How to Memorize a Textbook vs a Book

Do You Really Need to Memorize a Book Verbatim?

Set Yourself Up For Success

How to Memorize a Textbook (Realistically)

1. Examine the book

2. Make an equation
3. Get index cards
4. Find the big points and jot them down
5. Make use of your Memory Palace
6. Create crazy imagery to help you recall the info
7. Stick each crazy image onto a Memory Palace station for recall
8. Test yourself before the teacher does
9. Let the info grow into knowledge
10. Bonus! Save your knowledge for later

Example: How to Memorize Verbatim

Bonus Example: How to Memorize a Formula

How to Study a Textbook for Maximum Retention

Want this post in infographic form?

You can download this infographic, just like Aldolfo:

Aldolfo Artigas printed AND laminated this “How to Memorize a Textbook” infographic and now his sons are

using the technique too!

So are you ready to learn how to memorize a textbook, the right way?

Let’s get started.

 The Question That Inspired This Post
So you may be wondering: Hey Anthony, if people have been asking you about

this topic for so long, what finally made you decide to write about it?

Well, the truth is, I’ve written about textbook (and book) memorization before,

just never in the context of memorizing an entire textbook. 

You can check out my post about how to memorize a chapter out of a

textbook. And you might also be interested in another post I wrote, about how

students with dyslexia can still ace their exams.

In the end, the reason is simple: I decided to write this post and record a

podcast to help out one of my audience members.

Here’s what this struggling student wrote:

“Hi Anthony. I want to memorize some physics, chemistry, and math formulas,

and also some texts that I have to memorize verbatim, but it needs a lot of

Memory Palaces and too much time. Plus, I don’t know how to memorize

formulas. 

For instance, memorizing  sin(A+B)=AcosB+cos. 

Do I need just one Loci, and how do I memorize this? Of course, this is a very

simple formula, but exams are coming! I need your help.”

Now that we know why this student needs help, let’s quickly talk about the

differences between a textbook and other kinds of books.

How to Memorize a Textbook vs a

Book
For the purposes of this post, we’ll use the words “book” and “textbook”

interchangeably. 

When it comes right down to it, the only real difference is that someone has

called a textbook a textbook. Other than that, they’re remarkably similar —

pages stuck between two covers with a spine.

Very little else differentiates them, except for some signature that has been

applied to them by the author or publisher. Mind you, textbooks often come

out in multiple editions, and a quick win is to be aware of how recently the
edition you’re reading appeared on the market. You can sometimes find a

nearly identical (and much cheaper) version from the year before.

But overall, a book is a book, by any other name.

And whether it’s a book or a textbook (even boring books), the first question

you should always ask is: do I actually have to memorize this entire textbook

verbatim?

Do You Really Need to Memorize a

Book Verbatim?
One of the things I always ask people when they come to me with this

question is: why?

Why do you need to memorize the textbook verbatim? Are you certain

you need to memorize the whole thing – or even long passages – verbatim?

What will memorizing the whole textbook get you?

If it’s just speed that you’re after, think again about how to study fast with this

guide to high volume learning at speed.

There are certainly ways to memorize long passages of text word-for-word

that are 100% effective. There are people who are known to have done it. 

But, if you don’t absolutely have to put in the time and effort to memorize

verbatim, why would you?

Instead, what if you could learn something deeply enough to be able to

discuss it, to connect it, and to frame it in a certain context?

Chances are, memorizing in this way will not only be easier, but also more

effective. Memorizing verbatim is rarely necessary and the mind will fill in the

blanks if you structure your approach correctly.

So in this post, what I really want to teach you is the power of

memorizing select material from a textbook.

Your first step, as with any task that’s worth doing, is to lay a strong

foundation.

Set Yourself Up For Success

Now, let’s be honest for a minute. If your exams are coming up tomorrow or

the next day, this approach probably isn’t going to work for you.
In an ideal situation, you would take the time to dig your wells before you’re

thirsty. What that means in this context is that you want to know what

Memory Palaces are, and have yours set up and comfortable before you start

to study for your exams.

