Memories and the Present Moment

 After last week's post on the nature of the interrelatedness of what we call self with other people and even things, I got to thinking about memory. What is it, and how does it work? In particular, I was interested in how memory interacts with the present moment.

Before addressing memory, we need to establish what the present moment is. This is not easy. The present moment seems to be composed, for the most part, of anticipations, of ways of organizing toward a conceptualized and hoped-for near term future. For instance, if I am having a genial conversation with a friend, I focus on how to keep the geniality and friendliness flowing. I anticipate conversation topics that may amuse or entertain my friend. I anticipate topics that may comfort her. I pay attention to how what I am saying impacts her so that I can adjust, if needed, my tenor and emphasis. This is all toward keeping the conversation flowing into the future. I can sense her doing something similar in response to me.

The strange thing is, the future keeps receding as the present moves. We never get "there," even though we both move toward it in our anticipations. That said, there is no real goal in the conversation. We are together just to enjoy each other's company, just to enjoy the flow of the conversation and to reaffirm our affection for each other. Nevertheless, even in such a relaxed and present-oriented interchange, we keep anticipating and organizing the future. 

What is the present moment? It is a way of anticipating and moving toward possible futures. The present is replete with anticipation. This anticipation rests on conceptualizing, on having ideas about what the future can hold. Much of this conceptualizing takes place beneath conscious awareness. We don't consciously think about how to turn and form the conversation. We do it on a prereflective, but nonetheless conceptual, level.

Memory comes into play as it is jogged by the present moment. But memories don't come back in the fullness of the past moment they are attached to. They come back compacted, crystallized, and condensed. For instance, last week on this blog I discussed my memory of Mr. Moran's typing class from high school. I noted that I spent about 45-50 hours in that class, but I don't remember all that time. Rather, I have condensed it down into a few images and snippets. This makes human memory profoundly different than computer memory. The two shouldn't even share the same word. Computer memory works on particulars. Human memory is based on abstracting and works using figurative devices such as metaphor and metonymy.

What's more, the use of a memory in the present moment changes the memory. In its interaction with the future-oriented present, a memory becomes refigured and redrawn, its metaphors and metonymies alter. My having remembered the typing class just now has changed my sense of it forever. Memories do not contain the past. They contain crystallized images and conceptions of past interacting with the present, and all these interactions affect each other, so even the past, as held in memory, alters.

Memories are jogged because the present moment, in its anticipation of the future, calls to them. In a strange sort of way, possible futures call to memory. The present moment is this interacting between possible futures and the memories, from the past, that are jogged by those anticipations.

For instance, in my conversation with my friend she brings up a great apple she ate the day before. This jogs my memory that the university in my state recently bred a new type of apple. Anticipating that my friend will find this information interesting, I share it with her. She shares with me how her father taught her how to grow apple trees in the backyard. Memories are in the service of a desired future outcome. The present moment is the interrelating of memory with conceptualized possible futures.

Is it possible to just be in the present moment? Is there a way to shut down the constant buzzing of anticipations and jogged memories? Possibly. I study Zen, and I meditate a lot. I do it to foster a way of perceiving that is broader than conceptualization. I do it to see more by allowing this constant interplay between memory and anticipation to settle.

I do it because I seem to be always working towards something, even in my more relaxed moments. I want to just see what is here with me. I'm not trying to stop thoughts. Thinking is part of being human. Rather, I am allowing myself to notice that which I typically overlook in my conceptualizing. I don't believe I necessarily do this very often. Nonetheless, each moment is a chance to see anew, around and beneath the clutter of anticipations and memories. 

What else is there besides memories and anticipations? A lot. But it takes effort to calm the mind to see this. In some ways I live in the fog of my thoughts. In other ways I am engaged in the flow of the uniqueness of each moment. I assume this is true with everyone.