this post was submitted on 25 Jun 2026
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Flashcards. Write down your credentials and memorize them. Throw them away willy nilly when you're done.
Hey, don't use a password manager like KeePass, because brain is the only safe place to store passwords. In order to do that, WRITE THEM ON FLASH CARDS to memorize them and then THROW THEM AWAY
Tell me it was a joke
Flashcards are your brains friend. They are no joke.
A paper notebook is basically the same fundamental as a password manager but with a different tradeoff. You trade cryptographic security for a reliance on physical security. Its probably a great option for a lot of older people who only log into things from home. But its just a password manager. An analogue one.
Flashcards are dumb for this. If you are going to write it down, just secure it. Don't have them out all the time to try to memorise it. Jese. The worst of both.
Writing down your password is breaking the very first rule ever made about passwords. A cliche. Only appears in fiction
Write clues to your passphrase, not the actual passphrase. I spend a fair amount of time making my username and password. I choose something that I'm going to remember.
As an example, I was asked to attend a meeting to check out a point maker, a box that bombards objects with photons to collect the reflections, generating a 3d point cloud model that can be measured in cad. This particular one was fairly awful. Bottom of the barrel effort. The salesman was a complete slob, he was late, he took forever to set it up and had much difficulty getting it to actually work. When it did, it measured a 12.75" brick at 14.5". I knew right away it was shit.
They forced us to create an new account on the laptop with the software as it was too advanced and proprietary (pukes) for me to run it on my cad workstation. So, my password begrudgingly became a stylized derivation of "This Guys Balls Smell Like Cheese". I still remember that password to this day 12 years later.
Not only that, but when we would have the guy out to troubleshoot, I would sometimes have to log in for him to repeat our steps. The salesman was always impressed with my typing speed and ability to remember my password. He probably never even knew my password was a total insult at him. My clue for the pass phrase was "Lynard Skynard".
You should try KeePass or VaultWarden. A new account is just a few clicks away. You can do the mind tricks with the main password.
You offering to pay?
They are free...
That would work, if I had like ten or twenty of them to remember.
No amount of studying is gonna make me remember almost a hundred strings of 24 random characters, and what string goes to what account
It was supposed to be joke 😔
Damn, I see that now. The heat wave is making me stupid, my brain isn't made for 35C
That's your new password friend! For everything! "My-brain-isnt-made-for-35c" I solved internet security. /s
That is actually quite effective, though I would likely spell out the 35 and allow sylization to create numerics.
You can likely now remember that phrase “My-brain-isnt-made-for-35c” forever if you just reinforce the memory from time to time. Creating an absurd image in your head or even using a real image to associate is another good way of remembering something. For this, I would leave myself a clue of 'I thought 36 was OK'.
Maybe not for everything though.
Look, the amount of negativity I'm generating for myself just trying to encourage a simple alternative and self reliance is really irking me. I've used this method for twenty years or so, and found it to be extremely effective. Consider it a door. Use it if you want. It is possible. You are better and smarter than a machine or software. Last post about it.
All good with me. Feel free to PM (DM?) Me with reasoning and if there's research you're aware of that supports. I admit I know too little.
I had a phrase that was the first letter of the title books on my shelf from left to right. I don't use it anymore but I still remember it.
Last point. Many of us have hundreds of passwords because you need a password to log into everything. Even a dog walker portal is some software platform making you setup an account. I think that's gone way too far requiring a login for everything. I want to buy, for example, some yogurt cultures from a fermentation store. Not setup an account become best friends.
Don't use random characters. Use absurd phrases that mean something to you.