Oscar Wilde once said, “Memory… is the diary that we all carry about with us.” We always have our memory in our pockets and it would leave a smile on our face every time we remember it – but imagine a life without memories to recall? Wouldn’t it be very depressing and very boring? Memories are very essential in our lives because they allow us to grow and learn to be a better person. Our recollections can teach us very important life lessons, demonstrate skills and abilities and can make us feel happy and entertained. There are so much more things that our memories can do and how beneficial it is in our lives.
First of all, our memories are very essential because it teach us very important life lessons that we can use and apply in the future. By having memories, we will know what is right and what is wrong. We can remember where we did our mistakes and learn from it. Time would pass by, responsibilities would build up – that is why memory is very important in our lives. From what we have learned, we can be able to apply it further in life. Famous people and athletes like Michael Jordan will not achieve what he is if he did not learn from his lessons. Michael Jordan was rejected from the basketball varsity team when he was in high school- but look at him now, he is a famous basketball player. We all made mistakes , yet it taught us lessons that are very useful – because of our memories we are able to know what is fair and right to make us a responsible and a better person.
In the same way, while memories teach us very important lessons, it also teach us skills and abilities that we can attain. Abilities like singing, dancing, playing instruments and etc. – we can obtain those talents by practicing. Through our memories, we can also know the things we mostly do everyday, like being able to cook, studying and doing some chores at home. For example, learning an instrument for band class is not an easy task. There are so many skills and abilities that we can do. Therefore, these examples shows us that having memories are very crucial and vital in our lives because it will definitely help us do the basic tasks we need in life when we grow up – and we can also share our talents.
Furthermore, we can reminisce these recollections when time passes by – to keep us happy and entertained. In the novel, “The Giver”, the community are limited from some of their memories. All the forgotten memories have been transferred to the “Giver” and will only stay in him. The people’s retention of color, love, war and pain are taken away from them. They did not have “true happiness” because they did not have access to some of their memories. If that situation happened to us, our life would be like black and white. We would not be able to remember the things we have done. Every thing that we do is a memory we are doing but how can we do that if we are limited from our own memories(like the people in the Giver)? Whenever we are in sorrow, our memories are there to help us remember the good times that would keep us happy and motivated that is why it is very essential in our lives. By the time we get old, our memories would always stay in our brain and in our hearts that it would bring happiness as we remember the things we did.
Now that we know how essential our memory is in our lives. According to Paul Reber, Professor of Psychology at Northwestern University, our brain can store up to an store 2.5 Petabytes of data – that’s 2,500,000 Gigabytes, or 300 years worth of TV. Our memories are limitless and because of that, we can know and learn more. It can teach us so much more basics of life lessons. We can develop more skills as time passes by. By thinking back from the things we have done, we are able to keep ourselves entertained and happy – we can “throwback” to so much more things because our memory can store so much data. Therefore, we should treasure and cherish all the things we do while it lasts in our minds – like Dr. Seuss once said, “Sometimes you will never know the value of a moment until it becomes a memory”.