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I have a memory, and I can just eliminate mistakes when they come up because I've already made them.

Many memory techniques involve creating unforgettable imagery, in your mind's eye. That's an act of imagination. Creating really weird imagery really quickly was the most fun part of my training to compete in the U.S. Memory Competition.

When you get old, it's hard to tell what's memory and what you've kind of created in your head as memory, you know?

Even as I think of myself as a 'rememberer,' I also know my memory is probably doing all this work to reconstruct a narrative where I come off better.

Recalling a memory is not like playing a tape recorder. It's a creative process.

I always try to write from memory, and I always try to use memory as an editor. So when I'm thinking of something like a relationship or whatever, then I'm letting my memory tell me what the important things were.

I have a hot memory, but I know I've forgotten many things, too, just squashed things in favor of survival.

If you don't have your experiences in the moment, if you gloss them over with jokes or zoom past them, you end up with curiously dispassionate memories.

I started to write things down, as a very young child, wanting to find a way to remember - to keep close, somehow - moments that made an impression on me.