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Be Good at Forgetting
Memory Can Be Friend or Foe
Perfect recall exists. There are a few people who really just do remember it all. Everything. Every moment of their lives. They don’t need to keep an address book or store phone numbers on their phone. They simply remember it. It’s called having an eidetic memory.
Having an eidetic memory must be hell. Leaving aside confusing the memory of where you parked your car two weeks ago with where you parked it today, as people with photographic or eidetic memories don’t suffer from this, just imagine never being able to forget your embarrassments, your most painful memories, the moments when you were most disappointed, most defeated. There are actually methods in hypnosis and psychotherapy meant to dull the emotional impact of these memories by rendering them hazy, but having a perfect memory would seem to get around that.
Forgetting can also mean losing your bad habits. I know that when I’m practicing something technical, like a card trick or a martial arts technique, I often lose my bad habits if I just take some time off.
Perhaps most importantly, forgetting is inextricably tied to being human. I cannot imagine experiencing life in a way totally alien to everyone else. It must be like being a Star Wars fanboy living in the franchise, yet no one else can see the easter eggs.
