I’ve heard that people with a good ability to memorize organize those memories as a visual map in their brain. In fact, Robins et al. 2022 describes using a cognitive map as a structure to store memories. Wilson, 2024, gives a summary of a huge study that showed Taxi drivers and ambulance drivers seemed to have the lowest number of deaths caused by Alzheimer’s in 2021 in the USA.

This lends credence to the idea that you might be able to improve your memory overall by increasing your ability to read and navigate with a map rather than relying on GPS all the time.

There’s an old post on Reddit that describes how to create and use a mental map to memorize anything.

References

r/howto (2016). How to memorize anything… I present memory mapping [Online forum post]. Reddit. https://www.reddit.com/r/howto/comments/564bu7/how_to_memorize_anything_i_present_memory_mapping/

Robins, S., Aronowitz, S. & Stolk, A. (2022). 11 Memory structure and cognitive maps. In: De Brigard F, Sinnott-Armstrong W, (Eds.). Neuroscience and Philosophy. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK583710/

Wilson, F. P. (2024). The Curious Reason Taxi Drivers Are Protected From Alzheimer’s. [Video]. Medscape. https://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/curious-reason-taxi-drivers-are-protected-alzheimers-2024a1000n9h?ecd=mkm_ret_250126_mscpmrk_neuro_dementia_etid7184671&uac=73962DR&impID=7184671