There is a 100% chance that if you are reading this then you still have at least the smallest amount of life left, but hopefully you have many good healthy years ahead of you. When you look back on what you have done, how many things could you name given an hour? The chances are it is lower than you think.

The brain has a vast memory capacity that estimates to be 2.5 petabytes, which in simpler terms is 2.5 million gigabytes. So you may think that you would be able to remember most of your life when you hear this, but your brain forgets over 80% of your memories. If you don’t believe this, name 10 things you did a week from whatever day it is today. You make approximately 864,000 memories a day, so if this is true you should be able to remember 5361120000 over a whole lifetime.

All of this is probably confusing, but one more question is, will you even remember reading this tomorrow? What about in a month? Or even 10 years? By then you will not remember reading this, which is weird to think about because right now you are reading this and will have no recollection of this moment. So the next question moving on from this is how would you remember more?

I like the definition of “memorable moment” because I think it sums up how a memory becomes a memory. The definition states “Something that is memorable is worth remembering or likely to be remembered, because it is special or very enjoyable.” In other words things likely to be remembered are your own birthday or your guardians first names because those are things that are likely to be remembered, but what about something that is worth remembering.

What makes a memory worth remembering? Kaleb Hunt with Medium summed it up in his own way and this is what he said:

“Here’s my theory: It’s the ones that make you feel something when you didn’t expect to. The ones that slip past logic and land straight in your chest. The small ones that told you something big. The laugh that broke the tension. The silence that felt safe. The text that came at the exact right time. The look across the room that reminded you you’re not as alone as you think. We don’t remember them because they were big. We remember them because they were honest.”

I will put the link here so you can check it out because it is a great article. A memory worth remembering is something not normal or something that does not happen every day. You can’t just wait for memories to come to you because you have to create them.

There is still much more time to create memorable memories. Take pictures, record videos, write them down in your diary or on your fridge or wherever because you will want to look back on your memories because soon enough it will be 30 years from now and all the memories you made along the way have just become nostalgia. Not because you are sad that it is gone, but because you are happy that you got to experience it. Because all life really is, is a collection of memories.