4 Types of Readers: The Hourglass, the Sponge, the Jelly Bag, and the Golconda

The type of reading you practice will influence your memory

Photo: Seven Shooter/ Unsplash

Over a century ago, German psychologist Hermann Ebbinghaus put forward a theory on how quickly people forget information when no attempts are made to retrieve it. Here’s what the curve looks like:

Notice how quickly memory for information decays; most people’s brains forget information it doesn’t think it needs. This is why I’ve made the case that notes are incredibly important, an idea echoed by Curtis “50 Cent” Jackson as one of the most important lessons he learned from Robert Greene.

If you want to keep information, the brain is not always a reliable ally; it won’t remember what it forgot.

Of course, deciding what to remember and preserve is also a skill in itself. Artful Prudence writes, “Samuel Coleridge…