Tag: memory

Playing it Back

As I picked up the cup, I felt it slide.

My grip seemed strong, and my focus was top-notch. Yet, gravity was inclined to foil my efforts.

My reflexes took over, clutching the cup tighter. My hands trembled momentarily, but I was able to steady myself.

Crisis averted, I thought. Or maybe not.

I looked down at my custom football jersey, now splashed with beer. When my hands had trembled, some of the liquid had left the cup — and ended up on one of my most expensive pieces of clothing.

It was the cruelest of ironies. I don’t drink; I was bringing the beer to my mother, sitting at a table nearby. And yet, I’d paid the price for chivalry.

Back at the table, with the beer now handed off, my mind began racing. I was counting the seconds until I could get home and carefully place the jersey in the wash. And I was reliving my quasi-disaster, playing it back over and over to see where things went wrong.

I was stuck on a road to nowhere.

If I could turn back time.

This is more than a famous Cher song. It’s a common lament. A wish with no chance of being granted.

For time moves in but one direction — forward. Attempting to re-litigate the past is foolhardy.

And yet, we continue to try.

There’s a reason why time travel movies are so popular. There’s a reason fashion trends cycle every few decades. There’s a reason why songs about regret — including that Cher tune — persist.

We are obsessed with playing it back. We are consumed by the thought of one tweak yielding a different outcome.

We’d rather not look at the spilled beer on our cherished jersey. We’d rather not sweep up the shattered glass from the kitchen floor. We’d rather not face the conundrum we find ourselves in.

Far better to picture an entirely different reality.

Even if conjuring such illusions amounts to little more than wasted energy.

I sat in the classroom, staring at the whiteboard.

My business school professor was introducing the concept of decision trees, and I was mesmerized.

Not by the myriad probabilities and the complicated math. All of that was over my head.

No, the concept itself had me enthralled.

You see, I had long dreamed of seeing all the possibilities in front of me and choosing the optimal one. For I had obsessed over the moments that caused bad outcomes, imagining how they could have gone better.

I tended to do this more with the little things in my life than the big ones. I rarely played back my decision to move to a new state or to jump to a new vocation.

But that trek down a muddy path that got my shoes dirty? That money I wasted because I forgot to use a discount code? I’d chew on those missteps for months.

Now, I had a visual aid for this fixation. I could draw the branches and vividly explore the alternatives.

I could make the imperfect art of playing it back a bit smoother.

And so, my games of what if intensified. What was once an arcane exercise turned into a data driven endeavor. One whose futility was masked by ferocity.

Nothing could deter me from this sorry crusade. At least not until the day I spilled some beer on my cherished football jersey.

For my mother caught me in this sad spiral. And she would have none of it.

Stop reliving it, she scolded me. We’ll get the jersey clean and move on.

It wasn’t exactly earth-shattering advice. But it changed my approach entirely.

For my mother’s words exposed an underlying truth. This obsession with playing it back, with decision trees, with alternatives — it wasn’t about hiding in the past for me. No, I kept going to the tape as a means of control.

If I could find the root cause of bad outcomes, I could avoid them in the future. At least that was the thought.

But things happen, regardless of my attempts to avoid them. It would be far better for me to focus on my response than to keep digging for the root cause.

With that ethos in tow, I find myself playing it less often.

In September 2008, the Miami Dolphins and the New England Patriots met for a football game in Massachusetts.

The game was billed as a massive mismatch. New England had won 21 straight games in the regular season, had dominated the division both teams played in, and had played in the most recent Super Bowl. While the Patriots were missing their injured star quarterback, they still had Bill Belichick — the best head coach in the National Football League.

In the days leading up to the game, Belichick prepared meticulously. He watched hours of game film, noting the Dolphins’ patterns and tendencies. And he formed a game plan to exploit those tendencies.

But once the game started, it was Belichick who was exploited.

