Haha! I had someone tell me their name a few weeks ago. Kinda sounded like coffee so his name is now coffee. Can't for the life of me remember his actual name and I've asked numerous times. I usually just hope that I don't get in a situation where I need to know their name. Fun times. At least we can laugh about it.
"(Okay. Okay, okay, okay, here goes.) Hey, I'm so sorry, I'm so very bad with names, what's yours again? (Gawd that was awful, but it's over, we did it, I'm so proud of us, we overcame our fear and.... FUCK what did they say?!)"
Constant issue for me. I realized how much of a relief it was the other day when someone asked my name again after being introduced 15 minutes earlier, I got a chance to ask them their again and I felt a little more human for a bit.
Something that helped me was realizing that names are hard for everyone.
Unlike faces, which a lot of people also struggle with, names are completely arbitrary. They don’t help you identify a person at all unless you already know them. Facial features at least help you recognize someone but “Tim” or “James” could be 20 people you have met this year alone.
Everyone is bad with them, so just admitting to it is actually either a huge relief or at least understandable to the other party, like your experience. I find it’s typically the former, and after they share their name again, they confirm they have mine right, or ask in kind because they also forgot. It’s a human moment.
The worst in when you interact with someone almost every day for months and you know their name, but then you meet them after a 3 month break and have no fucking clue.
So this is dumb but I’ve been carrying around a little notebook to write random things down, and I’ve taken to recording names of new people I meet. Also people are way more forgiving of forgetting names and I’ve also accepted that people that aren’t are not worth being around anyway.
I once had an acquaintance/friend for 4 years who told me their name when we first met. I immediately forgot it of course but managed to avoid referring to them by name the whole time and I only found out what it was again when I told them I was moving overseas and they gave me contact details to reach them after I moved. So funny suddenly achieving that 4 year long goal of one day figuring out what they were called like that. Of course, I lost the contact details and forgot their name immediately after that but on the day I was able to thank them using their name for the first time in years and it felt very satisfying.
I played that game ONCE for about 15 minutes and since then I've been able to remember names 5x better than before.
There's no fundamental shift in memory capacity, the game just trains you to pay attention when someone says their name. After a few repetitions, it sticks.
Highly worth it. Though, now I remember names so good it freaks people out.
Anyone do a thing where to remember the name you mentally attach them to someone you already know. Then right on cue you can remember the link but not the name of the family member you linked them to.
I have a very specific way of remembering names. I don't know if it will work for everybody but I find It works 95% of the time.
When someone is being introduced to me I get the new person to tell me their name and then I get somebody else to introduce me then say their name back to them.
Instead of just one memory pathway being built I have multiple ways at once.