He Memorized Proverbs in 3 Years…Here’s How (w/ Carlin Day)

Carlin Day isn’t a pastor or a memory expert. He’s an insurance agent with a family and yet somehow he managed to memorize the entire book of Proverbs, word-for-word, in three years using the memory palace! Here’s how he did it

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Carlin Day Interview Transcript

Carlin Day:
I just did a chapter a month and now I just review a chapter a day, and that was already a habit from before because I would read a Proverbs of the day. So now I just review it in my head. It’s better than reading it. Yes. Okay, so here’s a tip.

Josh Summers:
Welcome to Bible Memory Goal. My name is Josh, and you just heard from Carlin Day. He’s a good friend that I met a couple years ago because of Bible memory, and he’s been part of our community for a number of years, led a small group, he’s awesome. And he’s also memorized the entire book of Proverbs, not just memorized it, but he knows every chapter and every verse. And I’m actually going to ask him how he does that, and he’s going to walk through a lot of his process that I think you’re going to enjoy. But to start, I wanted to give him a little bit of a test. Even in laughter, the heart may ache and joy may end in grief.

Carlin Day:
It’s Proverbs 14, verse 13.

Josh Summers:
That is correct. And how about we do Proverbs…why don’t you tell me what Proverbs 25 verse 12.

Carlin Day:
25:12. It is a word aply spoken is like apples of gold and settings of silver, and you got to read that one for verse 12, which is like an earring of gold or an ornament of fine gold is a wise man’s rebuke to a listening ear.

Josh Summers:
That’s awesome. Okay, here we go. Proverbs, chapter eight, verse 17.

Carlin Day:
I love those who love me. All those who seek me will find me.

Josh Summers:
That is awesome, Carlin. Okay, here we go. I’m just going to give you a couple words. Do not gloat.

Carlin Day:
No, do not gloat. That’s probably Proverbs 24 verse 17.

Josh Summers:
That is correct.

Carlin Day:
Is that right?

Josh Summers:
That is correct.

Carlin Day:
Do not gloat. When your enemy stumbles. Do not let your heart rejoice.

Josh Summers:
I want to dig deep into this Carlin and go even in a little backstory of how we even met. But just to start off, let’s just set the stage for everybody. You have memorized the entire book of Proverbs, word for word. How long did that take you?

Carlin Day:
It took me just a little under three years. A little under three

Josh Summers:
Years? Yeah. I remember you were about a year in when you and I first connected back in 2021, and was it you, we found each other on Twitter, is that what we said?

Carlin Day:
Right, yeah. I had saw you posting things about Bible memory and I was just disconnected, and then I kind sent you a message and then we messaged back and forth and then we finally got together and we had that small Bible memory mastermind. Yeah,

Josh Summers:
We had a group of six guys and we’d meet once every month or every couple months. I’m not sure what it was. Every month. Yeah. Yeah, that was really neat. That was a special time, I think. I really enjoyed that. So let’s go back to what you’re doing in Proverbs here, because I’m sure that anybody who’s watching this or listening to this right now has got to be thinking, okay, what is it sometimes for people memorizing the actual verse location? Right? The chapter and verse number is one of the hardest parts of it all, and yet here you are, you’ve memorized the entire book of Proverbs and you can pull out even just by a couple words. So tell me when I said the words do not, what was it? Do not gloat, what was it that was actually going through your mind after I said that?

Carlin Day:
I’m thinking ideally there’s two verses that have the word gloat in it, but I knew exactly in my mind what location I was at. I knew exactly where I was, so I just had to match the chapter to the number of the location, and that was my verse. So it pinpointed because of the imagery that I have, it pinpointed me right to that spot. Okay. So

Josh Summers:
Did you have an image for gloat that was very specific?

Carlin Day:
Yeah, so gloat sounded like goat to me, and I don’t do that in every verse, but in gloat I just somehow went with a goat. And I like that verse because that verse has Dominique Wilkins in it. So Dominique is D, the first letter of the word, and in the middle of the verse, it’s when your enemy stumbles. Do not let your heart rejoice. So I use the D and the W to make Dominique Wilkins, and then I just added a goat and the rest I just piled onto that. So there’s no other imagery or anything else, it’s just Dominique Wilkins and a goat at that location.

Josh Summers:
Okay. That’s interesting then that location must tell you exactly what verse and chapter you’re in, is that correct?