You could build a ladder to the moon with all the different memorization

techniques out there, but I teach a very particular approach called the

Magnetic Memory Method. You may have heard of it, especially if you’re a

regular reader.

And because I teach this specific approach, I would recommend that you get

yourself set up before crunch time — before exams are staring you down,

making your palms sweaty and giving you nightmares!

My approach uses location-based memorization strategies, all based around

Memory Palaces. You’ll need more than one Memory Palace, and you’ll need
to do some self-exploration. But the good news is… it’s super simple to do,

and the process is a lot of fun!

The first step in the process is to have a carefully defined Memory Palace.

Before you ever pick up a book, even if it’s scriptural, you’ll determine how

much material you want to memorize from it. And then you’ll create a Memory

Palace in advance so you can recall that information with ease when you need

it.

But what if you’re new here, and you’ve never created a Memory Palace

before? I’ve got you covered — grab my free 4-video memory course below,

and the series will get you up to speed.

We’ll talk more about how to use your Memory Palaces later in this post. 

Second, you will get in the right mindset for studying.

Setting a good mental attitude is key, before you even pick up the book. This

allows you to mentally take away the most essential information. 

And part of getting into the proper mindset has to do with relaxation. Before

diving into any memory technique, I always take a moment to chill out and

relax. Chillax, if you prefer. I do this by using traditional meditation

techniques. 
Now, some people have a very specific vision of meditation and what it

means, but for our purposes, it doesn’t have to be complicated.

Meditation, in my mind, is as simple as sitting with your back and neck

straight, imagining there’s a hook in the top of your head attached to a string

that’s pulling you straight up. Then, you just sit there and breathe.

Some people believe that meditation is about emptying your mind — here are

two of my favorite metaphors:

1. You’re sitting on the bank of a river. Your thoughts are the river, and you
just watch them go by. Then, any time you find yourself being sucked
away by the river you just bring yourself back to the shore and watch the
river again.
2. Imagine an elephant that’s tied to a chain on the ground. The elephant –
your mind – is romping around like crazy. You tie it to the ground with a
stake, and then a couple of seconds later, you have to go get it and tie it
down again. And with enough training, you can get the elephant to sit
down and go to sleep.

That second metaphor – the mind as an elephant – is a bit more appropriate

for memory techniques. 

Alan Watts said that meditation should have no goal whatsoever — it should

be sitting just to sit. And in this Tim Ferriss podcast, Sam Harris says, “all

you’re doing is paying exquisitely close and non-judgmental attention to

whatever you’re experiencing.”

So even if you can’t get your metaphorical elephant to stop running off, still

take a moment to sit and breathe. Take the time to chillax before you start

memorizing.

This allows you to approach memorization with the right attitude: still, gentle,

not fighting for or clamoring after anything. You’re just being… and absorbing

information. You might even think about it like this: you are a being, and the
information is also like a being. You get to absorb that other being into you,

something you can bring into yourself!

And if meditation isn’t your thing, you can also do some progressive muscle

relaxation exercises or pendulum breathing — this combines physical

processes with a particular way of breathing. Or maybe you can listen to some

music to get you ready to study.

Now that you’re relaxed and ready to become a metaphorical knowledge

sponge, let’s break down the memorization process step by step.

How to Memorize a
Textbook (Realistically)
When I was studying for my doctoral exams – and later for my dissertation

defense – I needed to read a total of 500 books to be able to sit for the exams

and write my dissertation.

500 books. No exaggeration and I’m not kidding. 

(In fact, if you read my post about how to memorize a chapter in a textbook,

you’ll see photographic evidence of me carrying a stack of 20 or 30 of those

books. I carried many, many piles like that from the library stacks to the

private office I had access to in the Robarts Library in Toronto.)

The good news for you is that you get to learn from my extensive studying

experience — how I operate when I’m conducting research or want to

memorize the contents of a book. (You can also use this same method to

memorize a novel, if you’re reading between the lines…)

Quick note: looking back at the question from our intrepid reader, you’ll notice

that they use the word “loci”. I don’t use that word myself, because the

Magnetic Memory Method is much more specific. 

