Many people are initially introduced to image memory by seeing amazing memory performances, such as memorizing playing cards backwards, irregular numbers, long articles, or even entire books, and being dazzled by the amazing memory of a memory master. While watching the performance, one would feel that the memory master’s memory is really a bit unbelievable, as if whatever is remembered, it is amazingly fast. It is also this amazing and fast memory that has attracted more and more people to learn memory methods. Many people have the expectation that when they master the memory method, they will immediately be able to memorize ten or even tens of times faster than before. However, after being exposed to the image memory method, many people start to become confused, as the memory speed does not seem to be as fast as they thought, and even feel slower than before at the beginning. So, is image memory a fast memory or a slow memory? There is no doubt that image memory is a fast memory, but there is a process of “from slow to fast” and “practice makes perfect”. The principle of image memory is to transform the unfamiliar and abstract memory materials into vivid and lively images, like watching a movie, using the extraordinary image memory function of the right brain to remember. This principle is not difficult to understand, just like when we stand on a high building and look around, our eyes can take in a lot of image material at the same time and be absorbed and recorded by our brain in a very short time, while if we listen with our ears, we can listen to sounds from different angles at the same time, and although we hear them, your brain can only include few sound fragments at most. It is clear that image memory is an amazing tool given to us by the brain, but we have been ignoring its effectiveness. Those who know the principles of image memory will know that image memory has more steps than traditional rote memorization, namely: image transformation, image association, image simplification, and image staking. The first two steps: transformation and association, are necessary for almost any kind of information memorization. It is the need to first transform the memorized material into active, vivid images using the harmonic method, substitution method, or other flexible methods, and then link these images together. As you can see, the two steps of image transformation and image association are also two of the most basic, critical and core aspects. Whether the speed of memory is fast or slow depends mainly on how fast they are. Next, it’s time to talk about the speed that we all care about. Everything has a slow to fast, from will not to will, from skilled to flexible use of the process. In fact, in our lives, this situation abounds. For example, learning to drive, when we first sit in the cab, usually feel overwhelmed, the theory of those who already understand the knowledge once used in practice, will always be lost, confused, of course, the speed of driving can not be fast up. When you practice for a period of time, and constantly use the basic knowledge and methods learned, you will find that your feet, hands, eyes, head with more and more perfect, more and more flexible, you will no longer panic, which means that your brain has helped you to complete the coordination between the various organs with the work. At this time, the speed of driving will be much faster than before. Another example is that when we learn Wubi input method, when we first practice, we are not skilled enough to memorize the roots of the characters, sometimes we can’t remember which key a certain character is on, so our input speed is very slow, even slower than the full spelling input. However, after a period of training, when we are fully familiar with the root list, we can use Wubi input method very fast, several times or even more than ten times faster than the previous full spelling input. This is the time when the real effect of Wubi input method can be seen. Our image mnemonic method is also similar. At the beginning, when the use of the mnemonic method is not very proficient and the memory skills are not yet mature, image transformation and image association are done slowly, then the memory speed will not seem fast enough, and may even be slower than rote memorization. This makes it look a bit like slow memory rather than fast memory. Many people are not skilled enough in the use of methods and techniques to memorize images, so they feel a little slow and tedious, so they have a feeling that they might as well just memorize by rote. In fact, this process is very normal and necessary. In the actual use of image memory methods, it is also necessary to go through such a training process. Whether it is fast memory or slow memory, whether you remember the process is very fast or a little slow, as long as you can really use the image memory method, the information to be remembered into image memory, then, you can remember very firmly, forget very slowly, saving a lot of time to repeat the review, but also can greatly improve the efficiency of learning. Image memory can achieve the effect of unforgettable, no matter whether the process of “oversight” is fast or slow, long or short, as long as you can do not forget, can also be very good to achieve the effect of image memory. Of course, if you can be more proficient in the use of the method, the memory process can be faster, then of course, the memory efficiency will be higher. Therefore, when you first start learning the image memory method, it is okay to be a little slow, it is a process that every student learning the image memory method needs to go through. If you shy away from this process or even give up, then you will not reach the other side of freedom and your memory will never improve. As long as we continue to use the image memory method, do more training, and practice more, we will become more and more proficient in the use of methods and techniques, and we will change from “slow” to “fast”, and our memory will become better and better, and we will be able to achieve the real You will be able to achieve true “unforgettable”! Memory secrets: Learning image memory methods is a “slow to fast” “practice makes perfect” process, must be more practice, more training, more use, so that you from “slow memory” You must practice more, train more, and use more, so that you can change from “slow memory” to “fast memory” as soon as possible, and your memory will be improved by leaps and bounds! Many people have a vague understanding of memory methods, and many will have a vague idea that mastering simple memory methods is the same as eating the “memory elixir”, no matter what you remember will be much faster than before. Memory methods can indeed help us improve our memory, no matter what information we need to memorize, there are memory methods that can help us greatly improve memory efficiency. However, there is a certain distance and stage from the mastery of memory methods to the overall improvement of memory and to the practical application in various fields. What we call image memory is an umbrella of various memory methods and their applications, encompassing all aspects of memory improvement and application. To understand image memory comprehensively and accurately, it is necessary to understand the