Quotes About Memory

The nature of trauma is that you have no recollection of it as a story.

Moments appear like scattered puzzle pieces. What belongs to what? Where are the corners? I can hold only bits and pieces in my hands, and even these are suspect. I can't bring my parents close. It's not possible to sit them back down again and ask them: What happened? Did you ever love each other? When did you stop? Your legacy is a daughter who tries and tries to remember you.

The nature of trauma," van der Kolk had said, "is that you have no recollection of it as a story. The nature of traumatic experience is that the brain doesn't allow a story to be created.

Oh, child! Somewhere inside you, your future has already unfurled like one of those coiled-up party streamers, once shiny, shaken loose, floating gracefully for a brief moment, now trampled underfoot after the party is over. The future you're capable of imagining is already a thing of the past.

Experience, particularly in childhood, sculpts the brain. The

In fact, people who are extremely adept at mental tasks that demand cognitive control and a roaring working memory—like solving complex math problems—can struggle with creative insights if they have trouble switching off their fully concentrated focus.5

The hippocampus is crucial in recognizing a face as that of your cousin. But it is the amygdala that adds you don't really like her.

Just as a sexual fantasy can lead to sexual feelings, so can happy memories cheer us up, or melancholy thoughts make us reflective.

Whether we're trying to hone a skill in sports or music, enhance our memory power, or listen better, the core elements of smart practice are the same: ideally, a potent combination of joy, smart tactics, and full focus.

A mais antiga raiz de nossa vida emocional está no sentido do olfato, ou, mais precisamente, no lobo olfativo, células que absorvem e analisam o cheiro.

Quando a nossa mente vagueia, o nosso cérebro ativa um conjunto de circuitos cerebrais que tagarelam sobre coisas que não têm nada que ver com aquilo que estamos a tentar aprender. Na ausência de foco, nenhuma nova recordação daquilo que aprendemos é armazenada.

Independientemente de que se trate de desarrollar una habilidad deportiva o musical, de fortalecer nuestra memoria o de escuchar a los demás, las claves de la práctica inteligente son siempre las mismas, una combinación agradable, en términos ideales, de alegría, estrategia inteligente y concentración.

Anatomically the emotional system can act independently of the neocortex," LeDoux told me. "Some emotional reactions and emotional memories can be formed without any conscious, cognitive participation at all.

The brain uses a simple but cunning method to make emotional memories register with special potency: the very same neurochemical alerting systems that prime the body to react to life-threatening emergencies by fighting or fleeing also stamp the moment in memory with vividness.

While the world often confronts us with an unwieldy array of choices (How should you invest your retirement savings? Whom should you marry?), the emotional learning that life has given us (such as the memory of a disastrous investment or a painful breakup) sends signals that streamline the decision by eliminating some options and highlighting others at the outset.

Sobrecarregar a atenção diminui o domínio mental. É no momento em que estamos mais tensos que esquecemos os nomes das pessoas que conhecemos bem, já para não falar nas datas dos seus aniversários, dos nossos aniversários de casamento e de outros dados socialmente cruciais.

And then like a song we'd forgotten was even on the mix, you stepped into the house and my whole life.

I wore it, this careless thing you don't even remember giving to me from your bag. It wasn't a gift, this thing I'm returning. It was barely a gesture, almost forgotten already, this thing I wore like it was dear to me. And it was. No wonder we broke up.

The file clanked against me, my stupid idea nobody would have gotten had I ever done it. You even wouldn't have gotten it, Ed, I thought, watching her go. It's why we broke up, so here it is. Ed, how could you?

Call me later, you'd said, so I could call you later, at night, and it is those nights I miss you, Ed, the most, on the phone, you beautiful bastard.

What does it mean? Where does something like this come from? How can you find it again,just what you wanted at just the right time? Never,probably. It's empty and nothing now, I don't even know why I kept it, and I'll keep it no more.

It's why we broke up, Ed, a small thing that's disappeared or maybe was never really in my hands in the first place.

Foi por isso que a gente acabou, Ed, por uma coisinha pequena que sumiu ou quem sabe nunca tenha estado de verdade nas minhas mãos

It's not like I hadn't seen you before. Everyone had, you're like, I don't know, some movie everyone sees growing up, everybody's seen you, nobody can remember not seeing you. But just suddenly I really, really needed to see you again right that minute, that night.