Our memories are what we are, what makes us make the decisions we make, act as we act and love as we love. We would be nothing without our memories but, is it possible to remember everything?
The answer is no, but we can take measures so that when it comes the time to look back, we have as many memories as we can. How you do it ?. Very easy. In this post we tell you how.
Memories and emotions
The first thing to keep in mind is that the most important part of a memory is the emotion or emotions it brings. Surely it has happened to you that a certain smell evokes a specific moment of the past. A day with your parents in the flower market returns to your memory when you notice the smell of fresh flowers, or when a perfume reminds you of a person very close to you in the past.
All memories carry with them one or more associated emotions. Those who come with more powerful emotions, fear, disgust, anger, sadness, nostalgia, happiness, etc., are the ones that last the most in our memory. It is precisely these emotions that get us to learn from our experiences so that, in the future, we know how to make the decisions that will cause us a more pleasant emotional state.
Is it possible to remember everything?
Remembering everything is impossible, since our memory does not work like an infinite video camera. If so, it would be very difficult for us to make decisions quickly, and we would live with an emotional “backpack” too complex to be operative. We remember many things, and most of them will come back to memory when facing a concrete situation. When we go to the cinema and the seats are not numbered, we look in our memory for the place in the room where we felt more comfortable watching the movie, but we do not remember every movie we’ve seen.
Therefore, our memory is selective, and the learning we draw from our memories weighs more heavily than the memory itself. This makes us learn to differentiate between what makes us feel good and what makes us feel bad, and to always choose the path that leads us to feel better. The bad thing is that a lot of fantastic memories of our life, especially of our childhood, are being buried deep in our memory and, over time, we have to discern whether it is a real experience, or an imaginary one.
“Life is not what One lived, but what One remembers and how One remembers it in order to recount it”Gabriel Garcia Marquez
SOS, I want to remember!
It has already become clear that we can not remember everything. But there are ways to get those beautiful memories of our childhood and our life in general to flutter through the “great hall” of our memory again.
Photos are our best friends, and also for our children. If we were fortunate enough to have parents who are fond of photography (like mine), and we have been a little organized ourselves, it is possible that we will have some invaluable treasure called photo albums sitting on a shelf.
Most of the memories we have of our childhood come from photographs, and the same happens with moments that have made us enjoy throughout our youth and adulthood that, although perceived as important at the time, they tend to get blurry. Do you remember all the barbecues with your friends ?, every exam you have passed?, every day in the park with your children?…
Organizing your photos
Taking photos is very important. And seeing them again and again helps us keep our memories fresh. But if our photos are spread in loose folders on the computer, we can hardly revive them without feeling the cold sweat down our forehead imagining the day we have to sit down to organize them.
Therefore, organizing our memories is as important as capturing them. It is a job that is best done slowly. If we have made a trip and we have the photos with our smartphone, it is best to dump them into the computer when arriving home and put in a separate folder those that belong to the trip. The day you want to make an album or relive them you will always know where to look.
Having a place where we can immerse ourselves in the sea of our life and relive all the special moments that we have captured with our camera is priceless. That is why it is important that we have a system to store and organize our memories.
We have Kuicco. Do you have one? Tell us about it in the comments!
Papá viajero y apasionado de la música y la tecnología. Mi mayor afición es recorrer el mundo con mis hijos y vivir junto a ellos grandes aventuras que luego puedan recordar con Kuicco.
Thank you so much for this piece! You have contributed immensely on accounting for memories, which I just need right now.
Thank you very much for this especially the part on emotional association.