This post really doesn’t have anything to do with marketing or credit unions. I’m appealing to something else we all have in common: we’re human. And yeah, we’re all getting older, no matter how young we were a few years ago.

According to this article on msnbc.com, we don’t all have early-onset Alzheimer’s. It seems most of our memory lapses are normal. That’s good news for me and many of my friends whose conversations are littered with exclamations of forgetfulness.

Following are five of the most common:

1. Seeing someone out of context, like your UPS man at Starbucks. You recognize him but without his uniform and truck, you just can’t place him. To help you remember, try to focus on a physical feature of the person, like their glasses or haircut.
2. It’s right on the tip of your tongue, but you just can’t come up with the right word. Usually this is because old information has gotten in the way of new. Similar memories can block each other out. The solution? Stop everything you’re doing; in time it will come to you.
3. Where’d I park my car?  This happens to all of us, right? Like every day? Well all you need to do is be aware of your surroundings. Ever been to Disney World? They label the parking lots – Goofy, Minnie, Eeyore — and number the parking spaces, making it easier for you to remember where your car is. This is called encoding if you’re at all curious. (One horror story I’ll share: I was on the van at airport long term parking, heading into the terminal. There was a woman on the van whom the driver had been driving around for quite a while because she had no idea where she’d parked her car. It seems when she parked it, she was an emotional wreck because she was flying to see a sick relative. Finally she asked to be let off so she could walk around and try to locate her car.)
4. Here’s another daily occurrence: going all the way upstairs to get something and then forgetting what you came looking for. Maddening! The reason we forget? We’re multitasking, thinking about other things or just not staying focused on the task at hand. Just slow down, focus and stop multitasking!
5. I’m terrible at remembering names. It’s kind of embarrassing but if you think about it, names are completely arbitrary. (I don’t look like a Lisa.) It’s kind of like the parking lot thing – you need to form an association.  Maybe I have an obnoxious laugh – laughing Lisa. Or make up a story about me: Lisa lost her lion. Creating a mental image will help you remember.

So. Stay focused, concentrate, and, uh, yeah, whatever. Oh yeah. You’ll remember what you were trying not to forget.