Remembering changes me

The word "remember" can mean different things.

To quote dictionary.com, it can mean: to recall to the mind by an act or effort of memory.

It can also mean: to retain in the memory.

The difference between these two concepts has struck me in what could be a sign that it is time for another transition in this process of remembering every day that passes.

My aim when I began this process was to be able to retain every day of my life in my memory so I could remember where I was, who I was with and what I was doing on any day of my life, at least from then on.

I have achieved this goal for every day since 17 December 2011 - and some of the days back to January 2011 as I have been trying to fill in the blanks on my mental calendar.

The review method I use involves regularly recalling to mind the images I have pinned to my mental calendar for each day as memory tags. I refresh these images at least once per month under the technique I am currently using.

But reviewing past memories is, to an extent, to relive the moments: every day I am reconnected to points along my inexorably growing timeline.

There are benefits from actively remembering that I have explored on this blog: from being reminded someone's birthday is approaching to being reminded of my own mortality and the finite number of days I have to come. And all levels of profundity in between.

But there is something else going on.

We all carry our pasts with us, but I actually gather mine in my arms every day through this review process.

I'm wondering what impact this is having - and whether I should continue.

In the past, whenever I've felt the desire to stop reviewing past days it has been because it is taking too long, but on each occasion I've cut the number of days in the review to make the process more manageable and been happy to continue.

My current process is manageable. As I've written here, reviews are just part of my routine and do not distract me from living in the moment.

But now I'm realising this daily reconnection to my past has an impact I don't yet understand.

Tithing

Tithing is setting aside 10% of income for the church. I don't do that, but the concept of ring-fencing some money for altruistic purposes is something I have found to be beneficial.

The image pinned to my mental calendar as a memory tag for 26 May 2013 is visiting a church my wife likes in the capital. They announced the guest preacher would actually appear in a recording of a sermon given recently at another church and would help us with our finances.


It was about giving 10% of income to the church, which seemed to be more about helping the church with its finances. The key message was to make the payment as soon as any income was received.

While churches undeniably do a lot of good work, such as in helping the homeless, reaching out to the lonely, and so on, there are other things I would not like my money to be used for, such as the attack on homosexuality. Bible teaching is often cited as justification for homophobia, while other texts are ignored, such as that banning women speaking in church, prohibiting divorce and extolling trial by ordeal to detect adultery. I am told some texts have to be seen in the context of their time, whereas others are the unchallengeable instruction of God to be followed today. Which is which seems to be the choice of the speaker.

All the same, I decided to put away 10% of income, whether from my salary, freelance work or - should it ever amount to anything - advertising income from this blog.

A substantial sum of money builds up quite quickly in this way. While this hasn't helped my finances, as making ends meet with what remains is a bigger challenge, it is satisfyingly liberating: this tithe money is for God's work, as I understand it to be.

That sometimes has involved giving the money to good causes, such as donating to aid work for Syrian refugees (a far more generous amount than I would otherwise have considered), a project I support in Africa, exceptional expenses where I have been the unfortunate victim of fate (the car breaking down) or whatever.

It is not just a saving fund as there are some things that do not feel right to pay from it, such as my forthcoming air ticket to my wife's country. That, I feel, should come from "my" money. But when she had to return suddenly due to a family illness recently and we had to buy a special ticket, my special fund could be used.

Resisting time's collapse

I realise now that I was used to time collapsing.

If I think to my childhood and our sitting around the table for Sunday lunch, I can recall very vivid images and particular incidents. But I do not remember specific days. These memories are conglomerates, one Sunday in my memory represents however many hundreds of times we sat down together.

If I think to just a few years ago, when we were in my wife's country and she was working in a particular office, I can remember making trips to collect her. But it is difficult to remember if she worked there for three months or ten. The days have merged and the time has blurred.

Since beginning this process I can remember every day of the past 22 months.

And I find there is something strange, even a little unsettling, in the fact that time has not collapsed.

As I recall having my hair cut on 21 March 2012 while waiting for my car to have a new section of exhaust fitted, I have a desire to let this memory concertina into all the other memories of having my hair cut while living in the same town. Yet, I remember as separate events every trip I have made to the barbers during this period.