There are operational factors in the 10-step method I teach that may not seem

to involve memorization. But trust me, each step is essential to the Magnetic

Memory Method of textbook memorization.

Remember: before you do anything else, have a carefully defined Memory

Palace that involves a location you’re intimately familiar with. I usually chart

out at least 10 – but sometimes up to 50 – stations. Sometimes I even use an

entire room or spots within a room.

Let’s call that step zero: create your Memory Palace.

A Memory Palace is a mental construct, based on a real location. You use

different spots inside the Memory Palace to store information along a very

well-constructed journey. Those spots are called “stations” — an entire room

is a macro station, and a spot within that room is a micro station (like a bed,

desk, or chair). You can leave associative imagery in those locations, so you

can then go back along the journey in your mental construct, decode the

images, and recall the information you left there.

Now that you have step “zero” behind you, let’s dive in to the 10 steps to help

you memorize a textbook.

1. Examine the book

Now we get to the good stuff! Take your textbook, and take a good look at it:
 Look at the front cover. 
 Look at the back cover. 
 Look over the introduction.
 Read the conclusion, and
 Be sure to scan through the index, if your book has one. 

And read the colophon page — that’s the place where they include information

about the book’s publication, like the place of publication, the publisher, and

the publication date. If you didn’t know what a colophon page is, look it up. It’s

fascinating. I also find the table of contents of a book to be very interesting.

These parts of the book are what Gerard Genette called the “paratext.” This

means the text beside the text. This step takes about five minutes and

effectively trains your brain to understand the scope and the dimension of the

book with respect to the topic.

Not included in that five-minute estimate is the time it takes to read the

conclusion, which could be a much longer process. So why should you take

the extra time to read the conclusion?

Partially, so you can judge whether or not the author’s conclusion about their

subject was profound enough to warrant reading the book in the first place!

Sometimes when you read a conclusion, you’ll realize that the author hasn’t

arrived at any conclusion that makes it worth reading the process or the

argument that substantiates what the author concluded.

Okay. So maybe that’s a little judgmental. It’s certainly not a foolproof way to

decide what to read. But, when you have 500 books on your plate it’s worth

taking the time to determine whether or not the book warrants all that reading.

You only have so many hours before your exam, after all.

The conclusion (and introduction) will also give you clues as to where the

information is in the book — or at least the important information. And this

location data is often included in the context of the concluding remarks, which

can be quite helpful.

For example, the author might say, “In chapter one I do this, in chapter two I

talk about this, and in chapter three I cover that.”

Next, you’ll make some foundational decisions.

2. Make an equation
When I take a look at a textbook, I decide in advance how many pieces of

information I want to retain from it.

This is what the Magnetic Memory Method calls the “principle of

predetermination.” It’s not an arbitrary or random decision. Instead, you will

consider the length of the book and the purpose of your studying. Is this for an

oral exam or an essay?

Using this method creates an understanding of what your goal is, and what

the outcome would be. It creates a border or frame of sorts, to keep you

focused. 

Usually, 3 to 5 pieces of information per chapter is enough. And for today’s

post, we’ll use 3 pieces of information per chapter as our number.

Before we move along to the next step, let’s examine two reasons why

choosing a specific number is important.

1. Failing to plan is planning to fail.

It might sound a bit cliché, but it’s true — especially when it comes to

structured reading. When you’re reading for a particular purpose, then it’s vital

to plan how you’re going to read. Books are filled with details, pages full of
information, and you can easily become overwhelmed if you don’t plan

appropriately.
2. You can avoid getting overwhelmed

When you predetermine how to approach a book and structure your reading

process, you prevent overwhelm. You end up denying it from existing in the

first place, because you know you are only going to memorize three pieces of

information from each chapter.

Of course, you can always add information later if necessary, but containing

and maintaining the information before you even get to it is a good strategy.

Plus, less is always more. Focusing on just a few key points will allow a lot of

the surrounding information to stick to your specifically memorized points. Go

ahead and try it!

Next, you’ll take out a stack of index cards and start organizing.

3. Get index cards

For regular readers here at Magnetic Memory Method, you might want to sit

down for what I’m about to say.

