It is hardly surprising that old people forget who they are.
Over and over I have experienced the Aha! moment of remembering something I
thought I would never forget: peak experiences, insights, knowledge of my inner
self, lessons learned. Come to think of it, I am amazed that, after so many years of existence, I can
remember myself at all, considering how easy it seems to just leave important information
lost in inaccessible memory. So many memories! What is it that does or does not bring each of them back to us?
Perhaps I am tethered to reality a little more loosely than
most, but given the opportunity to let my mind roam around an issue or create a
dialogue about an event, I am astonished at how often I come across a nugget of
myself learning a personal truth that I swore I committed to memory, but
apparently did not. Because here I was discovering it all over again – the I knew
that! syndrome.
Personal themes and memes from the past
remain salient now and in the future, but very often I seem to start again from the beginning when they come up. Rumination will often find the shortcut
to an answer that I had worked out before, but why can’t I just start with the
answer and expand on it instead of forgetting I already know where to begin? Why
is it that previous realizations are not part of my conscious mental arsenal? And
how many other answers will I NOT encounter, NOT bring into the present with
me?
If I can forget these ultimately important insights, it is an easy step to see that it would not be hard
to leave behind even my name and address in the confusing fog of so many
memories.
Still, these easily forgotten epiphanies and personal decisions are entirely internal, entirely in my memory only, while the facts of my existence are shared with a large community, verbal and written, a safeguard to forgetfulness. We assume we know who we are and, in the scheme of things, we do. But I think it is important to have interactions that reinforce those assumptions. People
call us by name, we get mail at our address, we are listed in the phone book, our children
have expectations.
But what happens when people who we have
counted on for years disappear, when our living circumstances change, our
children move away, our partners die? Certainly less contact with the pillars
of our existence encourages forgetting.
Perhaps more important, it takes energy to sort all those
memories and pick out our own thoughts from dreams, lies we have told ourselves, other people's stories, even
movies and books. We need to be motivated to spend that energy, to have some
purpose for continuing to know ourselves. Such purpose comes from intensities,
from passions, from love now and in the future. And from continued reinforcing contact with others.
I am afraid that if you have lived your life for those who have gone or as only a reflection of your culture and your
surroundings, it will be more difficult to find that golden thread that is you.
Not only will you have less motivation to “find” yourself, you will have less
skill at deliberate recall of a “yourself “ that you never were very aware of
to begin with. So easy to get lost.
All this is not to say that collapsing brain cells will not
interfere with even the strongest sense of self and passion.
Certainly this kind of deterioration is a wicked way to lose your self, a sad
and despicable facet of physical decay that confuses, perhaps eliminates our
memories. But these are exceptional circumstances and I am only now referring
to the exigencies of living a typical life to a typical end – the difficulties
in keeping it all straight in our minds.
And once more (for perhaps the hundredth time) I come to the
conclusion that first, continued involvement with life is essential. But just as important is the specific practice of rumination, musing. An examined life is the road to
retention, no matter how often I astonish myself with my forgetting. No matter how much longer it takes as
experience piles up. No matter how much energy I need to sort those piles.
There is no other way.
One yellow figure, there among
