If you want to upgrade your brain like Eddie Morra from Limitless, then, unfortunately, you won’t find it to be as easy as taking a single pill. Instead, you’re going to have to look at more arduous and lengthy strategies, including such things as brain training or improving your overall health.
If you choose to go the brain-training route though, there is one especially effective and ‘easy’ method that you may find helps you to see the kinds of results you’re looking for. That method is to focus your training on working memory. But what does that actually mean?
"Wisdom is more active than motion itself.
She pervades and permeates everything by her purity.
For she is a breath of God's power,
a pure revelation of the glory of Almighty.
Therefore, nothing that is defiled can reach her.
For she is a reflection of eternal light,
the spotless mirror of God's power,
and the image of his goodness."
Wisdom 7:24-26, NLT.
What is Working Memory?
The traditional view of memory split out the capacity for storing information into three separate categories. Those were:
(I) Working memory,
(ii) Short-term memory, and
(iii) Long-term memory.
Short-term memory was described as containing all the information that you remember for a while, but that would ultimately be ‘sent to trash’. This includes such things as people’s names, or what you had for breakfast. Long-term memory meanwhile includes all that information that you will remember indefinitely: e.g. Scripture verses, the names of your friends, the night you proposed, how to tell the time, the alphabetical letters, etc.
Working memory, on the other hand, is based on this description: it is effectively your brain’s equivalent of computer's RAM (Random-Access Memory). This is where information would be stored that would only be required for a very short amount of time. The most popular example is the phone number that you are going to write down.
In turn, the working memory – based on the traditional view – could be broken down into a ‘visuospatial scratchpad’ where we would visualize things and a ‘phonological loop’ where we would repeat things to ourselves in a bid to not forget them.
Today though, psychologists are recognizing that working memory has much more in-common with visualization in general. This is our ability to internalize information, whether that’s memory, imagination, or something else.
In short, this is our ability to create a representation of the world whether for predictive purposes or something else. In conversation, this means keeping track of what’s been said and what’s next. In sports, it means knowing where everyone is on the pitch. When working, it’s what allows us to multitask and switch between different things. This is nothing short of crucial for your ability to work quickly and effectively.
And if you use your minds more effectively like having the tendency to reflect first before you do anything, then I can assure you that you'll have fewer or no regrets at all in your life. But effective reflection requires your mind to have the knowledge of the truth and insight into how things work on the grand scale. This is a tall order but also achievable.
How To Train Your Working Memory
The good news is that there is a proven method among other available methods for increasing working memory and that is to train using something called the N-Back Test. Use this and you can gradually improve your ability to hold information in your mind and do multitasking with incredible results. Watch the following video to start training while entertaining your brain.
The N-Back Test Method
The N-Back Test, in summary, attempts to measure the continuous performance of the individual's working memory and its capacity.
Researchers have found that the brain can be trained and exercised for optimal performance just like any other body part like body muscles. As mentioned earlier, the test called the N-Back Test can be used to achieve that purpose. This Test was introduced for the first time by Wayne Kirchner in 1958, published in the Journal of Experimental Psychology.
Researchers have also found that the test can significantly improve personal IQ, especially fluid intelligence. But researchers all around the world are still working to reach a consensus that the results of the basic test could be applied to anyone with consistent results. The test needs more studies.
Then came the N-Dual Back Test. This is the variation of the basic test which was proposed by researchers led by Dr. Sussanne Jaeggi, et al. This test has shown some consistent results and can be applied with confidence. These research paper findings were published in 2003 in the peer-reviewed scientific journal - NeuroImage.
This is how it works in this test: Two independent stimuli are presented simultaneously and the test subject is required to indicate whether the stimuli match with those in n-number of steps from the sequence presented earlier.
To get a brief look at how it works, please watch the following video, courtesy of Johns Hopkins University.
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