Memorization of Numbers onto the Next Level: The PAO System

The PAO system, otherwise known as the Person-Action-Object system, is a system that is used to memorize a long list of numbers combining memory image association with chunking, which creates a powerful mnemonic effect.

The system requires the memorizer to pre-set 300 images, a mere investment that yields much greater rewards.

These images include:

• 100 People
• 100 Actions
• 100 Objects

In essence, creating a system of people, actions, and objects that span from 00-99 yields 100 combinations for each subset of 100 pre-made images, allowing for the total number of combinations of people-actions-objects to be exactly 100 x 100 x 100 = 1,000,000 different image combinations. This means that it will be very rare for the same image to repeat, circumventing the confusing problems that arise when images are repeated too many times in a memory palace. 

To create the list of 100 people, either the Dominic System is used, or the Major System is used. For example, if the list of 100 people is created through the Major System, each number will represent an initial, and it will look something like this:

Using 3 random numbers from 00-99:

10 (T, Z) = Tay Zonday 

19 (D, B) = Derren Brown 

21 (N, T) = Nikola Tesla 

For actions and objects, we may pick whichever actions and objects we want, but it is a good idea to pick actions and objects that are associated with the person. For example:

Action 10 = Singing

Action 19 = Performing Hypnosis

Action 21 = Writing 

Object 10 = Microphone 

Object 19 = A person

Object 21 = Notebook 

So the association for 10 will be: Tay Zonday singing into a microphone. If you can picture that, acknowledge that you just memorized 6 numbers in one image, for Tay Zonday singing into a microphone is the number 101,010 or (10 + 10 + 10) 

The numbers may be mixed up to create novel images every single time. If you want to memorize the number 191,021, or (19 + 10 + 21) all you have to do is take the person from number 19, the action from number 10, and the object from number 21, which makes the image of Derren Brown singing at a notebook. Similarly, the number 212,119 or (21 + 21+ 19) may be combined to make the image of Nikola Tesla writing on a person.  

The fact that 6 numbers at a time can be memorized in only one image at a time, means that you can memorize the 16 number combination, the date, and the number of the back of a credit card in only 4 images, or a phone number in 2 images. 

Edit: A good source on searching up famous people with certain initials can be found here.