As time passes my recollection does alter. There is a different flavour to the visits to past days when I refresh the images pinned to my internal calendar as memory tags. The recent past is fresher, but I am the same, my habits and concerns are unchanged. Looking further back, I can remember when those days too were as fresh, but now they have lost their freshness and the person I was then was focussed on different things.

Before I began this process, those days would have faded. Events would have merged, or been forgotten. After a while, I would be scratching my head to remember where we were living during that time, perhaps even whether we were in my country or my wife's. How long we stayed would be a mystery without looking to a calendar.

Except now I know instantly that we moved into the flat we rented on Thursday 29 December 2011 and spent a very happy time there before moving out on Thursday 27 September 2012.

That time hasn't collapsed, but every time I refresh the images for those days they are a little more distant and, while I may have changed, it seems strange that days now long gone have not faded.

Refresh technique

The technique I use for remembering every day that passes has developed since I began this process on 17 December 2011. Here I will describe my current technique for refreshing the images pinned to my mental calendar. See the post My mental calendar for details of how my calendar is arranged and the post How it began for information on how I form images.

If you are interested in trying the same process, you might like to browse through my past posts tagged How I remember to see how my technique has changed as the number of days I am dealing with has grown. These posts include further details on how I form images.

The technique I will describe here is for refreshing a selection of the images every day so I don't forget them. This technique was forced on me as my previous technique broke down because it took too long and wasn't sustainable. I have been following this new technique since 4 July 2013.

When I first wake up, I take today's date and think back to 6 months before. So today being Wednesday 23 October, I think back to 23 April, which I know - because I remember - was a Tuesday. I recall the image for that day and the following day to create a two day window that ends on the same day of the week as today. For some months, I'll have to move to the correct days in the week for this alignment.

From refreshing Wednesday 24 April, I add 6 days to give me the date Tuesday 30 April and again refresh the Tuesday and Wednesday images.

I continue this process of passing a two-day window over each week until I reach about a month ago. In this case, that brings me to Tuesday 24 September. I back up to 23 September to be on the same date as today and then refresh the images for each consecutive day until I reach today. That is, I review all of images for the past month.

In total that's around 70 images, which need only take a few minutes. It often takes longer as I like to explore the memories a little and sometimes have to scramble around to find an elusive image. There are various postings here tagged "lost images" on how I've managed to recover those that first eluded me.

That is the first phase of my review completed.

Then at some point during the day - perhaps while getting washed, cycling to work, going for run, driving or some other free mental time - I'll run through the images for the same date each month from January 2011. So in this case I begin with 23 January 2011, then move on through 23 February, 23 March and so on, right up until the present day. In some cases this will repeat some of the reviews I've already done. I've worked out a quick and easy way to orientate myself through the days in the week in this phase of the review, described here.

In this way I am refreshing one image per month for periods older than 6 months. Continuing to the present day exercises my recall muscles and helps to build associations between images for days separated by a month.

January 2011 is before I began this process of remembering every day that passes on 17 December 2011 and many days during this period have no images associated with them, so I recall the nearest. It is a habit I have got into, partly to remember what happened during 2011, and partly because the contrast with the period when I do have images for every single day is stark and helps to motivate me to continue.

This is the second phase of my review.

UPDATE 28 December 2014: I have recently modified the second phase of my review, to include two consecutive days per month, which I refresh over two days. With over three years of memory tags, this seems more manageable. More details here.

Generally, though not always, at some point during the day, I'll also think back to where I was a year ago, two years ago and sometimes back further, occasionally as far back as my early childhood. In this remembering I can only say for certain what I was doing a year ago or perhaps two, but I think it is important to remember and recall my life before I began this process of remembering every day that passes.

Finally, as I lay down to sleep I run through the images for the past month once more, adding in the image for the day just lived that will gradually become entrenched on my mental calendar as the day moves inexorably back through the weeks, months and years.

Trees

I have been using this process of remembering every day that passes to remember other key information as well, such as new people I meet, the names of friends' children and what facilities are available at different stops along the routes that I drive.

Now I'm applying it to trees.

