We are what we remember we were
Our past memories determine our present and future
🏷️ Categories: Memory.
We are not what we have lived, but what we remember having lived.
Memory is nothing more than the fine thread that binds together fragments of our history. It is not always faithful, it is never complete, but it is capable of defining who we are. Without it, we are nothing, absolutely nothing. In spite of everything, memory is capricious, in it there are only fleeting moments lived, it is as if we were trying to grab sand with our hands; most of the sand would escape between our fingers...
We are the pieces of a great history.
You are what you remember
In psychology, autobiographical memory is what defines your identity, and it is a mixture of personal experiences, events, places and knowledge.
But it has a problem: memory is very malleable.
Your identity is based on a story that you reconstruct all the time, giving new meanings to past memories and looking for logic between events, often unconsciously (Conway & Pleydell-Pearce, 2000). If you consider yourself resilient, for example, you will remember moments of coping better, while minimizing memories of vulnerability (McAdams, 2001). This is a typical case of malleability.
“Who am I?”
“Why do I act this way?”
“How did I get to be who I am?”
“What traits define me?”
You answer all that from the history that you are building with your memories.
Imagine remembering an argument with a friend from years ago. If the relationship is good now, you will perceive the event very differently than if the relationship ended badly. In one case you will not give it importance and think that all relationships have frictions, in the other, you will think that the person never treated you well and that you chose your friends badly.
The same memory, two ways of perceiving the past.
We have become accustomed to think of memory as a camera that captures every detail, when in reality it is an artist that tries to paint the same landscape many times, although it will never get the same result.
This is how the brain works.
What you remember will influence what you learn
Think of memory as an ever-expanding network.
The more you like something or the more important it is in your life, the more effort you put into understanding it, and that makes it easier to remember and add new related information. Thus, each learning becomes integrated into a denser and denser network of knowledge, which makes it possible for you to keep your memory stable (Østby and Østby, 2018; Conway et al., 2004).
The more you like a topic, the more easily you will remember it.
The more you care about a topic, the more easily you will remember it.
The more you know about a topic, the more easily you will remember it.
Perceiving the world and paying attention to the world are two very different things.
In spite of everything, only a small remnant remains in the memory, most of what was experienced will be lost and this has a huge impact in the long term.
Memories, rarely floating in your mind like drifting ships, are connected to a network. When neural pruning happens, the brain keeps the main networks you have built and gives them more and more prominence in your memory, while isolated memories fall into oblivion, like drifting ships that sink.
This is how you prune your memory, selecting without realizing it, those branches of your tree that have been most important over time.
Why do you clearly remember one teacher from your childhood and not the rest?
Why do you remember how to add and not other formulas you studied?
Why do you remember the argument with your partner and not what you said to the neighbor when you said hello?
The fate of a memory depends on the importance you give it and the frequency with which you remember it. The spaced repetition of the memory will guarantee that you will not forget it and if the memory defines you or affected you personally, you will remember it even better. The more closely it is linked to your hopes, beliefs and goals, the less you will forget it. That's why you can never forget the best times you've spent with your loved ones.
You know so much about the person you love that you could give intensive classes on their life.
What you remember will influence what you will imagine
Our expectations about the future are fueled by what has already happened.
When you imagine a future event or vacation, your memories become the basis for creating possible scenarios. In fact, the brain uses similar neural circuits for both remembering and imagining (Østby & Østby, 2018).
If you were successful in similar situations, you will project optimism into the future.
If you did very poorly on a trip, you will have anticipatory discomfort before you travel.
You are using the past to imagine your future, you are casting predictions.
Each of our memories is a mixture of fact and fiction. The core story is based on true facts, but we reconstruct it each time we evoke it (Schacter, 1999). We fill in the gaps of an incomplete story with probable details that we select unconsciously and end up finding fragments that fit our story.
Memory is like all of our biology, something living and changing.
✍️ Your turn: What memories have defined the person you are today? There are some teachers, some friends and certain phrases that I will never be able to forget?
💭 Quote of the day: «What had once seemed shallow and tedious now loomed in memory like a paradise.» Peter Benchle, Jaws.
See you next time, take care of yourself! 👋
References 📚
Conway, M. A., & Pleydell-Pearce, C. W. (2000). The construction of autobiographical memories in the self-memory system. Psychological Review, 107(2), 261-288. https://doi.org/10.1037/0033-295x.107.2.261
Conway, M. A., Singer, J. A., & Tagini, A. (2004). The Self and Autobiographical Memory: Correspondence and Coherence. Social Cognition, 22(5), 491-529. https://doi.org/10.1521/soco.22.5.491.50768
McAdams, D. P. (2001). The Psychology of Life Stories. Review Of General Psychology, 5(2), 100-122. https://doi.org/10.1037/1089-2680.5.2.100
Østby, H., & Østby, Y. (2018). Adventures in Memory: The Science and Secrets of Remembering and Forgetting. Greystone Books Ltd.
Schacter, D. L. (1999). The seven sins of memory: Insights from psychology and cognitive neuroscience. American Psychologist, 54(3), 182-203. https://doi.org/10.1037/0003-066x.54.3.182
Thank you for this article, Alvaro. Just this morning, I asked another Substacker why it is that we focus on the negative and not on the positive. It fits in with so much of this article. We remember the things that are important to us. The failures that devastated us, the people who kept us from personal success, etc. Only a few people, those who helped us break through learning barriers or lifted our spirits with a laugh or compliment are the ones we remember. Thank you.