The Dolphins rolled out a new offensive formation. The running back would line up where the quarterback normally did, taking the snap directly. He would then rush to the outside behind a convoy of blockers. Or he might zip it to a nearby wide receiver if the defense left that receiver open.

Miami hadn’t used this formation — the Wildcat — in any of its prior games. Belichick hadn’t prepared for it, and neither had the New England defense.

The Dolphins ran roughshod over the Patriots, earning the victory on the way to a division title. New England ended up missing the playoffs.

This game showed how playing it back has its limits.

Video footage has revolutionized football, taking coaching, scouting, and player safety to the next level. But it can’t tell all.

There’s always a surprise looming that the tape can’t find. A Wildcat formation, if you will.

How teams react to that sudden adversity makes all the difference. The players, coaches and staff who can steady themselves through the fog tend to be the ones who claim victory. Those attached to the past find themselves weighed down by it.

The same dichotomy awaits us. Memory is a potent tool. But it’s not all-powerful.

Past doesn’t always make prologue. And dwelling on what’s written can lower the horizons of what we’ve yet to write.

So, let’s move away from playing it back. Let’s get off the what if carousel. Let’s swap out the rehash for the response.

We’ll be better for it.

How Will You Be Remembered?

Legacy.

It’s just one word, and three syllables.

But that word is anything but simple.

Legacy describes the lasting image of us after we’ve left the frame. It describes how we’ll be remembered.

And that can be a tricky subject to broach.

Much like an onion, there are layers to the concept of legacy.

There’s the layer of mortality. Of knowing there will be a time when we’ll no longer be able to add chapters to our story. This truth is as inconceivable as it is inevitable, and many of us struggle to come to terms with it.

There’s the layer of ego. Of obsessing over what others think of us and our accomplishments. Many of us are afflicted with this obsession to some degree, even as society frowns on such selfish fixations.

And then there’s the layer of control. Of when and where we have agency over our narrative.

This layer is the most complicated of the three.

It’s impossible for us to maintain complete control over our legacy, since it lives on long after our heart stops beating. After our light fades, how we’ll ultimately be remembered is anyone’s guess.

We might have a hunch, sure. But as the decades pass and societal norms evolve, what once seemed crystal clear becomes much murkier.

There are many examples of this phenomenon throughout the years. In fact, there’s now a well-known term for it — revisionist history.

And while it’s not a given that our legacy will be rewritten in this manner, it’s certainly a distinct possibility.

Even so, we do have some ability to influence our legacy. The way we live, the values we espouse, and our consistency of purpose can all feed the story others will tell of us.

Shaping that narrative is important work. It’s our only opportunity to have our say, which is why we take on the task so vigorously — even if there’s a chance it will end up fruitless.

It’s this delicate balance, this act of weaving a tale we have no final judgment over, that makes the subject of legacy so intriguing.

And it’s what makes How will you be remembered the most maddening question we face.

The matter of shaping our legacy often comes down to four words.

Do the right thing.

It seems like straightforward advice. Or even common sense.

But the right thing is open to interpretation.

In religious circles, it might mean attending a house of worship, following a certain diet and remaining abstinent until marriage.

In the world of organized crime, it might mean not telling the authorities about your co-conspirators, or not getting behind on your debts.

In the world of politics, it might mean prioritizing your base, or sticking it to the other side of the aisle.

In each instance, those following the code are doing the right thing. They’re staying on the right side of their community’s code of conduct. And they’re ensuring that community will look upon them fondly.

Many of us channel this spirit within our own day-to-day lives. We might not be religious zealots, or mafiosos, or members of the C-suite. But we still fixate on doing what our moral compass deems to be proper.

Through discipline and devotion, we take steps to build our narrative. And we use the community around us as a mirror to gauge our success.

Often times, we’ll use this confirmation bias as a sign of self-righteousness. We’ll assert that our version of the right thing is the one the world will approve of. We’ll believe that we’ll be remembered fondly for years to come, so long as we stick to the path we’ve been following.

But this is delusional.

