I have a way of remembering to do things that might be idiosyncratic, or it may be completely normal. So I thought I would reach out to the dozen or so people who read this little blog to see if you do the same thing. So here’s the scenario:
Let’s say I want to remember to take a CD to the office with me tomorrow morning. I will pick out some very specific action that I know I will take tomorrow—like picking up my keys off the bedside table—and I’ll visualize myself doing that while thinking to myself “don’t forget that CD.” I only need to spend a minute or two concentrating very hard on picturing myself picking up the keys while thinking “don’t forget that CD.” Then in the morning, when I’m picking up my keys, the thought “don’t forget that CD” will magically appear in my head.
I believe this is technically a form of self-hypnosis, or something like it. It works most of the time, but only recently did I start to wonder if other people use this little trick. When the thought comes popping into your head, it feels very much like deja vu. In fact, I think I figured it out when I was curious about the feeling of deja vu when I was little (this was before I learned there was even a term for it). I reasoned that surely I didn’t have some buried “memory” of a future event, so I tried to induce deja vu like this. Eventually, I got it to work.
So does anyone else do this? If not, you should try it, it really works.