Carlin Day:
Correct. Yeah. It’s kind of like in one world you’d say. And then that location 17, is that spot

Josh Summers:
17, I’m assuming? Are you using some kind of major system to remember that number 17 or is it something else for you?

Carlin Day:
No, I use the, so every room or every kind of location in my world I guess you’d say, or that chapter is in fives, so 5, 10, 15, 20, 25, 30, and that one goes to 34 in that chapter. So that was just, I went 5, 10, 15 and I knew that was 16, 17. That’s how I found that number. Okay.

Josh Summers:
Okay. Alright. So let’s just say, let’s break this down. For somebody who has never used a mind palace before, and when you are creating this, now you talked about this other world, is this a physical location for you or is this kind of a world that you have made up off the top of your head? No, I like to

Carlin Day:
Use, this is really cool because when you talk about using a memory palace, I really love to use something already in your heart. So I think that it’s so important when you’re making a memory palace, it’s for something that you really want to remember long-term because if you use, so that house it’s, it’s actually like a trip to a house and then around a house is how I did it on this one because another chapter is actually inside this same house. So what happens is I kind of travel from one place to the house and then I go around the house and that’s how I get all my locations, but it’s where each different chapter is linked to one another so that, yeah, sometimes I go in buildings, but I also will go around them or outside of them, but I already know it. It’s a house that I’ve been at a lot and I know that spot and so it’s already here, so I’m storing it on a memory that I already have.

Josh Summers:
Yeah, I’ve had a lot of people ask me whether or not they can just make up a memory palace, and I’ve actually known people that have used even just virtual locations, like a video game place. But I’m very much in line with you where I think that there is a lot of value and attaching it to something that so well that there’s just no way that you’re going to forget it. Like these locations that we go to day in and day out. I mean something as simple as your favorite restaurant or obviously the office that you go and work in. So then what is it, is there anything that helps you remember that path to that house and that walk around that house is chapter 24, for example?

Carlin Day:
No, so it’s just, I know the 31 chapters, so that’s one thing that I did. The only thing in my Proverbs project that I did is when I started one thing, I just decided, as I said, I’m going to try to link the place that I’m at to the year I was. So it’s 31 chapters, and so I thought I’ll just do year one, year two, year three. And so this one is just kind of falls at a place where when I was 24 years old, it wasn’t that it was something really memorable, but that wouldn’t have been a place that I’d used for year one, if that makes sense. So year one, year two was at the house that I grew up in, but it makes it really, my brain picked up on that. And so reviewing it, I just know where chapter 24 is.

Josh Summers:
So then when you’re creating your palace, let’s say it’s year one, year two is that house that you grew up in and then you are breaking that out into sections where you’re going to put or locations, I say I guess where you’re going to put five verses per location. Is that correct?

Carlin Day:
Correct. Yeah, it’s wild. If you just follow this logic. When I started the first house where I grew up, the first five verses every picture of the front of a house, the first five verses are in the front yard and clockwise, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. And then, so where would my next section be? I go through the gate to the backyard and there’s 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and then I go to the other side and it just keeps continuing like that. And on the first chapter, I just go around my house and basically go in the garage and then that’s it. That ends the first chapter.

Josh Summers:
Interesting. So then in essence, every verse is getting its own micro location, is that right? So it’s not just one location for five, it’s like you’re going to this one location and then you’re circling around it. Is that correct?

Carlin Day:
Correct. So I’m creating, so on the front yard, on the left side, if you go clockwise is a mailbox and then a fence and then a bush, and then by the road and then in the middle of the yard, five locations. Okay. Yep. So he’s kind of like quadrant. So it’s kind of like I make a room on the outside kind of section it off so that I know those are the first five.

Josh Summers:
And then for the verse numbers themselves, you’re only remembering you’re only creating something for the every five verses, is that correct?

Carlin Day:
Yeah, I mean, I just know that location one is one and there’s only five, and they’re always in clockwise. So 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. And so in my brain I can count to them. So there’s nothing

Josh Summers:
Signaling

Carlin Day:
What it is other than its location.

Josh Summers:
I think that’s a really effective

Carlin Day:
Way to

Josh Summers:
Do it that I have failed at honestly, because what I’ve done is I’ve attached a number to every single verse that I memorize using usually pictures having to do with the major system. And the problem with that is now I’m convolute, let’s not convolute it. It’s just making it more complicated. When I’ve heard you and many other people talk about just viewing it for every five and then knowing that you can just add, I know that it’s three verses ahead after that does that, yeah,

Carlin Day:
Right. But the beautiful thing about doing what you’re doing, where you peg it to actually knowing the number is that you don’t have to memorize 915 verses and then review them so that all of them, you can just know three verses and know where they’re at. That is a benefit to doing it. By the way. It’s really effective if you know all of them, but it’s not as effective if you’re just picking five verses here, six verses there.

