Sometimes my mind forgets things. Like many people I know I can be scatterbrained and forgetful. I try not to be too hard on myself about it; it’s a function of my age, waxing and waning hormones that go along with it, and the natural progression of life in this fast-paced day and age. Heck, even younger people are forgetting things as their overtaxed, overstimulated, overtechnologized (yes, I know that’s a made-up word) minds can’t keep up with everything that’s going on around them. When our minds are packed so full of information, ideas, thoughts, visions, etc. something is bound to fall out, right?
I was having a philosophical discussion with my son about this a few weeks ago. Technically our brains store virtually everything we’ve ever seen, heard, experienced, etc. The challenge comes in when we try to access (recall) the information. People with photographic memories remember everything they’ve ever read and can recall it in great detail. There are some people who can remember the faces of everyone they’ve ever met, and actually their names as well! I myself don’t have a particularly good memory, although I’ve been trying to exercise my brain playing some of those games on the computer designed to improve my cognitive ability. I’m not totally convinced they’re having a great deal of impact, but they can be a fun way to pass a few minutes and if my brain gets stronger in the process, more’s the better.
I continue to be amazed, however, at the capacity of my body to remember things before my minds does. For example, I can be minding my own business when I can be hit with an overwhelming wave of sadness. “What’s the matter with you?” I chide myself, somewhat impatiently, brushing at my eyes and willing myself to get it together. Eventually I push past it and get on with whatever I was doing when it hit. Sometimes the sadness lasts longer than a few moments and I might go through an entire day battling it, shaking it just enough to function through the course of work, the commute, etc. only to have it reemerge when I’ve quieted myself in preparation for sleep at the close of day. When the sadness lingers into the next day and I find myself dragging through a couple of days perhaps not deeply enmeshed in it, but with a subliminal awareness that I am not quite feeling right. Then I remember–that is, my conscious mind remembers–that I am coming up on the anniversary of some great loss–my mother’s death, my father’s passing, the loss of my job, the ending of my relationship. Ah yes. The mind has forgotten, but the body remembers.
Each year for many years after my mother’s death, I experienced phenomenon I described earlier–a creeping sadness working it’s way through my body as a dragging weight, a pressure in the chest, a tightening of the throat, a stinging of the eyes as they fill with tears, inexplicable emotionality–all of this before my mind catches on that this was the annual rite that I’d come to call “my mommy cells waking up.” My body remembers before my conscious mind catches up. Now, I am coming up on the anniversary of my father’s death four years ago. Four years ago today I flew from California home to Indiana to sit by his bedside, and hold his hand, and listen to his gasping breaths as I sat vigil with him during the last 48 hours of his life. My daddy cells began waking some weeks ago. I should have recognized them for what they were, but this year they’ve been masked by other stressors and emotions and so were hidden from my awareness until now.
Some scientists scoff at the idea of “cellular” or “tissue memory,” and perhaps the idea of one’s body “remembering” is unlikely or unscientific or something to be scoffed at. All I know is that for me certain sights, sounds, smells can invoke a particular memory not simply in my head, but often in my body. And when my conscious mind can’t make sense of why I am inexplicably struggling with a mental, physical, and emotional phenomenon like sadness, I can often trace it back to memories of some traumatic event.
So what does any of this have to do with gratitude? Heck, I don’t know. I am grateful to have the insight into knowing that my body is following a particular rhythm to the cycles of life and death as I’ve experienced them around me. I miss my parents’ physical presence in my life, and while my mind is able to “move on” and push through and past any lingering grief at their loss, my body remembers and allows my heart and mind to align briefly in acknowledgment. I wish I could articulate this better; this is one of those topics that I feel much more clearly and deeply than I can explain. Overall I am grateful for the wisdom and insights I gain from listening to what my body is telling me and tuning in to what’s happening beneath the surface of conscious thought. There, if I pay careful attention, I will find the answer to questions I hadn’t realized I was asking. And for that I am especially grateful.
