Is It True? Did It Really Happen?

(Experience vs. Memory)

The writer Wright Morris said, “Anything processed by memory is fiction.”

This seems true. Our memories are not perfect recording devices. I have memories of things from my childhood my family members swear never happened.

We are also governed by what psychologist Daniel Kahneman identifies as the tug-of-war between our “experiencing self” and our “remembering self.”

Our experiencing self is us when we’re living our moment-to-moment lives. Most of our experiences pass without notice or triggering any kind of memory to be stored for later. Daniel Kahneman says our “remembering self” is a “storyteller” who prioritizes moments that disrupt or alter the narrative of the experience.

Additionally, we have a bias toward weighting the ends of experiences. Just about everyone has experienced a movie they were enjoying up until a disappointing ending, after which they declare the movie to “suck,” even though they might have approved of eighty-five of its ninety minutes.

You could have a pair of identical vacation experiences during which everything was perfect, except you lost your wallet one time at the beginning of the vacation and the other at the end. Only the one when you lost it at the end will be recalled unfavorably.

Marriages that end in divorce are remembered as misery, but it’s clear this couldn’t have been true for the entire duration of the marriage.

In this writing experience, you’re going to reconsider an experience from your life and see if it alters your perception of the experience.

AUDIENCE

While it’s likely the results of this writing experience will be of interest to others, the primary audience is yourself. This is an experience of personal reflection. You never know when it may prove useful for some other piece of writing, but for now it’s all for you.

Writing can be that way sometimes.

PROCESS

1. Choose experience.

Think about an experience from your life for which you harbor either mixed or negative feelings. It could be a class, a relationship, a vacation, a job, an apartment—anything.

2. Remember your experiences.

Daniel Kahneman’s research suggests that most of our experiences never take root in our memories, but a careful reconsideration will help give a fuller perspective of this experience.

If it’s something like a vacation, try to recall the entire trip, not just the part that went poorly, such as being stuck on the “It’s a Small World” ride at Disney World when a power cut knocked out everything except the ride’s soundtrack, which repeated endlessly for six hours.

Walk yourself through the full experience. Were there times that were good, when you were happy and fulfilled?

3. Write the story of your experience.

Get down as much as you recall while going through this active remembering process. Does it change how you view the experience?

One of the most important implications of Kahneman’s research is that our remembering selves impact our happiness. We’re very good at remembering the bad things and less good at remembering the low-grade or unremarkable positive things.

People who can “live in the moment” tend to report being happier on a day-to-day basis compared to those of us who spend time looking to the past or the future.

What have you discovered about your memory?

REFLECT

Writing itself often falls prey to the divide between the experiencing self and remembering self.

Students will decide whether a writing experience was worthwhile based on the grade. Too many disappointing grades make students believe writing just isn’t worth it.

I have worked on many “failed” projects in my life, including entire drafts of books that proved unpublishable. I often look back on those disappointments with a certain amount of bitterness, thinking I must’ve wasted any time spent on them since they ultimately didn’t pan out.

And yet I can remember moments of working on those books when I had great days of writing and it all felt really good. I also tend to forget bad days on projects that ultimately sold to publishers, because those efforts had a happy ending.

I now try to make a conscious effort to be more aware of the experience of writing and not judge how I’m doing by the results. I find this makes it much easier and more pleasant to write, which results in me writing more, which results in me writing better—a kind of virtuous circle.

How do you tend to view your work? Is it only worth it if it pays off? Do you enjoy the journey no matter what the result might be? Or is it some kind of balance between the two?

What conditions help you do your best work?