I had a weekend away in a rural area with my wife recently. The image pinned to my mental calendar for one of the days is walking in the countryside and looking at a tree. My wife was interested to learn the name of trees and though I am no expert, knowing only half a dozen types, I explained how I had learned those I did know. The first step is to become aware of a particular type of tree. Once I had noted the tree - its leaves, its bark, its shape - I would keep an eye out for it. Sure enough, I would inevitably see it elsewhere and so build the ability to identify it as "that new tree". Then I'd look it up in a reference book to put a name to it. I've found this much more effective than studying the reference book and trying to memorise the details then spot the trees.

So for 7 October 2013 my memory tag includes this particular tree. We spotted it again on subsequent walks and were able to put a name to it as an Ash tree.

We continued to sight it and it has become a common theme of some subsequent tags, which helps me to recall those image. It is in my memory tag for 15 October, finding it on a garden walk at the place we visited with my parents for lunch. On another day out we spotted a tree with similar leaves and red berries, which features in my memory tag for 17 October. Checking the reference book, this is a Mountain Ash, or Rowan Tree.

In refreshing the memory tags I both remember the features and names of these trees, and the common theme helps me remember images for different days.

Unlost images

This process of remembering every day that passes continues to progress well.

My current review routine takes little time, even as the days pile up.

Inexorably, the images pinned to my mental calendar as memory tags move from being reviewed every day, to twice per week, to once per month. As ever, it is often the past few days that are the most confusing: for example, was it Monday or Tuesday I went there?

The day-per-month reviews haven't given me problems for a while now. As I switched to this review routine on 4 July, I'm now giving these days their refresh for the fourth time.

Images that have proven to be elusive in past reviews have given me no problem this time around.

Sometimes it is remembering an image was lost and how I found it again that brings it to mind. For example, the image for 12 March 2012 once eluded me. It came up again today - it being 12 October, I was reviewing the 12th of each month. But I instantly remembered how I remembered when I lost it and there it was.

This is a good sign.

Longer months

On October 1, I reviewed the images pinned to my mental calendar for the 1st day of each month since January 2011. I start the review before the date I began this process of remembering every day that passes (17 December 2011) partly because I am trying to fill in the blanks for 2011 and partly because the contrast between finding blanks and finding every day remembered helps to motivate me to continue.

When I do these reviews, I have a sense of the days surrounding the one I remember from the image. It struck me when I recalled February 1 that it had been a while since I had revisited January 31. The reason is simply because September has only 30 days, so I had missed reviewing the 31st day of each month.

I repeated the review since January 2011 recalling the images for the 31st of each month. Obviously 5 months do not have 31 days.

This threw up an interesting mathematical pattern.

I orientate myself through the days of the week by counting on the days over 28 in a month. Here's why. When February has 28 days, the corresponding dates in March fall on the same day. The dates in other months are shifted by the number of days over 28. So December 31, 2011 was a Saturday. Therefore, January 31, 2012 was three days later: a Tuesday.

There was no February 31, 2012, but if there had been it would have fallen three days later again: a Friday. As February had 29 days in 2012, March 31, 2012, would be one day later: Saturday. And, in fact, it was. I instantly know because I remember it was the day we drove home from my parents house with my nephew, to be collected by my brother the following day.

Initially it was a surprise to me that the pattern worked when stepping through non-existent days. But it holds true and makes jumping to the next month straightforward.

There was no April 31, 2012, but if there had been it would have fallen three days later in the week: Tuesday. As April has 30 days, May 31, 2012, would be two days later: Thursday. Which it was. I remember it well. I made a special trip to a shopping mall in the capital.

Unpack what is happening with the numbers and it makes sense why this works.

Days like old friends

This process of remembering every day that passes has now just become part of my life.

Without wishing to tempt fate, the routine seems sustainable. It seems a while now since I've struggled to recall the image pinned to my mental calendar as the memory tag for a day.

My more detailed reviews only cover the past 6 months - a two-day window passed over every week and every day of the past month. From January 2011, I just recall one day per month.

Calling up those more distant days less frequently means I sometimes greet them like old friends: instantly familiar, though not constantly in mind.