There was a time when we memorized things because we had to. But also because we wanted to. It’s been 45 years, but I can still remember my first girlfriend’s phone number: 998-2045.
Seven digits. No area code or speed dial. No speakerphone or mute button. Just the haptic reassurance of manually dialing her number on the wall phone in our kitchen. I knew it the way we used to know things: by heart. By letting them become a part of us.
Sure, it’s useless clutter today. Clutter that likely keeps me from remembering things that are more important. But once memorized it’s impossible to let it go.
Ben Rector (Old Friends)
The Quiet Revolution
We used to know things deeply in our soul.
But, somewhere along the way to tech nirvana, we got lazy. We stopped memorizing phone numbers, birthdays, anniversaries. It became unnecessary—information that’s as useless as an old phone book.
All that technology and convenience quietly robbed us of something deeply human. We transitioned from participants in our lives to spectators of our lives. My iPhone now knows more about me than my wife does.
The Wisdom We Traded
But here’s the thing: we didn’t just reduce the clutter in our memory bank. In the name of convenience we traded some more important things away.
We lost intentionality.
We lost connection.
We lost wisdom.
ThePower of Identity
Neurologist Dr. Oliver Sacks (1933-2015) was obsessed with memory and what makes us who we are.
“Memory is identity. I have no past, no story, no self without memory.”
Dr. Oliver Sacks
Our memory is a personal cartographer, of sorts. It’s a map of where we’ve been and what we’ve seen.
Today we rely on Waze and Uber to guide us. We rely on digital calendars and contacts apps to make sure we show up at the right place and time for a meeting. We rely on Artificial Intelligence to remind us of the attendees and key takeaways from the last meeting.
All this sounds like an upgrade—until you realize the trade off; the cost.
The Cost of Convenience
There is a cost to all of this technology and convenience. It will take generations to unfold. But, it seems to me that we’re losing part of our identity. We’re also losing something else.
Prior to the introduction of the Waze app, London cab drivers were forced to memorize 25,000 streets. A 2008 study found that those same cab drivers had larger hippocampi—the brain’s memory and spatial navigation center. The skill of memory literally made their brains bigger.
Nobel Prize-winning neuroscientist Eric Kandel found that memory rewires the brain. When we learn, we change the shape of our minds. Which begs the question: if we don’t memorize anything today, what’s doing the shaping?
With all this technology, our brains aren’t having to work as hard at remembering things. Over time, our brain can start to atrophy like an unused muscle. This lack of “exercise” is partially fueling the explosive growth in dementia and other neurological disorders. The number of adults with dementia is projected to double by 2060.
Intellect vs. Wisdom
In the past, our intellect was largely determined by how much we knew—how much we had crammed into the hard drive in our brains. Today, intellect is largely a function of how quickly we can find data and information from third parties.
Intellect is not Wisdom
Thomas Sowell
Wisdom, on the other hand, involves good judgment, practical understanding of life, and the ability to make sound decisions based on experience and deeper insight. Knowing how to access information is only half the battle. Real wisdom is knowing how to interpret information effectively in real-world situations.
Intellect is knowing that a tomato is fruit. Wisdom is knowing it doesn’t belong in fruit salad.
Our memory is meant to be exercised, not exorcised. Like a garden, it needs tending, pruning, weeding, and, of course, reaping and sowing.
The Erosion of Effort
There was a time when someone remembering your birthday or anniversary with a note or greeting card was deeply meaningful. Because, remembering someone’s birthday, their anniversary, or their phone number are simple acts of connection, of attention.
But automation changed that sentiment. Technology and convenience cheapened thoughtfulness, memory, and intentionality.
Sure it’s great to get 175 🎂🎉🥳🎈on Facebook on your special day. But, there is something highly impersonal about an automated social media message. Particularly when it’s created by a Facebook data center in rural Virginia that automatically tells everyone it’s your birthday.
When did we decide these things are no longer worth committing to memory?
“Attention is the rarest and purest form of generosity.”
Simone Weil
We traded intentionality for convenience. We traded attention for efficiency. We traded wisdom for intellect.
And in the process, we’ve slowly trained ourselves to stop paying attention to the things that once gave our lives texture; things that matter. We transitioned from participants in our lives to spectators of our lives.
The Way Forward
Real wisdom requires attention. It requires commitment. It requires us to carry the things that really matter within us—to make them a part of who we are.
I don’t need that old phone number anymore. But some things, while seemingly trivial, deserve to live in your soul forever.
The question isn’t whether we can go back—it’s whether we’re willing to choose what deserves to be remembered, and then do the work of remembering it.
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This post was previously published on Wit & Wisdom.
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“[Wisdom] requires us to carry the things that really matter within us…” This implies that there are experiences that do not matter, that in fact may be toxic if held brightly in memory. Many individuals struggle with past experiences, bad relationships, traumatic incidents. The goal for many of us is to use wisdom to decipher what things should be forgotten, and then to use our intellect and awareness of the present moment to work toward forgetting. Meditation facilitates the forgetting and helps us to reside in the present rather than the past.