Josh Summers:
So have you found now that you’ve memorized, well, I’ve got so many questions for you, Carlin, but first of all, how often do you have to review to maintain this? Has it been pretty sticky or have you found it to be sticky? Is it it’s stuck in your brain pretty well? Or has it been something that you’ve had to really work at to maintain?

Carlin Day:
Yeah, when I first started, I memorized the first chapter so fast using this method that I was like, I’m going to do this in a year. And I was like charting it. I was like, I’m going to memorize all this

Josh Summers:
In a

Carlin Day:
Year. Everyone raised their hand and use the memory palace because you learn how amazing it is.

Josh Summers:
But

Carlin Day:
Then what happened is I just learned that you have to really lock in those memories because when you sleep, they’re going away. But actually after I got on a disciplined schedule, I just did a chapter a month and now I just review a chapter a day. And that was already a habit from before because I would read a proverbs of the day. So now I just review it in my head. So it’s actually even faster than having my Bible. So it is no problem. I don’t mean to sound like I’m bragging or something, but that discipline is super really effective because it’s better than reading it. And every time I review it, the only problem you have with your mind and with memory palaces, it kind of tries to wash some of it away. So I’m sure you’ve had that happen with memory palaces. If you create a lot of imagery, you’ll remember

Josh Summers:
Some,

Carlin Day:
But you’ll lose some. So that’s been a little tricky is that it’s almost like your brain is trying to make you forget, don’t try so hard, just remember it, but then you’ll forget it. So I do think that, I don’t know how long will I have? I’ve been wondering that lately, could I stop and then wait a

Josh Summers:
Year and still do it? I don’t know.

Carlin Day:
So in

Josh Summers:
My personal experience with that, and I’m sure that it’s different for every single person, is that one, it depends on how long I’ve reviewed that initial, how deep into long-term memory has it actually gone. And then in those cases where it feels like it has slipped away, the memorization process is like five times faster. I still have to memorize it for if I haven’t done a good job of reviewing it. But I was just going over Titus again. I was like, oh man, I lost chapter three. I had one and two because I’d been reviewing those over and over and over again. But chapter three ended up just being one that I lost pretty quickly. But reviewing it, I was able to pick it back up really quickly as well. I would imagine that that’s probably the way it would go. Alright,

Carlin Day:
So you

Josh Summers:
Did the book of Proverbs. Have you noticed as you’ve gone through life the past three years, that because you have that stored away in your memory, is that something that it does come out in day-to-day life? You’re like, oh, there’s a proverb that talks exactly about that and does that happen to you very much and what’s it like?

Carlin Day:
Yes, and one of the problems is that when it happens, I always have the proverbs coming to my mind that says, A prudent man keeps his knowledge to himself, but the heart of fool blurts out folly. So you don’t want to interrupt people for having normal conversation and then lay on some proverbs to them. That’s kind of a funny thing. But yes, the answer is yes. There’s been a lot of things in my life that I guess you’d say that Proverbs has affected the way I think and the way I act in a great way. You can’t even measure it because I don’t know, because it’s in here and it’s going through my mind. One of my favorites is that one night I went sleep with, I went to bed and I was thinking about something like a problem, and I woke up and I had a Proverbs imagery running through my mind. I was trying to remember something, and when I woke up, I remembered

Josh Summers:
The proverbs,

Carlin Day:
I remembered the verse, I was putting it together, the images that I had remembered, and it actually applied to that problem that’s always happening once you memorize any scripture or when you read scripture, your spirit is using it to try to apply it to what’s going on in your own spirit, what’s going on in your own brain, what’s going in your own life. That has really big, but definitely has had an effect on me for sure.

Josh Summers:
Yeah, this is an interesting kind of challenge or feat I guess you’d say, of having completed the entire book of Proverbs. I don’t know too many people who have done that. Every verse seems to be its own little microcosm of an idea as opposed to just this narrative. So what do you do with that now that you’ve finished it, other than just having it to yourself? Have you gone and recited it in front of anybody or what do you do with that?

