PAO stands for Person-Action-Object. Every two-digit number from 00 to 99 gets all three: a person, something that person characteristically does, and an object tied to them. Once the list is learned, any six digits become a single scene.
How one image holds six digits
Split a long number into groups of six, and each group into three pairs. Then take:
- the person from the first pair,
- the action from the second pair,
- the object from the third pair.
Suppose 14 is a chef - chopping - a knife; 27 is a footballer - kicking - a ball; and 83 is a firefighter - spraying - a hose. The number 142783 becomes a chef kicking a hose. The number 832714 becomes a firefighter kicking a knife. Same three pairs, different order, completely different image - which is exactly what makes it work.
Put that scene at one stop in a memory palace, and a fifteen-stop palace holds ninety digits.
Where the people come from
Most practitioners build on the Major System, so that each pair's person has the right consonant sounds, or use initials: 14 might be A.D. (1 = A, 4 = D) and so a person with those initials. Others simply choose memorable people and learn the list by rote. The Dominic System, developed by eight-time world memory champion Dominic O'Brien, is a well-known initials-based variant.
What matters is that each person is vivid to you, and that their action and object are unmistakably theirs. A person you cannot picture is a hole in the list.
What it costs
PAO is not a weekend project. You need three hundred distinct, instantly available images - a hundred people, a hundred actions, a hundred objects - and each must be tied to its number firmly enough that you never hesitate. Most people take months of regular practice to get there.
That is why it makes sense to learn it in stages:
- Learn the Major System code and a word for each number from 00 to 99.
- Use those words on their own for phone numbers and PINs until they are automatic.
- Upgrade the words to people, one decade at a time, and give each an action and an object.
- Practise short strings - six or twelve digits - before long ones.
Is it worth it?
For everyday numbers - a PIN, a door code, a date - the Major System on its own is enough and far quicker to learn. PAO pays off when you want to memorise long strings: a credit-card number for a trip, a list of historical dates, the digits of pi, or just the satisfaction of doing something that looks impossible.
It is also a good illustration of how memory champions work. They do not have unusual memories; they have spent a long time building a large, well-organised set of images, and they place them on routes they know perfectly. See what the research says about that.
Practising PAO
Memory Palace for Apple TV includes PAO alongside the Major System in its number training, with a guide you can read or listen to and sessions that place each image at a stop in one of five 4K palaces. The recall test afterwards asks in random order, which is the only way to check the numbers are really yours.