I know that I’m usually scowling and calling for the death of index cards… but

in this case, they have a different value, other than rote learning. (As you may

or may not know yet, rote learning is a no-no in the Magnetic Memory Method.)
However! When we’re talking about how to memorize a textbook, we do have a

certain mania for index cards. In fact, it’s part of what I call “Magnetic

Bibliomancy.”

To join in the fun, grab an index card and let’s get started. 

First, write down the name of the author, the title of the book, and the

bibliographic information. 

Please note: there is certain bibliographical (or paratextual) information that

doesn’t need to take up space in your Memory Palace. And if you regularly use

memory techniques, you’ll find yourself absorbing that information anyway.

But I don’t tend to offer Memory Palace space to it, since index cards are

something you can hold onto.

Now you’ll have one index card that has all the bibliographic information of the

book. Number this card in the top left corner — number 1. (I always label my

index cards in the top left corner.)

Next, you’ll begin to fill out your other index cards.

4. Find the big points and jot them down

Now that you’re all organized and have your plan, it’s time to get down to

business. 

Because you read the introduction, paratextual materials, and the conclusion,

you should already have an idea which chapters you want to read first. You

don’t have to start with the first chapter! There’s a high likelihood that your

mind already decided how to prioritize your reading efforts.

Remember, for the purposes of this blog post, we’re looking for three primary

pieces of information out of each chapter. So, there are 3 pieces of

information you’re going to walk away with from whichever chapter you read

first. 

You have your index cards ready to go, and you’re ready to start writing down

the key pieces of information on each card, numbering them the same way (in

the top left corner).

You will want to have some sort of indication on each card about where you

are in the book. This has to do with what I call the “ownership mindset” for

textbook memorization. You’ve already adopted the attitude that you’re going

to succeed. You literally want to feel like you own the key information in your

textbook.

One way you can take on this mindset is to pretend you’re a talk show host on a

popular show or podcast, and later this evening you get to interview the author

of the textbook. Millions of people will be watching or listening, so you really

need to know your stuff. And you need to be able to read the book fast.

When you use this mindset, it allows you to ask questions while you’re reading.

You get really curious about the topic, and instead of passively reading you end

up engaging with the text. There’s pressure: time pressure, the fact that you’re

going to interview the author. You could even imagine that the author is sitting

there with you as you read, and pretend like you can read their mind about the

answers to your questions.

Studying is a numbers game. I’ve touched on this, but I want you to categorize

everything using a kind of numbers game. So when you come across a gem of

a detail, write it down on your index card along with the page number where

you found the information, and sometimes the chapter name or number. 

This kind of information always goes in the bottom right corner. And if you

have secondary ideas, you can use the back of the index card to jot them

down. I always do this regardless of whether I’ve copied down a quote from a

book or just a note or observation. 

Here’s why I diligently complete this step: if I ever need the information again,

I’ll know where to find it. 

At this point, you’re not doing any kind of memorizing whatsoever. Instead,

you’re:
 Familiarizing yourself with the material, 
 Connecting details with already-known information, 
 Learning new information, and
 Gathering new facts and details. 

That’s it — but memorization is not ready yet. You aren’t memorizing the book

as you go along, but rather focusing on the book and marinating yourself in it.

Next, you’ll take the information from your index cards and transfer it into your

Memory Palace.

5. Make use of your Memory Palace

Once you’ve finished reading the book and filling out your index cards, it’s time

to place the information into the correct spot in your Memory Palace.

Let’s pretend for a moment that our example textbook had ten chapters. Since

we wrote down three pieces of information per chapter, we now have 30 index

cards. And because we prepared our Memory Palace ahead of time, we have

30 stations ready to go.

Now it’s time to memorize, magnetically.

In the next step, you’ll make your information visually appealing.

6. Create crazy imagery to help you recall

the info
Take each index card and think of an image that relates to the information on

your card. Make the images bright, zany, and exploding with action.
I’ll walk you through a few examples so you can see this step in action.

Example 1: Imagery based on the author’s appearance

Let’s take Gerard Genette, the author of Paratext, as an example. If I wanted to

memorize material from the book Paratext, I would use Gerard as a lexical

bridge or Magnetic Bridging Figure, helping me move from station to station.

