Day 12 : How to Not Forget : Part 5
Yesterday, I wrote a bit about the importance of remembering things often in the context of making and keeping traditions. However, most events in our lives are not tradition, they are things that happen once making it even more important that we intentionally remember in order to not forget.
In the last installment of this series within a series, let's talk about some ways we can intentionally remember.
Talk about events in detail with people who were there.
This collaborative remembering makes for more balanced remembering. Since we really remember only the last time we remembered an event, rather than the actual occurrence, having other people share their memory helps our recollection to not be skewed. Use sensory and feeling words, as these words help to anchor memories and thereby gives us more entry points to the memory.
Talk about events in detail with people who weren't there.
Be a story-teller. Share with your friends, spouse, and children things that happened to you as a child or just yesterday. Again, use those detail words {do I sound like a teacher?}. Retelling stories helps us to remember them and it gives those around you the opportunity to connect with you.
Look at pictures and talk about what you remember.
I love doing this with Judah. We sit with the iPhone, he finds my photo app, and he swipes through pictures. As he does, we talk to him about what was happening in that picture. We talk about how exciting it was at the Children's Museum when he saw the train or went shopping in the grocery store. He tells the story of knocking his cup in the floor while eating spaghetti {he's watched the video so many times, he knows it by heart...and laughs every time}.
I often wonder if having a camera so readily available will help us and our kids remember better. I know that I've always loved looking at pictures of myself and my family from when I was a child. Sometimes I'm not sure if I have an actual memory or if I just remember a photograph. I do know that there are photographs that affirm that something in my memory actually happened, rather than something I imagined.
I can remember the waiting room in the hospital when my youngest sister was born {I had just turned 3} - my grandparents took us and my aunt was in the waiting room. I remember going in to see Brittany for the first time and the nurse gave me a hospital gown to wear. I remember being anxious because I thought I had to take off my clothes to wear the gown {I did not}. I remember sitting on the hospital bed and holding my baby sister and feeling confused and important. I know that all this happened because there is a picture of me holding her while wearing a hospital gown.
Talk to each other.
At the end of the day, as I'm tucking Judah in bed, we talk about all the things we did that day. Right now, I do most of the talking, but he's getting the hang of it and will jump in sometimes to share what he remembers {most of the time he remembers what food he ate}. Then, during the day, I usually try to bring up something that we've done in the recent past, "Do you remember when we took the blue blanket outside in the back yard? We played on the swing and kicked the white ball. We both laughed when I swung you from side-to-side!" It's helping both him and me to not forget what we've done together.
I also do this with Lyle, but on a larger scale. He doesn't love it because I usually catch him off-guard. I'll ask him to tell me something that he remembers about specific time periods in our lives. I just like remembering together, but hearing it in his words. It's like having someone read a book of your life aloud to you.
Ask for details.
I know, this is like a cheat-point because I've already talked about details, but I recently read an article in New York Magazine that made me realize how important this is. The article explores one reason why girls often have stronger memories than boys and it came down to how their parents talked to them while recollecting events as a young child. When you have conversations with your children about their days, you are teaching them how to remember. Parents, apparently, have a tendency to ask for more details from their daughters than their sons. Because the girls then associated events with more details {emotions, specific sensory images} they remembered the event more clearly in later years.
My dad is an incredible story-teller. One of my favorite memories as a child is of my dad telling us stories of his own childhood. He told them in such detail that it felt like I knew my dad as a kid. And when he said, "I know what it's like to be a kid/teenager," I believed him. I want my own kids to be able to tell their kids their own tales of a happy childhood. So, I will make it a point to ask for and share details of what is happening in our lives.
What do you do to intentionally remember in order to not forget?
In the last installment of this series within a series, let's talk about some ways we can intentionally remember.
Talk about events in detail with people who were there.
This collaborative remembering makes for more balanced remembering. Since we really remember only the last time we remembered an event, rather than the actual occurrence, having other people share their memory helps our recollection to not be skewed. Use sensory and feeling words, as these words help to anchor memories and thereby gives us more entry points to the memory.
Talk about events in detail with people who weren't there.
Be a story-teller. Share with your friends, spouse, and children things that happened to you as a child or just yesterday. Again, use those detail words {do I sound like a teacher?}. Retelling stories helps us to remember them and it gives those around you the opportunity to connect with you.
Look at pictures and talk about what you remember.
I love doing this with Judah. We sit with the iPhone, he finds my photo app, and he swipes through pictures. As he does, we talk to him about what was happening in that picture. We talk about how exciting it was at the Children's Museum when he saw the train or went shopping in the grocery store. He tells the story of knocking his cup in the floor while eating spaghetti {he's watched the video so many times, he knows it by heart...and laughs every time}.
I often wonder if having a camera so readily available will help us and our kids remember better. I know that I've always loved looking at pictures of myself and my family from when I was a child. Sometimes I'm not sure if I have an actual memory or if I just remember a photograph. I do know that there are photographs that affirm that something in my memory actually happened, rather than something I imagined.
I can remember the waiting room in the hospital when my youngest sister was born {I had just turned 3} - my grandparents took us and my aunt was in the waiting room. I remember going in to see Brittany for the first time and the nurse gave me a hospital gown to wear. I remember being anxious because I thought I had to take off my clothes to wear the gown {I did not}. I remember sitting on the hospital bed and holding my baby sister and feeling confused and important. I know that all this happened because there is a picture of me holding her while wearing a hospital gown.
Talk to each other.
At the end of the day, as I'm tucking Judah in bed, we talk about all the things we did that day. Right now, I do most of the talking, but he's getting the hang of it and will jump in sometimes to share what he remembers {most of the time he remembers what food he ate}. Then, during the day, I usually try to bring up something that we've done in the recent past, "Do you remember when we took the blue blanket outside in the back yard? We played on the swing and kicked the white ball. We both laughed when I swung you from side-to-side!" It's helping both him and me to not forget what we've done together.
I also do this with Lyle, but on a larger scale. He doesn't love it because I usually catch him off-guard. I'll ask him to tell me something that he remembers about specific time periods in our lives. I just like remembering together, but hearing it in his words. It's like having someone read a book of your life aloud to you.
Ask for details.
I know, this is like a cheat-point because I've already talked about details, but I recently read an article in New York Magazine that made me realize how important this is. The article explores one reason why girls often have stronger memories than boys and it came down to how their parents talked to them while recollecting events as a young child. When you have conversations with your children about their days, you are teaching them how to remember. Parents, apparently, have a tendency to ask for more details from their daughters than their sons. Because the girls then associated events with more details {emotions, specific sensory images} they remembered the event more clearly in later years.
My dad is an incredible story-teller. One of my favorite memories as a child is of my dad telling us stories of his own childhood. He told them in such detail that it felt like I knew my dad as a kid. And when he said, "I know what it's like to be a kid/teenager," I believed him. I want my own kids to be able to tell their kids their own tales of a happy childhood. So, I will make it a point to ask for and share details of what is happening in our lives.
What do you do to intentionally remember in order to not forget?
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| Not forgetting painting on the door. He was beyond excited. |
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| Not forgetting that little boys love sticks. |
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| Not forgetting the way my seven-week old baby smiles in the sunshine. |
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This is the twelfth post in the series 31 Days of Not Forgetting.
If you'd like to read previous posts in the series, click here and scroll to the bottom.
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