'We all have fantastic memories – it's just a case of tapping into this ability'

After quickly double-checking my diary, I pointed out that our

interview was the following day, at 12.30pm. It goes to prove that even those with the best memories in the world can, sometimes, make mistakes.

Despite this slip-up, there are few people in the world whose memory skills can rival Thomas's. The 41-year-old is one of only 15 international memory grandmasters and in 1998 he broke an 18-year record for reciting Pi to 22,500 digits from memory. So who better to give the low-down on how to improve our memory skills?

Most of us would like to be able to speak in public without using notes, or simply remember people's names, but struggle with both.

Thomas says our memories are better than we realise. "Some people have a slightly better memory than others, but in reality the gap between the top and bottom is actually very small. So when you start learning how to train your memory you see a massive paradigm shift. It's a bit like everyone running the hundred metres with their legs tied together.

"Most people would shuffle along at the same pace, but once you lose those shackles you can go a lot quicker. Not only that, but if you train you can become very quick and it then becomes a sliding scale. So memory is all about training."

He says one of the simplest techniques is using your imagination.

"If I say the word 'breakfast' you might think of bacon and eggs, or croissants, but you won't be thinking of the word 'breakfast' written in black on a white background. We think in images yet most information comes in the form of black and white text.

"A lot of people ask me how you memorise names, for example. And the answer is to change it into an image. My name's David Thomas, which doesn't mean much to anybody but if you take 'David' you might think of

David fighting Goliath with a sling and with 'Thomas' you may think of Thomas the Tank Engine. That way you create an image which you're more likely to remember."

The Halifax-born memory expert says another helpful tip is to write using images.

"If I gave you a list of 20 words you're going to struggle to remember them, you'd do well to get eight or nine of them. But if I showed you 20 objects on a tray, you would remember 14, or 15, because you can see them. The single most important thing I talk about is the fact that we all have fantastic memories – it's just a question of tapping into this ability. I get people coming up to me and saying, 'I've got a really bad memory', but they haven't, they're just not using it in the right way."

Thomas uses himself as an example to show how a better memory can change your life. He was working as a firefighter in West Yorkshire when, in 1995, he saw memory expert Dominic O'Brien memorise a pack of cards on TV and went out and bought his book. Within 12 months, he was competing in the World Memory Championships, where he came fourth. Since then he has set up his own company, DMT International, written several books including Essential Life Skills: Improve Your Memory and become a successful motivational speaker giving talks all over the world.

When it comes to improving our memories, Thomas says we should be creative. "If I say remember egg, wardrobe, telescope, door, lawnmower, roller skate, football, window, computer, elephant, you're going to struggle to remember them all. But if I say think about cracking open an egg and out falls a wardrobe, on top of the wardrobe is a telescope, look through the telescope and you see a door, go through the door and there's a lawnmower, the lawnmower is riding on roller skates, the roller skates kick a football, the football goes through a window, lands on a computer on top of which is an elephant.

"All of a sudden you're picturing these images and this is just a technique that allows you to tap into your memory that already exists."

Organisation is another important factor when it comes to making the most of our memories.

"Imagine walking into a library and asking one of the assistants if they have a book and they say, 'yes'. But what if every book in the library is in a big pile on the floor, it could be on the top or it could be right at the bottom.

"Well, it's the same with our memories. You pile stuff into your head and wonder why you can't find it. If someone asks, 'Who was the lead singer of T'Pau?' you look for it in your pile and you might find it, and you might not.

"Of course what happens when you walk into a library and ask for a particular book is they say, 'Yes, go to the far corner, look under 'real life' and it's up on the top shelf' – because the only effective way to operate it is to develop a system where you store the information."

As with most things, practice is crucial.

"I think the concept of brain training is pretty universal these days and variety is the key. You do need to do a range of exercises to stretch and train all different parts of the brain.

"It's the same principle as going to the gym. If you just do barbell curls you will end up with big biceps but not much else."

So what are the practical benefits of improving our memories?

"You are doing what others either won't, or can't. I'm not going to say it's brilliant to be able to memorise a list, but if you're going for a job interview or a promotion and there's 10 of you and nine people walk in with a piece of paper and you're the one who delivers what they want to say without any notes, you're the one who stands out from the crowd.

"I had a woman who came on one of my courses who was a filing clerk and she said that every time she went for a file she had to look up the code in a book, and she wanted to learn these codes so I showed her how

to do it. She went away, she did it, and phoned me up three months later and said not only could she do her job in less time but she felt more confident and had been promoted."

There are also important health implications.

"It's not just about being able to pass an exam, or remember somebody's name, it's about the quality of life. There's plenty of evidence linking the level of brain activity to the chances of getting Alzheimer's or dementia, so it's either use it, or lose it.

"In the future someone will probably develop a pill that means we'll live till we're 120, but whether people will have the mental faculties to be able to enjoy the last 30 years could come down to the toss of a coin."

This is why memory is so important. "I'm not saying there's one thing that can improve your ability 100 per cent, but I can give you 20 that can improve it by 25 per cent, and there are no areas of life where it can't have even some small effect."

THE TOP FIVE MEMORY TIPS

1 Brain training: This is simply a question of doing any exercises that stretch your brain. Good ones are crosswords, sudokus, art and chess. There are also a range of brain training games available on computer consoles.

2 Think in images: Make it funny. The great thing about images is they can be ridiculous and weird, whatever happens to work for you.

3 Write in images: There is more brain activity when you draw a character than when you just write it, and because you're using more of your brain, you're more likely to remember it.

4 Organisation: Try to memorise things in small, bite-size chunks.

Learn five things, make sure you know them and then move on to the next five.

5 Practice: This should be little and often. So setting aside five to10 minutes a day is a good way to get started. Memory training is not like physical training so you can do as much as you want – and the more you do it, the better you get.