In this episode of the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast, I follow up on the “How to Memorize a Textbook” podcast with “How to Write a Dissertation” (or any article or essay).

Tune in now and you’ll learn:

* The best ways to use index cards to create a “skeleton” that you can use again and again for other writings or to memorize material for a public presentation.

* Why index cards are better than Evernote and Anki.

* How to make writing a dissertation as interesting as writing a screenplay for television or the movies.

* How to use the floor of your apartment to organize an entire dissertation into multiple chapters so that you can present the evidence in the best possible order simply by sitting and writing.

* The best conditions to create and maintain a writing space for composing your writing.

* The need for syncing to Dropbox or some similar service while you’re writing.

* How to avoid the need to re-read your dissertation before the defense.

* How to know almost exactly where in your dissertation you’ve made various points.

* The best way to keep your research material “mobile.”

* How to apply the techniques in this podcast and “How to Memorize a Textbook” to memorize and write blog posts about gardening, cooking or whatever area of interest you might want to write or present about.

* … and much, much more.

I also invite you to an upcoming webinar titled Memory Secrets of an A+ Student, which I highly encourage you to sign-up for and attend. I’ll be talking more about using memory techniques as part of scholastic success with an eye to making sure that the techniques can also be used by everyone.

As a student, as you may know, I was pretty foggy in my mind most of the time for various reasons I’ve talked about before. Memory skills and the index card research technique that I talk about in the podcast were key to my success and although paper and pen seem like ancient technology to students today, I still highly recommend using them.

Handwriting uses, rather obviously, the hand, and there are good, scientifically grounded reasons that explain why that handwriting creates higher levels of cognition. Couple this with a Memory Palace, location-based memory technique and you’ll quickly experience much larger results than typing. It’s not entirely clear to me why typing differs from handwriting, but the effects are plain and the practical benefits evident. As I talk about in this episode, it’s easy to lose or accidentally delete a computer file, but so long as you have an ordered stack of index cards, you know the order of points you talked about in the writing and can re-write it relatively easily.

You may even be able to dictate directly from the index cards, which is a point that I neglected to address in the podcast itself. If you have dictation software and are able to verbally respond to index cards off-the-cuff, then the writing processes can go even more quickly for you, making your job simply one of editing.

If you’ve enjoyed this episode of the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast, please add a comment here, subscribe on iTunes or Stitcher and feel free to share it with anyone you know who is currently writing a dissertation or writing in general.

Talk soon!

Sincerely,

Anthony Metivier

Anthony Metivier is the founder of the Magnetic Memory Method, a systematic, 21st Century approach to memorizing foreign language vocabulary, dreams, names, music, poetry and much more in ways that are easy, elegant, effective and fun.