Secrets Of Mental Supremacy
	Association and Memory <  Previous Contents Next  >

In an earlier paragraph I told you that proper association of ideas practically insured power of memory. Let me now try to give you some notion of how this principle of mental activity can be utilized.

Let us take a simple instance. Epictetus says: "My mind to me a kingdom is." Now, first of all, we consider this splendid utterance until we thoroughly understand and appreciate it. That is good, but it is not enough. We desire to possess this sentence—to make it a part of our mental stock in trade, so that we can use it at appropriate times in public speaking, in writing or in conversation. How shall we do this? Well, we have really four ideas in the quotation: the mind, a kingdom, contentment (implied), and the personality of the man, Epictetus, who wrote the sentence.

Let us first learn something of Epictetus. Let us analyze his character and place a mental picture of him in the midst of a network of associations which will make that picture of Epictetus our own forever. We find the following points for association: A slave--became free--great philosopher--blameless life--banished--friend of Adrian and Marcus Aurelius.

So we may associate the picture of Epictetus with the following ideas:

slaves who were great men; great philosophers who were banished; men of humble origin who became friends of kings; Adrian and Marcus Aurelius-- any one of these will almost certainly suggest to us the idea, the mental picture, of Epictetus.

Now to return to Epictetus' sentence: The three ideas, kingdom, mind, contentment, should each be dwelt on for a moment in this wise: Kingdom, a place of vast extent, un- limited resources, boundless possibilities, infinite powers, much to explore, much to conquer. And to Epictetus, his mind was like a kingdom; and he was content. After the idea of a kingdom of great extent, take up the thought of the mind and its possibilities.

Dwell on this until you see how, to a man of intellect, the mind is really

a kingdom--a kingdom more interesting and wonderful than any mere physical country could possibly be. Then ponder on the notion of contentment in spite of humble circumstances. Associate this with the idea of Thoreau, of Purun Dass, of Diogenes, of Gautama, and of Jesus of Nazareth--all of whom were content to live simply, finding their kingdom in the mind and soul. "My kingdom is not of this world," said Jesus.

Thereafter any of these ideas will be likely to suggest the epigram we are studying; for all of these ideas are now united together by the network of associations we have constructed.

Now to work out in this way all the many things which you want to remember and to have at instant command, seems, of course, like very hard work. Happily, however, such a method of forming associations, of binding ideas into bundles or clusters, as it were, is necessary only until the habit is once formed. Then the matter goes on automatically, of itself.

Conscious Action Becomes Unconscious.

It is a beneficent law of the mind (and of the body, too, for that matter) that any act, after it has been repeated a certain number of times, tends to become automatic--to do itself without any sensation of effort, sometimes even without our knowledge. A few months of careful effort will in practically every case develop such a habit of associating apposite ideas, that the student will possess, without further care or drill, this most superb accomplishment of the mind--the power of association.

It requires both care and attention to form any desirable habit, either of mind or body; but, the habit once formed, no further care or attention is necessary. To learn to write, for instance, to form the letters, to combine them into words, to elaborate the words into sentences and paragraphs, the paragraphs into pages--all this takes time, a number of years. Once thoroughly learned, however, as by a trained writer, the practice of writing requires no special care or effort.

And so with this important matter of association. Few people have it to any great degree. In most people the ideas are separate, isolated. Cardinal

Newman says of some seafaring men that they "find themselves now in Europe, now in Asia; they see visions of great cities and wild regions; they are in the marts of commerce or in the islands of the south; they gaze on Pompey's Pillar or on the Andes; and nothing which meets them carries them forward or backward to any idea beyond itself. Nothing has . . . any relations; nothing has a history or a promise." All this means, in a word, that these men have not the power of association.

In order to arrange our ideas into clusters or groups, we must for a time give special attention to the matter. As a help to study along these lines, I can recommend the following exercises which have proven in my own personal experience and in that of others advised by me, of the greatest possible value.

Take any object you like--a rose, a pencil, a chair, a wheel, a knife. Having selected your object write out a list of its peculiarities. Say you have taken a knife--an ordinary table knife. Now, describe its form, color, size, shape, weight, material, and state its peculiarities--hard, cool, sharp, heavy, opaque, elastic.

Having written out this list of descriptive points, take them up one by one and think of what other objects have the same quality. For instance, in material the knife, being of steel with an ivory handle, resembles all cutlery and steel machinery, differing from them not in material but perhaps in the manner and degree of the tempering. The ivory handle will suggest a large number of articles made of that material. The sharpness of the knife suggests lancets, swords, scissors, and so on, and may also be applied in a figurative way, as to the nature of a remark ("Her words were like a dagger thrust into his soul"); or the effect of a glance ("An eye like a bayonet thrust met mine") and so on.

This treatment of the object "knife" if done exhaustively will prove a most valuable exercise. Three or four hours over it will be time well spent. Not that you are specially interested in the subject "knife," its analysis or its relations, but that in going through the exercises with any object whatever, you are getting your mind into the habit of treating all subjects in the same analytical manner. By the time you have treated twenty different objects in accordance with this method, you will have gone far toward gaining the invaluable accomplishment of associating ideas.