Past, Present, and Future

The present and the future are probably the most important time periods we think about.  We live in the present and it is here where we make all of our decisions that we live by.  We make decisions we hope will prove to be wise investments.  Our future is yet to come and within it we hope that we will gain a return on our investments.  We hope that the decisions we made will make our future brighter.  Some of us however make decisions without thinking about the future, living instead in the moment considering the present as the only certainty and therefore the only time period that matters.

Regardless of our outlook on the future and our opinion of the present, the decisions we make are ultimately based on our previous experiences.  This makes the past arguably more important than the future, although still less important than the present as we can not change our past.  Knowing and understanding our past however helps us understand the decisions we make and the reasons why.  Knowing this can help us avoid repeating past mistakes, and in some cases it can help us build upon past success.

What we need to keep in mind however is that the present is not just here and now.  While our perception in this moment of the present is here and now, the present as a time period is eternal.  Every single moment we live is in the present.  Every single decision we ever made and ever will make is done in the present.  It is never ending.  We forget this a lot when we look forward and when we look back.  We often consider the future as something to worry about when it comes and we often criticise our past or judge it by what we now know.  To do so is wrong however.  What you know now and the standards you have established should not be applied retrospectively.  Information that you have now gained that you did not have at the time should not make you feel guilt or elation for the decisions you made unknowingly.  You should judge your past only by what you knew in the past.

You should not judge the past by the standards of the present.  You should not judge your past self for liking things you now hate, or for hating things you now like.  Likewise your future yet to come will bring more changes.  The person you are today is not the same person you were a year ago and it won't be the same person you will be a year from now.  We live every day and our experiences shape how we feel, what we want, and what we learn.  What we know is fluid, ever changing.  Things which were important to us then will disappear from our minds completely when they are no longer important.

I would like you to try a simple exercise to make you think about this.  Without cheating or finding prompts to do so, write down in a list the name of everyone who was in your class in your first school.  At the time you would have known everyone's name, over the years that have passed since you parted ways the people you had freidnships with and relationships that lasted beyond those days will be at the forefront of your memory and they will likely fill your list first.  The people you had little interaction with or who you never saw again after parting ways will be gone.  You can try picturing your classroom and the layout where everyone sat.  The people that mattered to you who you remember will be in their seats, the others will likely be empty.

We retain the most important memories in our shallow minds.  Information which is not important is either lost completely or it is archived within our deep minds, where it will only surface when prompted - usually by reading their name in the example exercise above.  This apparent sense of memory completely disappearing can be somewhat disturbing at first especially if you find the exercise very difficult. 

Do not be alarmed though because this is natural.  It is not possible to retain all memories of everything we ever experienced.  We do not have the storage capacity in our shallow minds.  Our brains need to make the decision inevitably as to what is important and what isn't.  There are things you will never forget but you will never remember without a prompt; like files on a hard drive you need to have an idea of what you are looking for in order to find them.  Albeit with most computers you can browse those hard drives, it is not as easy to browse our memories.  There are techniques which can be used to make this possible, you can read about them if you like, I would suggest Tricks of the Mind by Derren Brown, he gives a brief overview of these techniques in the sections dealing with memory.

There are many abilities we possess as humans that are innate.  Processes that happen without conscious effort.  Selection of memory that is and is not important is one of those abilities.  While it can be nice to explore nostalgia and remember our past, you should stop and consider whether it is worth remembering something which you have apparently forgotten.  Our minds deem these things unimportant for a reason, think about whether you trust its judgement before trying to override it.