Photographic memory, a blessing and a curse
By BILL DUNCAN
The View Frome Here
Memory researchers says we are not supposed to remember everything. Daniel L. Schacter, Ph.D., and Harvard Psychology professor, writes in his book “The Seven Sins of Memory,” that “our minds would be impossibly cluttered if we could not dispose of useless information."
When a computer gets low on "memory" a notice flashes on the screen warning the user to delete enough files to allow it to save what needs to be saved. The brain, however does this automatically by wiping out things like the names of classmates in your first grade class.
That is unless you are a freak like me and have a photographic memory. I have a first grade memory that I wish would be purged with a mental delete button. I am still traumatized by it. Oh, yes, I remember the names of my classmates, but out of respect I will not name them, not even the hateful, old maid teacher.
Each afternoon in the first grade we were required to fold our arms and lay our head down on the desk for a nap. We were also seated alphabetically and because my surname began with a D, the girl sitting right behind me had a last name starting with an E.
One naptime she went into a deep sleep and wet her pants. The old maid was outraged and sent her off to get a mop to clean up the puddle while lecturing the whole class about her misdeed. I was traumatized and every afternoon at nap time thereafter I would live in fear that this accident would happen to me.
That is just one of the curses of a photographic memory. Professor Schacter’s was no help. He warns our brain cells can store endless material that can be instantly recalled. But you need proper nutrition, exercise and mental stimulation to make your memory meet the next challenge.
“Short term memory is just that,” he said. “Memory that is stored briefly. Committing information to the long term is a process called encoding. It takes more brainwork. For example if someone gives you a new phone number you may need to write it down several times before it goes into the long term memory storage.”
Is there any hope? Once something is encoded you never really lose it, according to Sonia Lupien, PhD and memory researcher with Douglas Hospital at McGill University in Montreal.
Admittedly, a photographic memory works well in my chosen profession, except when you are interviewing a Goldwater for President supporter during a political rally and she hits you over the head with a Goldwater picket sign because you are not taking notes.
It doesn’t fare well with your spouse either, when she swears that you did not tell her something and you can recall what she was wearing and where she was standing when the conversation took place.
People probbly don’t mean to lie to you, but they will deny saying things that you have "embedded" in that memory bank.
"Memory is the power to gather roses in the winter."
-Author unknown