Yakapin

Ten years since graduating from the university, and here I am with thoughts of numerous events that I could swear all still feel like yesterday. However, questions about those exact memories of the past keep me up at night, somehow.

As someone who doesn’t have a great memory, the emotions left by past events indeed dwell longer within me. Each time I try to remember exact engagements or encounters, I only end up with an exponentially growing emotional experience that later leaves me overwhelmed and confused.

Has anyone ever felt this way as I do?

Whenever I hear others share vivid memories of the past, I sense a pinch in my heart. Does it make me sad? Maybe. Does it make me jealous? Perhaps.

I question myself, for sure, as I try to sift through my mind and deep into the compartments I made in my brain to go back to specific events in the past. Yet I could never fully remember as clearly as the person sharing the memory with me. Some details don’t seem to get pulled back up from wherever my brain stored them.

I know of specific situations that I could recall, but I’m mostly focused on how those moments made me feel and not exactly the details of the events themselves. Is that strange? I need to know as I am not sure at all.

Lingering yet not welcoming

There are numerous instances when I wish I could go to the deep banks of memory storage I have in my brain to see how actual moments I try to remember happened. But those memories seemed to have been completely wiped out by my brain as it saw them as unnecessary. Even to this day, I don’t fully know how my brain works in choosing which ones to keep and which ones to simply erase/forget. However, I am sure that in science, our neurons create new links while other synapses weaken through time. This process is just how I try to make sense of my lost memories.

The synapses that we have created could become stronger or weaker over time. Perhaps, in my case, as I stop engaging in certain tasks or being in a certain environment, my memory of those past events weaken. Thus, I forget. The good news is that we can reaccess those forgotten memories once we receive enough information that can reactive the weak synapses between our neurons.

Even though I can’t fully describe the past, I know that once some of the bits of those memories are shared by others, we can rebuild that particular time in our lives and share the wonders of the past again. Numerous sensory triggers in particular highly affect me. One of the strongest ones is smell! I seem to have a heightened sense of smell these past few years which is a great way to remember certain moments or even people in the past. The challenge then is in the way I handle the emotions that come rushing back again. That is why when I do remember something, I can’t fully and happily welcome them as they are too much.

Somehow, because of the uncertainty that I feel about certain memories and emotions, I can’t fully embrace the chance to reminisce without feeling down.

For now, I am here inhaling the air of the present and thanking God for each new opportunity for me to create memories in this lifetime. I may not have the best memory bank as others, but I know my heart is always open to experiencing whatever emotional encounter I will be having in this lifetime. May those be good and bad, my heart can, later on, help my brain remember.