'I have a bad memory!'

How many times have you heard that?

How many times have you said that?

Every time that you say it, you're telling yourself a lie. It's not true.

In my Memory Magic Workshop, I ask the participants to take a vow to never say it again.

The number one thing you must believe is you have a great memory. Because your (false) belief that you have a poor memory will prevent you from attempting to memorize some things. 

This month I memorized Pi to the 400th decimal place. 

Pi is a number that describes the relationship between the circumference and the radius of a circle. It is a constant. And it is always the same, no matter what the size of the circle. It is slightly over 3.1415926535897932... 

Pi is a non-ending number with no repeating patterns. 

So, at one time, I thought this would be very, very difficult to memorize; as would most people. But then, someone showed me a way to remember it; to transform it from a list of 400 numbers to a paired association of only 100 numbers. I'd already memorized a paired association of 100 numbers, many times. So, by breaking it down, I knew that I could do it. And I did. And it took me less than 2 hours. 

So, my past experience led me to believe I could do something that would appear very time-consuming, and difficult. I couldn't have done it without my belief in my abilities. And this is what I'm telling you. You must believe you can do an apparently impossible task.

Just break it down. Let's use the Pi number as an example. Instead of remembering 400 individual numbers, I learned how to remember 100 sets of 4 numbers. It's still 400 digits, but it's divided into 100 parts. This made it easier. And it made it more believable.

So, please believe you can remember things. You can remember the names of more than 80 people you've just met. You can remember the prices of 100 products in your company catalog. You can remember the names of the family members of many of your customers. You can remember prospects, or visitors that you've only seen once.

Memory power isn't a gift. It is a skill, just like learning to play the piano. The more that you practice the skill, the better that you'll get at it. 

When I started to remember the names of the people in the audience, I didn't believe I could recall more than 40 names. I really didn't think I had the ability. So, I never tried. I looked at the size of the audience, and thought 'Well, I'll just have to do a different memory demo because the audience is too big for me.' My doubt prevented me from doing it.

But now, through past experience, I've learned that I do have that ability. I've memorized up to 80 names numerous times. In fact, you can see a video of me recalling the names of 80 people that I'd just met. 

Believe in yourself. 

This is a belief that will reap great rewards in all parts of your life.