Jim Kwik explains why we forget: the brain only sticks with information that feels emotionally important or novel. Memories strengthen when you retrieve them, and your brain prioritizes what matters for survival over random facts.
Why do people forget things and what can we do to remember them better? There's many different things. I'll just give you a few. The why we forget part, there's 2 big basic factors. So one is the information might not be biologically important. The things that we remember tend to be the ones that are biologically important. What I mean by that is they tend to be the things that evoke our emotions. So things that give us a sense of desire, happiness, attachment, things that scare us, Things that where we're stressed, for instance. All these factors can promote plasticity in the brain and help a memory stick around. Then there's the things that are surprising, places that we go that are brand new where there's a lot of plasticity taking place. Just the act of pulling up a memory can induce some plasticity and can make a memory stronger just by virtue of having pulled it up. So all these factors can help a memory stick around. But why do we forget? A big part of why we forget is that memory is competitive, and that's part of the enormous economy of the way the human brain is.
The Library of Minds: Brain Coach: How to Stay Sharp When AI Does the Thinking | Jim Kwik
