Memory and Its Influence on Everyday Life

Memory is defined as the case of remembering something or some occurrence. Regular life events are the daily happenings in a person's life that bring changes or affects their relationships with others. These events are such as; marriage, giving birth, the death of a spouse, loss of a job, etc., they are often related to stress. On the other hand, unique life memories are the episodic memories of a person related to a particular event that is very much different from that of another individual sharing the event. Formation of these unique memories involves the process of encoding where the brain records a new regular event and that of fixing the event into the long-term memory. These two types of memories are highly affected by different aspects making them extremely different.

Age and Influence on Memories

Age is one aspect bring out the difference in regular events and different memories in life. The unique memories we have are highly influenced by the age of their occurrence. The first encounter we have on something creates a unique life memory in us, example the first wedding we attended as kids. This event remains special in our mind since it had never happened before but as we grow older, we get used to attending weddings, and the event becomes familiar to us.

Emotions and Memory

Emotions related to the memory are another aspect influencing their retrieval. Researcher says that positive events create the greater part of the unique life memory of a person and are easily recalled compared to the adverse events. However, both the negative and positive events are found to be easily remembered compared to the neutral events encountered. The emotional weight carried by an individual memory is what triggers it being recalled. The birth of a child in a family bring much joy to the family members and friends, this creates a regular event in life, but to the mother who went through the pregnancy and labor pains, it creates a unique memory.

Location of Event Occurrence

The place of an event occurrence creates a deeper recalling of the event making it unique. In the event of a first hiking in a forest makes it more memorable. The sight of a forest will mostly remind us of the experience we had during the hiking but in the event of getting lost in the forest during the hiking change our thought towards hiking. It creates fear of the event, and the sight of a forest may create goosebumps in the recall of the event.

Lessons Learned and Memory

Lessons learned also influence the recalling of regular events and unique life memories. When something happens in our lives and brings in change, we tend to recall it often. The event may not be unique in any way, but it made a mark in our lives. In the event of a job, loss caused by our bad behavior at our workplace may not be unique, but it will help one learn to change that behavior to the next job.

Conclusion

Particular factors separate regular events and different memories in our lives. Age, place of occurrence, emotional weight of the event and lessons learned are major influences on these differences. These factors show that both the regular life events and the unique memories depend on each other to some extent since they are all created in mind but the influence of the different factors separates them.

1. Stevenson, R. Memories, and portraits (1st ed.). Champaign, Ill.: Project Gutenberg
2. Huxley, J. (1970). Memories (1st ed). New York: Harper & Row