Recently my fiancée and I had to confess something to each other.
It turns out it's a common phenomenon. Since so many carry cell phones and no longer learn a set of phone numbers by repeated dialings, it's common for couples not to know each other's numbers. In fact, Sarah Ruth and I weren't even close to remembering.
But then a friend reminded me of the very basic story-telling mnemonic device. All you do is break down the parts of any sequence and then make up a story with those parts.
Many have written on this method - and I think Andi Bell's work, "Memory Pack" might be the most famous.
For my purposes, I just needed a simple story. I started with my brother’s birth year - Gabriel was born in 1990.
Next I thought about the gifts he'd received at the party.
I'll forever associate 23 with Michael Jordan and there are 52 cards in a deck.
Then I had a few digits left and couldn't think of any related gifts.
So...I just thought about how these digits were actually my favorite number times 2.
Worth noting – I'm obviously obscuring her phone number here by not giving you all ten digits. It's my fiancée's number and she is taken. But each time I recall my story now, I can get to the digits faster.
My fiancée's story was much different than mine but equally effective.
If you'd like to try this, think of dates, places, and currencies important to you. It could be your favorite coffee shop or car. You can also search for your uses of a number in your texts if you have a smartphone.
