You may be relieved to know this, but I'm afraid to say your memory skills are sharper than you think. To those who think they're oftentimes forgetful, believe it or not—and I know you will believe me—you are actually really amazing at remembering sh*t. Which is good. So why am I saddened by what is supposedly a useful human ability to have? Because people seem to fall back on their memory only to remember bad things that have happened. On top of that, they never fail to remember you for the mistakes you've made.
What is it about people that make people wonder about people? One answer could be strange qualities. We're strange in that we forget information that doesn't particularly matter to us, even when we're told a thousand times to remember it. Having a good working memory enables us to learn and more importantly to live safely from one day to the next. It ensures that we are able to take information, whether true or not, and use it to create a basis on which simple (and difficult) decisions can be made. I'm talking about decisions that we don't need to consciously think about making. I'll avoid a giant pothole in the ground after I've seen someone drive their beautiful car over it, and I'll continue to avoid the vicious crater until it is covered up. I would have saved my tires from possibly puncturing and my car from experiencing premature wear in other areas I wouldn't even know about, and I'd have my wonderful memory to thank. (Thank you, memory.) Humans are pretty amazing to be able to do that. We rely on our memory at times where we could potentially get hurt. When we need to remember something that could help us to prevent physical or emotional damage to ourselves, we turn to our memory. We tend to remember negative thoughts and actions because we are simply watching out for ourselves and we don't want to fall into the same traps into which others have previously fallen, where they have gotten hurt as a result. This is a good thing. But keep in mind that only people are capable of bringing people down.
I think you've heard this before, but it stands out to me because it is symbolic of both sadness and truth combined, or tradness. Or sruth. You could be a saint all your life, and by saint I mean a good person whose worst mistake was forgetting their best friend's birthday (which is not good!). But once you've made a faulty decision that damages your reputation (reputation (n.): the common opinion that people have about someone or something), you have now made an infamous name for yourself and suddenly you're despicable in the eyes of everybody in the world. You can try to convince others that you're still the same, good person you always were, but what good will that do when people always remember the mistakes you've made? We shouldn't be out to get others and bring them down while they're probably already at their lowest point. Have some sympathy, because God knows nobody knows how to feel empathy these days. We need to break out of this cycle we have of making judgments about other people while sporting the mentality that you're somehow greater and less-deserving of being judged yourself.