Genette reminds me of Gillette razor blades. Not exactly a one-to-one

correlation, but I can nonetheless see him shaving in that first room, if I

needed to memorize that he was the author of Paratext. He would be shaving

away a beard with wild ends growing out of his face. For the context of

“Paratext” I could picture a pear bouncing up and down on a textbook, or a can

or Para Paint splashing over a book.

Example 2: Imagery based on concepts from the index card

In this example, index card 2 says, “A text does not exist outside of the text

itself.”
It may sound pretty obvious, but we don’t often think about the fact that until

someone comes along and reads the book, it essentially doesn’t do anything.

There are millions of books standing unread on bookshelves around the world

that only exist when someone is reading them or talking about them. 

So our minds are kind of texts, and when we read, the two texts intermingle.

The second station will feature the book Paratext itself, and words are trying

to escape from the pages. And poor Genette is standing there, trying to beat

the words back in — because according to him there is no text outside the text

itself.

Example 3: Imagery of the author throughout the Memory Palace

To get some of the other concepts in Genette’s thinking, I might see him

giving up the battle and then opening up a lid in his head, which is also filled

with words. I could use Genette for each and every station, doing something

related to the key phrase on the index card.

I’ve done this with Aristotle’s Nichomachean Ethics. I’ve done it with

Plato’s The Republic. I’ve done it with novels. Done it with all kinds of things.

Once you get used to it, it’s very easy. 

And when using this approach for Ulysses  by James Joyce it’s very easy to

see Joyce moving through my Memory Palace, not through Dublin, as he does

in the novel.

If I knew Dublin, then I might be able to use Dublin, but I don’t. So I was able to

use a Memory Palace based on a familiar location and I see Joyce going from

place to place so I can remember the different things that are happening in the

plot in order to recall them later.

Now you’ve seen three different examples of how you might use wildly

exaggerated information to help you populate your Memory Palace stations.

Remember, these images should always be big, bright, colorful, and filled with

lots of action.

Next, you’ll assign each crazy image to its own station.

7. Stick each crazy image onto a Memory

Palace station for recall
This step is the most straightforward of the ten.

You will begin with card number 1, and memorize the biographical information

at station number one in the Memory Palace. Then continue on with index

card two and station two, index card three and station three… you get the idea.

If you already know the author and title by heart, you might not need to use

that first station for biographical information. Use your judgment, so you don’t

waste valuable memory real estate.

Since it only takes a second or two to create a really action-packed image for

each station, be sure to take the time to really see them in your mind’s eye.

Next, you’ll test your recall.

8. Test yourself before the teacher does

This is the step many people won’t take: practice recalling the info by going

from station to station.

After you’ve gone through and used your Memory Palace to put every bit of

information on those 30 cards into the proper station, you can make sure the

information sticks. Pretend like you’re testing yourself in a real test situation.

Take the details, facts, concepts, and plot points that you memorized, and

write a summary from memory. Your index cards should be somewhere else

during this exercise — in a box, on a shelf, or somewhere else you can’t cheat.

And you can’t look back and forth the whole time to make sure you get things

right as you go along. 

Then, check your summary against the index cards. Did you remember all the

points from your cards? Did you remember things in the correct order?

Finally, it’s time to let the information grow into something bigger.

9. Let the info grow into knowledge

One of the most important stages of this process is to turn the information

you memorized into knowledge that you can use over and over — not just for

this single test or exam.

This is one place where the related information that wasn’t on your index

cards will come out to shine, as well. You get to see which pieces of

information are “magnetic” and stick to your brain. And you can start to apply

the things you learned in other situations, perhaps even bringing some of the

information into everyday conversations.

Plus, once you make the switch from information and data points into

knowledge, you’re much more likely to pass every exam with flying colors!

And speaking of transforming information into knowledge, you can also pull

that knowledge out of your brain banks down the line. Let’s take a look at the

10th and final (bonus) step in your memorization process.

