Science Says These 2 Minutes Can Dramatically Improve Your Memory, Recall, and Knowledge

Want to improve your memory? Of course you do. Knowledge is great, but success in any pursuit is based on what you do with what you know — so it follows that the more you retain and remember, the more you can do.

Fortunately, there are plenty of simple ways to remember more —

The list goes on. And they all work, but they all (except for getting a good night’s sleep) require time and effort.

But this doesn’t. A study published in Nature Reviews Psychology found that “… even two minutes of rest with your eyes closed can improve memory, perhaps to the same degree as a full night of sleep.”

Psychologists call it “offline waking rest.” In its purest form, offline waking rest can be closing your eyes and zoning out for a couple of minutes. But offline waking rest can also be daydreaming. Mind-wandering. Meditating. Basically turning your mind off for a minute or two.

While mentally disconnecting doesn’t sound productive, when it comes to remembering more, it is: Without those intermittent periods of lack of focus, memory consolidation doesn’t occur nearly as efficiently.

As the researchers write:

From an evolutionary perspective, activities such as daydreaming and zoning out seem to be a colossal waste of time that could instead be spent searching for food or remaining alert to danger from predators.

However, periods of reduced attention to the external world are a universal feature of human (and animal) experience, which suggests that spending a portion of time disengaged from the sensory environment might serve an important function. 

Periods of offline rest permit the reactivation of recently formed memory traces.
This iterative reactivation of memory could strengthen and stabilize newly formed memories over time, contributing to early stages of memory consolidation during the first few minutes following encoding.

That’s good news for anyone who has ever daydreamed for a few seconds during a meeting. Or lost focus during a presentation. Or lost track, mid-conversation. (Hey, you’re not lazy or inattentive or unproductive: You’re making memories!)

As with most things, the better approach is to be intentional. Say you couldn’t take notes during a meeting. Get back to your desk and write down a few bullet points. But then, if you can, close your eyes for a minute or two. Don’t replay the conversation, or try to memorize facts and figures. 

Instead, zone out. Engage in a couple of minutes of offline waking rest.

While that sounds counterintuitive, according to the researchers, “Moments of unoccupied rest should be recognized as a critical contributor to human waking cognitive functions rather than a waste of time.”

Sounds like a great use of two minutes to me.