relationship between the three major systems of image memory. The three major systems of image memory are “systematic approach”, “memory training”, and “practical application”. The first system is the systematic method of image memory. The systematic method of image memory is summarized into four major steps, including image transformation, image association, image simplification, and image staking. These four steps include almost all memory methods, and all kinds of memory methods can be accommodated in these four steps. Through these four steps, we can better apply various memory methods flexibly to various memory objects. However, mastering the method does not mean that memory will immediately improve greatly, nor does it mean that whatever is remembered will necessarily be much faster than before. Because memory is essentially a skill, it requires training. The method is a foundation, an introduction, and it is only after learning the method and mastering it that it is possible to use it. It is necessary to have a process of training and practice to use it well or not. Just like we know how to swim, it does not mean that we can swim, nor does it mean that we can swim very well. It is the same reason. To improve memory, we must master a systematic method, which is the foundation, or “introduction”, a necessary stage. After mastering the systematic method of image memory, to use it better, there are two directions, one is to help yourself through various memory training to master the skills of using the method faster and better; the other is to apply it very directly to what you need to study and work. This leads to two different paths of improvement, and into our other two systems. The second system is the memory training system. We call the various memory training methods “memory gymnastics”. After mastering the methods, to use them faster, better and more proficient, you can train through some memory training methods (memory gymnastics). For example, training with numbers or playing cards, through a period of training (for example, a month), so that you can do backwards within three minutes 100 numbers or a deck of cards. You can also memorize long poems or even entire books. Doing such training may have nothing to do with one’s professional studies or one’s daily work, but is simply and purely a training. In our daily study and work, we may not need to memorize a lot of irregular numbers so fast, or memorize playing cards, or memorize things like “Pipa Xing” or “Tao Te Ching”. So, such training is not practical for many people. However, one advantage of this simple training is that it helps us to imagine more quickly, to associate unrelated images more quickly and tightly together, which is delicious for the flexible use of memory methods. After all, the use of memory methods requires us to master a lot of imagination and association skills, and the key to the good and efficient use of memory methods is to see if we are skilled in these imagination processes. So we say that the training of memory gymnastics can well help us to apply memory methods to practice skillfully, flexibly and quickly. The third system is the practical application of memory methods. Most people learn memory methods not to become memory masters, but to apply them to their studies and work to help them improve their learning efficiency. To put memory methods into practice, we can of course bypass the memory gymnastics training and apply the learned methods directly to our professional studies and work. Any material or content to be memorized can be directly memorized by finding methods from the four steps of image memory. However, there is a long process to apply the memory method to professional subjects and expertise, which requires us to slowly explore the application skills and slowly improve the proficiency of the method. It is even likely that when we first apply the memory method to the professional field, we will often hit a wall, and even be slower than the previous rote memorization. This is like some of us learning the five-stroke input method, which requires a long training process to become proficient in using the method and to increase the input speed several times or even tens of times. Applying the image memory method to the professional field also has a similarly painful training and figuring out process, but once you go through this process, you can enter the realm of freedom in the use of the image memory method and can easily and quickly remember the professional knowledge you have learned. The relationship between these three systems of image memory is simply this: 1. Systematic memory methods are the foundation and must be mastered; 2. Memory training helps us to use memory methods more skillfully; 3. Practical application is the ultimate goal of our learning memory methods. In the current memory community, there are two different attitudes, one is to focus on memory training, want to become a memory master, want to feel the pleasure of rapid memory improvement; the other is to emphasize the application of memory methods in practice, think there is no need to do too much training away from the practical application. In fact, these two attitudes are relatively one-sided. If you just go on training, training, and retraining, the memory of numbers and poker is very strong, but you do not go into the practical application of memory methods, which is out of practice, except for the ability to attract people through magical performances, or even open classes to teach, it does not help people much in their practical needs. Of course, it is also very meaningful to attract more people to be interested in memory methods and to attract more people to devote themselves to the study of memory methods by demonstrating this magical memory power. So we also need people to focus on memory training, memory performances and competitions. If we only emphasize the research and practical application of memory methods and exclude memory training, then, most likely, there will be a lack of flexibility and proficiency in the use of memory methods. Because many methods, if you do not reach a certain level of proficiency through mere training, it will be a bit of a struggle to use them, especially when you encounter some very difficult to remember expertise, and you may give up when you use them. This is like using the Wubi input method without memorizing the Wubi roots, when you can’t even think of which key a certain character is on for half a day, it is faster to use Pinyin. Therefore, we should have the following attitude towards the image memory system: On the one hand, we should make it clear that the ultimate purpose of the memory method is to be used in practice, and we should study how to better and more flexibly apply the memory method to practice. On the other hand, we should also do more memory training and memory gymnastics as much as possible, so that we can master the method more skillfully and apply the techniques more flexibly, and also spread the memory method better through some memory performances, so that more people can benefit from it. In this way, our image memory system will become more and more perfect, more and more practical, more and more accepted and used by more and more people, and memory techniques will be popularized more quickly!