Our version of the right thing might not be viewed by others as criminal, intolerant or unethical — the way the worlds of organized crime, religion or politics often are. But that version is still heavily biased by our specific worldview. And by the contours of the times we live in.

For instance, smoking was once considered fashionable. Buoyed by public popularity and reinforced by opportunistic advertising, packs of cigarettes were as commonplace as smartphones are today. Restaurants and bars billowed with cigarette smoke, and lighters were everywhere.

Around this time, the number of women in the workforce was increasing. But by and large, women found themselves confined to clerical roles. Hiring women based on their looks was considered acceptable behavior. And so were other practices we now consider discriminatory or abusive.

These days, we would not consider any of this the right thing.

Sure, there are plenty of smokers out there. And there is, sadly, plenty of misogynistic behavior as well. But these behaviors now come with a social stigma — a stigma that could impact our legacy.

Our world is better off because of this evolution. But that doesn’t give us license to act self-righteous.

For even if we’re don’t smoke or abuse women, we’re not doing everything right. There are parts of our day-to-day lives that future generations will look at just as unfavorably as we now look at smoking or gender discrimination.

Our legacy will be rewritten over time. And parts of it might end up tarnished.

There’s no way around it.

 

So, how should we approach the topic of legacy?

We can start by reframing the question.

We can stop concerning ourselves with how we’ll be remembered, and start thinking about how we’d like to be remembered.

This small tweak puts the power back in our hands. It gets everything back to two dimensions.

By looking at the question this way, we can imagine an ideal future. One unencumbered by the shifting of society and the razor’s edge of revisionist history.

Then, we can imagine how this ideal future would entertain our memory if we were no longer around. And we can work toward bringing that vision to fruition.

This is the way I approach the thorny question of legacy. It’s what grounds me. It’s what inspires me. And it’s what drives me to do my best each and every day.

We can all take a page from this book.

How will you be remembered is insignificant. How would you like to be remembered is everything.

What We Can’t Forget

As the car pulled away, I looked out the passenger side window.

There they were, my grandmother and grandfather waving from inside the screen door of their house in Queens, New York.

The memory feels like yesterday, but it was so much longer ago than that.

It has to be.

I’ve been in Texas for nearly a decade, and my grandfather was crippled by a stroke less than two years after I moved west. He spent most of his time sitting on the sofa when I went to visit him in the years following the stroke.

After he passed, my grandmother sold the house and moved into an apartment in Manhattan with my parents. Less than two years later, she too was gone.

Memories are all that remain. But the details are ever more in doubt.

As I get older, I have no way of knowing for sure if my memories are accurate.

Did everything really happen the way I remember it? Was what I recall seeing, hearing and sensing real, or was it just a mirage?

When I think of that image of my grandparents waving goodbye from their front foyer, I’m not sure if I’m digging up a memory from 10 years ago or if my mind is playing tricks on me.

After all, my grandmother waved goodbye at us from that same spot each time we left the home, up until she sold it. My memories could be conflated.

There’s no way for me to know for sure.

Never Forget.

Those two words are imprinted in my mind forever.

I’m sharing this article 18 years after the darkest day of my life: September 11, 2001.

I’ve shared my memories of that day and its aftermath on Words of the West before. It’s the most important thing I’ve ever done.

Sharing my memories of that day has helped me heal. It’s brought me a sense of peace I had thought I’d never find again.

Yet, even as I move forward, the memories of that day continue to haunt me. As is the case with any traumatic stress event, I’m sure I will remain affected for the rest of my life.

Those haunting memories spike on September 11th each year. Not only do I know what the calendar reads, but all the old images and video clips resurface across the Internet, social media and mainstream media.

It’s like a refresher course, recalibrating my memories of the worst day of my life.

You could say I was one of the lucky ones. I was six miles uptown from the carnage at the World Trade Center. There are no Associated Press photos of me walking across the Brooklyn Bridge with the sky behind me looking like a war zone. There are no videos of me watching in horror as the twin towers crumbled.

