How Your Brain Forms Memories—And How to Remember More

Memories are something we all experience every day. Yet, despite their familiarity, most of us would struggle to explain what memories actually are or how they work.

The common response is often vague: ‘They're just things in my brain. Stuff I happen to remember’. When it comes to explaining how these 'things' become memories, most people are equally hazy. The typical response about memory formation is often along the lines of ‘it somehow just stayed in my brain’.

Now, look, I get it. Why would you need to know the specifics when your brain just does it anyway.

Well, what if it told you that by understanding how memories are formed and retained, you can significantly improve your memory.

You don’t have to be someone who just forgets things or can’t explain why some things stick and others don’t. You don’t have to be someone who has a fantastic memory when it comes to one topic and poor memory when it comes to another.

Right, let’s explore this memory thing.

Every memory you have stored started as a spark in your brain. It begins with a process called encoding. Encoding is the act of processing information from the world around you.

Think of encoding like taking a picture of your situation. If you’re paying attention and are interested in the picture you are taking then it will come out with good focus, sharp edges, clear, and with lots of details. But, if you’re not paying attention or don’t care for the picture, it will likely come out blurry and with very little detail.

Your brain acts in the same way. When you’re interested in the situation and paying attention your brain takes a great ‘picture’ of that information and encodes that high quality information. Leading to the ability to remember that picture well - i.e having a great memory of it.

But, when you’re not interested in the situation and not paying attention, your brain encodes a poor ‘picture’. The leads to remembering the ‘picture’ poorly or not remembering it at all - i.e having a poor memory of it or no memory of it.

So now we have taken the picture of the situation, what happens next?

The brain then moves the picture into storage - either short or long term. These two forms of storage are well known - they are our short-term memory and long-term memory.

We can think of this stage like files on a computer. Short term memory is like having a file open on your desktop - the information is available to you but if you quit the file the information disappears. Long term memory is like a file that you have saved on your computer. You can open and close that file as you wish with the information not disappearing.

Now unlike computer files, memories can be strengthened. This is known as consolidation. Unfortunately, this is where my computer file analogy falls over. Instead, we must turn to concrete to help us explain it.

Now think of the piece of information, that picture, that computer file, as concrete that has been poured into a mould. When the concrete has first been poured it is wet, but through time the concrete dries and cures and becomes solid. The same can be said for memories. In order to solidify them - consolidate them - we need to have some form of repeated exposure making them more durable over time.

This consolidation phase is critical when trying to learn new knowledge or acquiring new skills. It’s also one aspect that people often neglect. They take the one and done approach. They look at it once and then hope it sticks. Unfortunately, no matter how good the original picture - encoding – is, if you are not consolidating you are making it very hard for yourself to cement that memory in your brain.

The final aspect of memory for today is retrieval. Accessing the stored memory. The actual act of remembering. This is where your brain after the encoding, storage, and consolidation phases recalls the information. This is like opening a stored file on your computer. You gone through the hard parts of creating the content of the file and then saved it for later use.

This is when you feel like you actually know the information in question. When you can recall it quickly. It feels like you’re not even thinking about it before the memory comes to you.

And you aren’t. Your brain has accessed it faster than any computer could and well before you feel like you’re thinking hard about this consolidated memory.

However, you might be thinking about memories that seem etched into your brain without much effort. Now that is a fair point, and like all things with the brain, I have simplified things for practicality, but I have also excluded something incredibly important to memory, emotion.

Emotions are incredibly important in the world of memory. Now what I have discussed in this blog is still relevant and accurate, and you’re likely thinking, yes, for situations like school, university, and workplace settings. And you’d be correct, but let’s know take a look at the specific importance of emotion.

Emotion is pivotal in memory formation and plays a powerful role in determining what memories are vividly remembered and which ones just fade away.

Why? Emotional experiences activate our brains amygdala - the brains emotion processing centre which works in tandem with our hippocampus to encode and consolidate information.

When our amygdala is activated, hormones are released which boost the encoding and consolidation process. This is why you can likely remember your first kiss vividly or a wedding. Your amygdala was relapsing large amounts of dopamine - a neurotransmitter and the happy hormone of our body - significantly aiding and improving your encoding and consolidation of the memory to the point where you feel like you’ll never forget it.

Now this is also the same for negative emotion. Hormones released during traumatic situations also have the same impact on the brains ability to encode and consolidate the memory. It is thought that this is to aid survival. We remember dangerous or negative situations to protect us in future. Our brain is helping us out.

So there we have it - a simplified version of how memories are formed and how you can make them stronger.

From encoding the moment or information like a picture, having it saved like a file on your computer, to having it set like cement, your brain is constantly working to craft the memory of your life.

To improve your memory - engage your sense, connect emotionally with information and situations where you can, pay attention and focus when you know you’ll have to rely on the information late. Try to actively recall information and revisit it frequently, aiding that process of consolidation, by cementing the memory in your brain.

By doing these things - you may go from someone who can’t seem to remember a thing to someone who doesn’t forget anything. By understanding and applying these principles, you can unlock the full potential of your memory. In conclusion, understanding how memories are formed and retained can be a powerful tool for improving your memory. By grasping the processes of encoding, storage, consolidation, and retrieval, you can take active steps to enhance your ability to remember. Whether it's engaging your senses, connecting emotionally with information, or actively recalling memories, these strategies can help transform your memory from a passive process to an active skill

Thank you for reading. If you’d like a more in-depth exploration of memory or any related topic, feel free to leave a comment below, and I’ll be happy to dive deeper in a future post.