10. Bonus! Save your knowledge for later

When you’re done with your index cards, don’t throw them away!
Once you don’t need the information for your exam anymore, you also don’t

need to hold the information in your Memory Palace. You can empty out and

reuse your Memory Palace for something else, and let the index cards hold the

information for a rainy day.

For example, let’s say you memorized the James Joyce novel Ulysses for a

literature class. Once you took your exam, you didn’t need the information

rattling around in your brain, so you put the index cards in a box and shelved

them away for later.

Five years later, you’re asked to give a talk about the novel. You can simply

find the box with your index cards, reconstruct your Memory Palace, and save

time in putting together and memorizing your talk. 

There’s a high likelihood some of the information will still be in your brain,

tucked away in a corner somewhere. And maybe it’s there in the form of

paleness, or there are some ghosts or fossils of other information you’ve

stored in the Memory Palace since then. But anything that’s still in your

memory will become doubly magnetic after working with it again.

One of my university supervisors required me to submit summaries to prove I

was reading the books on my reading list. This is what got me into the habit of

writing out summaries, and I learned very quickly that writing summaries out

of Memory Palaces was just golden. This is material that – if you use it – will

change your ability to study and your understanding of how to take notes from

a textbook.

You can also use your summaries again later. Save them, and you might find a

way to use them for essays, pieces of a publication, or even a Ph.D.

dissertation. By using your recall abilities, you’re becoming an expert on your

subject matter. 
You put stuff in your mind, filter it, and then reproduce it — all without the

benefit of looking back and forth at your textbooks or index cards. And

through the process, you become a master of information.

Now, I know I said you may not need to memorize your textbooks verbatim,

but what about the situations where you do actually need to remember things

word-for-word? Before we wrap up, let’s take a look at a couple of examples of

how to do just that.

Example: How to Memorize Verbatim

We’ll use the first line of Homer’s epic poem The Iliad for this example.

Now imagine this — I used to work (more like play) at Hadey Windey’s school

in Burnaby, Vancouver. It was called ELIT or English Language Intensive

Training.

She’s got a vibrant, brilliant set of students who come to this after-school

program for extra training so they can be superstar students, and I was able to

develop a lot of teaching around memory skills for them. I also taught the

students other things like interpretative abilities and essay writing skills, all of

which are connected to memory. 

And I also was able to build, from this place, an amazing Memory Palace. I

never really thought of using it as a Memory Palace until I was training Hadey

in using mnemonic techniques and Memory Palaces, and she really didn’t

believe it was possible. 

I just happened to have an old translation of The Iliad in my iPhone as we were

sitting in a park. And I was explaining Memory Palaces to her, and drawing a

map of ELIT, showing her how she could use a Memory Palace based on the

school.
I said, “Here’s the kitchen, and the office that I have, and here is classroom

number 3, and the computer room,” and other things, and I showed how you

could make a linear mental journey through this area. Starting in the kitchen, I

said, “Imagine I’m limping, and I kick a pail from the kitchen to the door where

the Statue of Liberty is standing. In response, she digs with her shovel into the

ground and throws the dirt at my office door where I’m standing, writing

numbers, and then rubbing the numbers away while I’m coughing.”

Well, the first thing I want to point out is that all of these images are laid out

along a journey. It starts in the kitchen and then goes to the door of the kitchen.

Then an action goes through the hallway to the door of my office. And other

parts carry on through classroom number 3 and the computer lab and so forth.

But I’m limping, which reminds me of Achilles, because of Achilles’ heel. I kick a

pail. Moving on to the pail, Achilles’ father is Peleus. Now, I don’t need to have

the whole Peleus, just pail is enough to remind me of Peleus.

So, “Of Peleus’ son, Achilles,” the pail is now kicked at the Statue of Liberty.

“Sing, O Muse.” Now that’s personal to me. The Statue of Liberty means muse

to me. It’s just because it’s a woman in a gown, I guess — it works for me. 

The hardest thing to teach about Memory Palaces and associative imagery is

that you need to use what works for you. You need to draw from your own

personal pool of images based on other things that you know. You’re creating

associations. So it might not make sense to you, but, to me, it makes a great

deal of sense. 

