Memories: do they really go away?

Most of you reading would concur. You are getting forgetful. You forget names. You forget tasks. You forget where you were supposed to be going.

But are you really losing your memory?

I guess the question is whether you lost your memory or you simply cannot retrieve it. It is there somewhere, but you can’t access it.

Your memory is not a filing cabinet. Neuroscientists once believed that memories were like etchings on stone, slowly wearing away with time. Today, we know something far more interesting.

Memories are never erased. What fades is your ability to reach them.

Think of memory as a vast network of neurons firing in intricate patterns. Each experience you live creates a unique constellation of activity.

When you recall it, the brain recreates that pattern. Over time, the pattern does not vanish. The road to get there weakens.

Retrieval, not storage, is the real bottleneck.

This is why you suddenly remember a childhood smell when you walk past a bakery or recall an old friend when you hear a particular song. The memory was always there.

You simply needed the right key to unlock it. Your brain is constantly pruning and strengthening connections based on how often you revisit an experience.

The less you recall something, the harder it becomes to retrieve. But hard is not the same as impossible.

Studies on amnesia show this beautifully. People who lose access to their memories because of injury or disease often show fragments of knowledge they cannot consciously explain.

They may recognise a face without knowing why or perform a skill without remembering learning it. The storage is intact.

So how can you use this to your benefit?

First, stop thinking you are losing your memory. You are simply reinforcing it to your brain. Second, analyze the kind of memory loss you are experiencing. Is it visual, spatial, reasoning or attention.

What ever the kind, practice is again and again. Train yourself to remember where you left your keys or parked your car for example. Use cues, practise recall, revisit what matters.

Shape your environment so that it triggers the memories you want to keep alive. What you fear forgetting is still within you. You only need to reopen the path that leads to it.

Reach out to me on twitter @rbawri Instagram @riteshbawriofficial and YouTube at www.youtube.com/breatheagain