Make a Camera Click Sound to Remember If You Did Anything
This may be one of the dumbest memory tricks, but it works, so hello. Backstory: Every time I used my hair curling iron, which was maybe once a month, I always had the same anxiety session about ten minutes after leaving the house. Did I unplug it ?! My brain began desperately to remember. Okay, I think so. No, I’m sure I knew. I should have had, right? YES I DID! … But what if I hadn’t done it ?! The next day, start catching a glimpse of a local newspaper with a photograph of my burned-out house and me looking very guilty (although I have to admit my curls would be great).
Luckily, I found an easy way to get rid of the stress after styling my hair. It’s like this: whenever I turn off the curling iron, I take a mental picture, making the literal sound of the camera “clicking”. Sometimes I click my finger too. As I said, dumbass. Nevertheless, somehow the ritual infuses a moment into my memory, leaving no doubt in my future that it happened. Goodbye mental stress! I think of it as a lazier – but still effective – version of Lifehacker writer Nicole Dicker’s revolutionary approach to travel: photographing the dials of your stove before going on vacation .
You can “click” everything you need to remember: have you unplugged the iron from the mains, closed the garage or turned off the sous vide circulation pump. A mental picture is worth a thousand worries – no film or digital space required.