Yet, I have my own memories to deal with. Of eerily quiet Manhattan streets. Of heavily armed National Guardsmen at a toll bridge, telling us Go, go, get out of here! Of thinking that at any moment, my life might be taken from me.

Those all come bubbling up, each time the calendar turns to September 11th.

I don’t want to forget.

Good or bad — it doesn’t matter. I want to remember.

I pride myself on what I can recall. On how I use that past experience to make prudent decisions.

Memory is important to me because it impacts all three of the foundational pillars of my life.

Be Present. Be Informed. Be Better.

So, I fight doggedly against the fog of amnesia. I don’t drink alcohol. I get a good night’s sleep. I keep my brain active as often as I can.

And I hang on to my memories. Even the memory that has left me forever broken.

It’s difficult. Gut-wrenchingly difficult. But I fight through the pain.

I pay attention to the remembrances on September 11th. And each year, when I visit New York, I go to the 9/11 Memorial and pray for the victims.

Yet, the more time passes, and the more I subject myself to this kind of masochism, the more doubt creeps into my mind.

The year 2001 was more than half my life ago. I was a young teenager — a kid — on the day my life changed forever. And now, there are now legal adults who have only known a post 9/11 world.

These facts serve as a stark reminder that 18 years is a long time, and even the most traumatic memories can get distorted over that period.

I don’t know if my memories of that day are still accurate, or if they’ve faded a bit.

I want them to be accurate. I don’t want to be accused of embellishing anything from a day we are told — rightfully — to Never Forget.

But there’s no way I can know for sure how much of what I remember is accurate.

When the towers fell, I was in school — a school I left 8 months later. When I got home, my family watched Aaron Brown’s reports on the tragedy on CNN. But my parents and sister were too shell-shocked to keep watching the marathon coverage. So, I spent much of the event in front of the TV alone.

The only part of the day that was easily verifiable was the treacherous trip home. My father was with me that whole time. He recalls what I do.

The rest of the day — what I said, what I did, what I thought — I experienced alone. Those words, actions and emotions have been an important part of my life for nearly two decades. But now, more and more, I can’t tell which of them are real.

Perhaps it’s meant to be this way.

Perhaps our memories are meant to degrade when exposed to the cruel hands of time.

After all, our bodies betray us as we age. It’s only logical that our minds would follow the same path to irrelevance.

Even so, a fuzzy memory is not a welcome sight in our society.

In a world where cameras are always rolling, there is no room for error. The proof is there, in pictures and video. And we’re getting fact-checked all the time.

We don’t forget the events of 9/11 because we can’t forget. There are dozens of documentaries showing footage of the planes flying into the Twin Towers. Of the cloud of debris cascading down the cavernous streets of Lower Manhattan.

The evidence is overwhelming. But is that what really matters?

When I come across these iconic images, I’m almost numb to them. Sure, my pulse quickens and my face turns flushed, but that’s to be expected.

It’s my recollections of that fateful day that get me emotional.

The paralyzing sensation of fear. The realization that I might not survive. And the understanding that if I did, my life would be forever changed.

That is what brings tears to my eyes. That is what brings me to my knees.

And regardless how much my recollections of the details might fade, that is what I will never, ever forget.

Therein lies the truth of the matter.

Memories are not about logic. They’re not about timestamping the images in our mind and cross-checking them for rogue filters.

No, memories are about emotion instead.

That image of my grandparents waving goodbye is poignant because they are now gone. Regardless of the details, that memory is a bridge connecting me with two of the most beloved figures in my life.

And those recollections I have of the darkest day of my life are poignant as well. They might induce nightmares, but they also remind me not to take life for granted.

We all have memories that are intertwined with our emotions. Even if we didn’t live through the horrors of New York City on September 11, 2001.

Let us cherish these memories, rather than interrogate them.

For that connection to our heart and our soul — that is something we can’t afford to lose.

May we never forget.