Welcome to the Inspirational Living podcast.

Today's podcast has been edited and adapted from Memory, How to Develop, Train and Use It by William Walker

Atkinson, published in 1919.

Before the memory can be stored with sight impressions, before the mind can recollect or remember

such impressions, the eye must be used under the direction of our attention.

We think that we see things when we look at them, but in reality we see but few things, in the sense

of registering clear and distinct impressions of them upon the tablets of our conscious mind.

We look at them rather than see them.

In other words, we see without truly seen.

The way to train the mind to receive clear sight impressions, and therefore to retain them

in the memory, is simply to concentrate the will and attention upon objects of sight, endeavoring to see them plainly and distinctly,

and then to practice recalling the details of the objects sometime afterward.

It is astonishing how rapidly one may improve in this respect by a little practice,

and it is amazing how great a degree of proficiency

one may attain in a short time.

The famous French magician Houdin, from whom Harry Houdini took his name, cultivated his

memory of sight impressions by following a simple plan.

He started to practice by observing a number of small objects in a parish shop window, while

rapidly walking past the window.

He followed this by noting down on paper the things that he saw and remembered.

At first he could remember but two or three articles in the window.

Then he began to see and remember more, and so on, each day adding to his power of perception

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