“Of Peleus’ son, Achilles, sing, O Muse.” Me, limping, kicking a pail at the Statue

of Liberty, that brings back “Of Peleus’ son, Achilles, sing, O Muse. The

vengeance, deep and deadly” which is the next line — so the Statue of Liberty is

really angry about this, but instead of attacking back at me, she digs into the

earth with vengeance — “The vengeance, deep and deadly; whence to Greece

unnumbered ills arose.” 

So she’s throwing this dirt at my office door, and I didn’t really need to think

about the fact that it was taking place in Greece. Any time that you don’t need

to memorize something, don’t worry about putting it in the verbatim, because

verbatim is a weird thing. Basically, if you don’t need it and it comes back

naturally, don’t create an image for it.

So, “Whence to Greece unnumbered ills arose,” well, what am I doing as this dirt

comes at me? I’m writing numbers, and then I’m wiping them away.

Unnumbered. And I’m coughing, I’m sick — ills. “Whence to Greece unnumbered

ills arose.”

That’s a very simple example. I created a vignette since it’s not really a single

image or a set of images. And I did this on and on and on for as much of The
Iliad as I wanted to memorize to create this example for Hadey. And she was

blown away.

After that, she came back two days later and had memorized 100 words of

English vocabulary. (English is not her first language.) She was really skeptical

at first, but that’s how I finally convinced her to give this a try. Now she’s part

of Toastmasters, and she’s giving speeches left, right, and center, right from

her mind, directly from using the Magnetic Memory Method.

Now, it’s important to remember that this example was how to memorize a

poem verbatim, and you may not need to memorize your entire textbook word-

for-word.

And in additional good news, you can use this method for anything you want

to remember — it doesn’t matter whether it’s a formula, poetry, a quote, phrase

in a foreign language, or a textbook. 

Memorization is memorization, when you get right down to it.

The reality is that you can take a spoon or a bucket — the ocean of

information doesn’t care. The memory techniques and your brain treat all

information equally well. It’s only the ego that sees a difference, and lack of

preparation with the memory tools makes it more difficult. 

And finally, since our intrepid reader asked specifically about how to

memorize a formula, I’m adding a bonus example to help anyone who needs

to memorize them.

Bonus Example: How to Memorize a

Formula
Let’s also break down an example of how verbatim memorization works when

you need to remember a formula. We’ll use the example our reader asked

about:

sin(A+B)=AcosB+cos

As always, we want to start with a well-formed Memory Palace first. 

I think of my friend Shannon because her name starts with ‘S’. I was only in her

apartment once to watch a James Bond movie, but that’s all I need to get a

good Memory Palace rolling. 

Next, I start creating Magnetic Imagery to encode the first part of the formula.

Since the devil is the boss of “sin,” I put him on Shannon’s couch (a micro-

station). To memorize the character “(“ I make it a bulldozer. It drives over an

Apple computer, which draws upon another technique entirely, called

the  pegword method.

From this A for Apple computer, an arm emerges and tosses a crucifix at

Batman. Why? Because a crucifix is a good memory tool for remember, and

Batman helps me remember “b.” 

Now all I have to do is have Batman raise his shield — thus closing this part of

the formula with the “)” symbol. But this shield is special because it has two

guns to represent the = sign. Then Al Pacino “accosts” Batman throwing a

crucifix at Cookie monster wearing Batman “cosplay.”

I know that this process might sound like a lot if you’re a beginner, but you’ll

pick it up quickly. And you should — it’s powerful!

So there you have it. Your 10-step cheat sheet for how to memorize a textbook

or formula… or any other book you want to remember.

How to Study a Textbook for

Maximum Retention
Remember that scenario at the beginning of the post? The one where exams

were on the horizon, and you were feeling woefully unprepared?

Now you know how to determine how much reading you actually need to do,

how much memorization is on your plate, and the best way to memorize your

textbooks so you retain as much information as possible.

Most importantly, you understand that memorizing a textbook isn’t as hard as

it might seem!

You’re on the right track to ace your exams and create a whole new set of

knowledge that you can use now and into the future.

And if you feel like you could use a little bit more of a memory boost before

your exams, check out my free memory improvement kit.