Moments and Memories

A series of moments and memories. That’s what life is made up of. Kind of a weird thought, but it’s true. Moments that are encoded into lifelong memories, and other moments that happen once and then are forgotten forever.

No two people remember the same event the same way. Our eyes, our experiences, our views, our perceptions, our perspectives, our thoughts, our relationships, and a myriad of other things play a role in how we encode information. How we decide what is important … and how we decide what’s not.

Memory has been on my mind a lot lately. Moments in my life have led me to think about memory and come back to it quite frequently.

One thing that started all my thoughts was because we learned about memory in one of my psychology classes. (Random thought but I love being a psychology major!!!)

We learned that the sensory part of memory lasts anywhere from under a second to 2 seconds. So taste, feel, see, smell, hear … each little moment is in our memory for mere seconds, being unconsciously processed and then determined whether the input is worth noticing or not.

For example, you’ve probably heard people say, “are you feeling tense? Are your shoulders tight?”

So then you think about it and notice that you’re tensing your shoulders, causing them to be sore.

But hey, at least that’s helpful. At least now you’ve decided you need to relax and release the tension in your shoulders. 

It’s more annoying when people ask what your tongue is doing or how your toes are feeling. Now, it’s the only thing you can think about. (You’re welcome. I’ve done it to you just now. Muahahaha!)

If no one brought those things to your conscious attention, your brain would be moving its way along, unconsciously processing sensations.

After the sensory memory, there is the short-term memory. It’s also known as the “working memory” and it lasts anywhere from 2 seconds to 30 seconds. 

Then, with repetition and rehearsal, memories and facts can become encoded into the long-term memory.

The information is stored and could last 30 seconds to potentially … forever.

Forever is a long time.

Forever. I mean, wow!

Memory is a weird concept to me. Based on what we pay attention to, what’s important to us, how we are feeling in a particular moment … they all play a role in how well we remember something. How we encode the information. How our brain stores it into our long-term memory. How easily (or difficult) something will be to retrieve or recall later.

Another interesting thought is that each of us have different memories. We didn’t talk about this in class, but it’s something that I think about occasionally. Especially because I remember the most random details and other people laugh at the particular things I remember. Things that they’ve nearly forgotten or things that they do not think about much.

Kind of a unique thing about me is that I often remember stories of events better than the people who lived them.

My friend told me all of her stories of fun dates she went on, people she met, and crazy things that happened. Sometimes I’d bring up details of previous stories she had told me, and she was almost always astonished, telling me that she forgot that “that” happened. I wasn’t even there and remembered better than she did.

So morale of the story is … be careful what you tell me. I might just remember it. 😉 (That is a joke. Don’t panic!)

Next idea is that there are associations. Things our brain connect to one another in order to better remember something. BUT … that’s a whole other topic for another day. I just wanted to mention it in case you wanted to think more about memory. 😜 And about the complexities of life. And so I could remind you that I’m crazy and have a very chaotic brain! 🤪

I can’t tell you why I decided to talk about memory because I’m not really sure.

In fact, all of this above was a random addition to a different blog post that I’m working on, and I decided to take it all out and make it it’s own post.

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If you’ve read any of my previous blog posts, you know that I jump all over the place, and my ideas don’t always make sense. Soooo thanks for sticking in there with me because here I go again …

I started my Latter-day Saint Instagram account on January 2, 2017. It was actually just past midnight on January 1, but that’s besides the point.

The picture above is one of the first edits I made for the Instagram account. If you look closely, you can tell that the “made by font candy” watermark is there on the bottom right because I hadn’t paid for the app yet. I’m not going to lie, I thought I was sooo good. Ha! Not so much. Having “Dr. Suess” be written in black? What was wrong with me? 😂 What was I thinking?!

It was actually a blast to gain followers over night. My goal was to hit 1,000 followers. It took several months, but we did it! (I eventually invited my cousin and grandma to join me, but now I post *very rarely* by myself.)

I can’t remember when, but after general conference when Russell M. Nelson announced that he wanted us to focus more on Jesus Christ, we changed our account from @lds.make.a.difference to @make.a.difference.with.Christ

Unfortunately, I’m really really bad at posting on it, so it hasn’t grown in over 3-4 years. Whoops. I’m fact, it loses followers everyday. (Obviously the number of followers isn’t that important. It just shows that I haven’t been trying very hard.)

My blog is more important to me now, and I try to stay off Instagram as much as I possibly can, so I’m not too disappointed with myself.

My point in telling you all of that was simply for fun. It was a little background for why that edit looks so crappy. And I shared the quote/edit since it had to do with moments and memories.

Next topic jump:

Sister T. told me the other day that her posts weren’t perfect, but she had posted them anyway (she has a blog too).

I responded that if we waited til posts were perfect, we would never ever post.

The truth is, I feel like this post is extremely messy, but I’ve decided that it’s okay for me to just share stories and thoughts. A blog is all about sharing yourself right? Being vulnerable? Teaching people more about you?

I don’t need to be inspirational and positive all the time. 😋

That being said, to wrap up, I encourage you to make the most of your time. Use your moments to make memories.

Then share your memories with others.

And I think you’ll find life to be much more satisfying and enjoyable.

I know I have. 😉