Carlin Day:
Right. You share it with people. I’m going to give you my link so that people can send me cash. No, I’m kidding. I’m kidding. That’s the thing with business, you’re always thinking of with me with business, how do you monetize this idea? But no,

Josh Summers:
Yeah,

Carlin Day:
I’ve been looking for what to do with it. I am like I’m putting some or recite it and put it on a video so I can listen to it, things like that. And I’ve been asking people that exact question, like pastors or friends, what do you do with this when you have it? And I’m thinking like a man, right? Thinking like a businessman. And this one pastor, a friend of mine, he said to me, it’s maybe everything you do is not about what you do with something. Maybe it’s not what you do with it. Maybe it’s what it does to you. And I think that’s really powerful with scripture memory. That’s why we do it. It’s like what it does to your heart, how it changes you. And that might be all we need.

Josh Summers:
Yeah, no, I agree with you. I think that’s probably one of the biggest lessons that I’ve learned in memorizing scripture is I had set this goal and I thought I could do something in a crazy amount of time and I had to revise my goal. And I remember Janet Pope,

Carlin Day:
Who’s

Josh Summers:
An author and a speaker who’s talking with me, and she just said, maybe the goal is kind of distracting you from the real purpose of doing this. And that is to be transformed by the renewing of our minds to let God’s word wash over us. And have you seen,

Carlin Day:
What are

Josh Summers:
The ways in which you feel like God has worked through this or used scripture memory to change you or to just have an impact on your daily life?

Carlin Day:
The word humility is big in Proverbs, and that has been one of the big words that stuck out to me as I went through it and memorizes this humility of, you can see I got books behind me. I got a lot of self-development books like on Twitter or X, formerly known as Twitter. I like to post quotes and all kinds of things like that. And one thing that I think that I learned, the biggest lesson, like going through Proverbs, is that we have this idea of setting goals and dreams that you can get books on books about, but there’s this humility of following God while doing that. I mean, you still have to be disciplined and set things, but there’s this great humility that comes with a much more openness for what God wants to do with you. That will be so far, I wish, maybe you know it. I don’t know the verse. So here I fail, I know Proverbs, but I don’t know this verse which it says, it’s the benediction that says that the God of peace or the God of understanding will give you far more than you can ever understand

Josh Summers:
Or add or imagine or

Carlin Day:
Comprehend
Or imagine. And so we have this very famous business that I’m sure you’ve heard Napoleon Hill, he likes to say it all the time, is whatever the mind can conceive and believe it can achieve. And business people will stand up and slow clap, scream like, this is so amazing. But if you compare that to what God has for us, if we’ll be humble. So the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and discipline. If we’ll humble ourselves, what could God actually do with this that actually has merit or value? What could he do? And I’d say humility is the biggest piece of wisdom that I’ve learned from Proverbs.

Josh Summers:
That’s awesome.

Carlin Day:
So for those who have

Josh Summers:
Stuck around this long, I want to actually dive into a little more of the technical aspects of what you’re doing and some techniques. So let’s say that somebody

Carlin Day:
Is approaching

Josh Summers:
This, and I think

Carlin Day:
You

Josh Summers:
And

Carlin Day:
I would both

Josh Summers:
Agree that using some kind of mnemonic is always going to be better than rote memorization. And you and I both use and recommend the mind Palace. Do you have any tips or advice for somebody that is starting off using or wanting to use the mind palace that’s maybe never done it before?

Carlin Day:
Yes. Okay. So here’s a tip. An idea would be you compress and you compress and you compress, but you still have to be able to express, express and express. That’s a phrase that I’ve used to myself when you make a verse. So I like to use the first letter method to use the letters of the verse that compresses it a little bit. And so we got the string of letters. And so if we’re trying to compress, compress, compress, and then express it, we want to make it into as

Josh Summers:
Small

Carlin Day:
As an image, or I guess you’d say as singularity as an image that you can and still remember the code. And I think that people will find that we don’t give our brains enough credit is that you don’t have to use all the letters. It could just make one little word in the middle of all of those words. It could be like a four letter word or three letter word, five letter word, a name, and you just use that name to create your image. And you’ll be surprised how when you recite it and that image includes all those other letters, it holds that information. So the tip I would have for someone trying to use a memory palace is try to compress it into a few images or one image,

Josh Summers:
Like

Carlin Day:
Small and stored on a location. And then as you review it, you’ll actually be able to remember that one or two images more than having too

Josh Summers:
Much information

Carlin Day:
On a verse.

