memorization, decide how you plan to walk around the room. Choose the sequence of locations where you plan to mentally place the key units. For some, imagining a room in their head will suffice. However, for the first time, it will not be superfluous to walk around the house, as the great speaker did. In this case, it is worth choosing a familiar room, for example, your personal account. You may prefer the clockwise movement method.
With experience, you will be able to tap into an increasing number of objects and locations, thereby expanding your ability to capture information. You can use absolutely any item. Let it be a sofa, TV, shelf, desk, computer, and so on. You can move mentally from left to right and up and down. You don't have to be limited to just your room. Familiar routes and the like can be used for more efficient fixation in memory.
You need to associate key points of the information you are trying to remember with certain objects through associations. Starting to practice this method, it will not be superfluous to have a set of room elements in your head. Thus, you will always have a "handy" set of so-called mental hooks, which you can hook on the right key points.
As an example, consider how you can easily remember a list of the following items: bicycle, backpack, bottle, plasticine. These elements will be placed sequentially according to the layout of the house. We'll start with the corridor. It is necessary to use non-standard connections so that its reproduction is not difficult even after a long time.
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We place the bike on a hanger near the door, and it is in an inverted position. Such an association can easily be deposited in our head. Next comes the backpack, which weighs on the door, and a cat looks out of it. We put a sunflower flower in the bottle and place it on the nightstand. We completely seal the mirror located in the hallway with plasticine, thereby creating a non-standard association and fixing the last key element in our list. Thus, we have got a rather unusual associative array that we can easily reconstruct in our head.
Of course, Cicero's method should be applied to tasks that are much more difficult. The above example only helps to understand how information is memorized. This method is productive in the process of fixing in memory the text, the plan for the day, the order of the necessary phone calls, and more. Moreover, when the information is logically related data, and not just a collection of words, you can use the same room repeatedly. At the same time, rows of key elements will not jumble, and you will be able to easily recover data on a specific topic.
A few workouts are enough to learn how to use this method. This is its main advantage when comparing this technique with others. What's more, this technique can be used anywhere. And the room where you are can be an excellent starting point for memorizing information. You do not need to use the method of linked associations or the time it takes to reconstruct the chain, as is necessary with the method of successive associations.
You just need to recall a familiar room or use where you are at a particular moment. It is enough to look at the room, while arranging keywords and tying them to some objects. Recovering information is also easy. It is enough to remember the situation. By applying this method, you will be amazed at how easily and quickly even the most difficult material can be learned.
The Cicero Method is a unique mnemonic technique that anyone can learn. Even if you do not consider yourself a person with a good memory, using this technique, you will easily surpass each of them.