Josh Summers:
Can we walk through an example, perhaps maybe from one of the verses that you’ve memorized in Proverbs, what that would look like to compress?

Carlin Day:
Right. One verse that just comes to mind, I’ve said this one before to other people, so it’s so simple, is Proverbs 15 one, it’s a verse that most people know is they’ve heard it, they don’t know the reference, but it’s a gentle answer. Turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger,

Josh Summers:
Stirs up anger. Yeah.

Carlin Day:
So the first letters of those, if you just look at ’em, you don’t have to do any rearranging or anything, you’ll see a word that’s not a word. It says Agatha, A gentle answer turns away wrath. Okay. I’ve never seen the movie Avatar, which is crazy, but I know what it is. It’s blue people. And so all I need is I use little imagination and I say, Agatha is a blue alligator, and that’s his name or his species. I don’t know what he is. So on that location, all I have is a blue alligator. And why is it a blue alligator When you go there, you say, why is it a blue

Josh Summers:
Alligator,

Carlin Day:
Agatha? I mean you just A-G-A-T-A-W. A gentle answer turns away wrath. And you should be able to memorize the rest of the verse, which is

Josh Summers:
A lot of how Proverbs is written, where you’ve kind of got, if this then that or because of this then that. It’s a lot of back and forth. That’s really interesting. And I think one of the things that I’ve come away with doing this more and more, maybe somebody’s listening to this and going, I would never think Agatha thinking if someone showed me the picture of a blue alligator, but if it makes sense to you, that’s all that really matters. I think that there’s a lot of personalization, and that’s one of the reasons why I haven’t done too many public creations of a mind palace because most of my mind palaces are very much mine. Nope, it wouldn’t make sense to you. And likewise, I think some of yours, I don’t know if I do blue alligator, but I love that example. I think it’s a great example, but it may not work for me, but I think that what you’re saying, it makes so much sense where we’re trying to compress these

Carlin Day:
Long verses

Josh Summers:
Into something that is much shorter, but can be expressed in a simple visual, right,

Carlin Day:
Right. And then you can express the text back out of it. You got to make the code and then you’ve got to be able to disassemble it. I’m sure computer people could actually tell me what I’m doing. You’re making it really small, but then you’re still able to express it all. Perfect.

Josh Summers:
Yeah, you’re both encoding and decoding correctly. There’s God, it’s got to be both sides to that. Oh, that’s

Carlin Day:
Cool. So

Josh Summers:
What’s your next project, Carlin? Are you looking to continue or are you just like, I’m good right now with just holding on Proverbs?

Carlin Day:
Yeah, I’m open to seeing what God does with the proverbs, and I use it in business and I use it daily, and it’s so cool that my kids know that I value Bible memory. I’ve memorized a couple of Psalms, and that’s been a lot of fun. For someone who’s new to memory palaces, I have a beginner’s memory palace that I would say is really fun and people should try it. I’ll share that with you if you’d like to hear it. Yeah.

Josh Summers:
You know how we

Carlin Day:
Talk about the memory palace and locations. We don’t need the imagery. I have actually found

Josh Summers:
That to be true,

Carlin Day:
And it’s very surprising because locations, so a person can actually just memorize a verse just imagining they’re sitting in a house that they’re not at, and your mind will remember that it is really wild. It takes a lot longer to do it that way, but it’s actually, if you just my five locations, like I do five and five and five and five, and actually just memorize any verse, just pick a verse. Imagine you’re sitting in a couch, that’s location one, and just remember the verse and every time you recite it, pretend you’re sitting there and it’ll hold information. It’s quite wild, and maybe that’s because I’ve practiced a lot at memory palaces that my brain likes that, but I think somebody should try it that way before they even try it. A serious one.

Josh Summers:
I hope you enjoyed that conversation with Carlin. You can follow him on Twitter or X at Elevating Value, or you can even sign up for his weekly newsletter Elevating Value, which I’m a part of as well. He sends a lot of great insights into your inbox. You can go to elevating value.com to learn more about that. And of course, he is part of our community, and I would love to have you join us if you’re interested. And if you want to learn more about scripture memory, stay accountable, visit bible memory goal.com/join. I’d love to see you there. Thank you for taking time today. You can watch more interviews right here or check out these tips on how to use a memory palace. If you want me to walk you through learning. Psalm 46, God bless. Take care.

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