Inspiration Has a Shelf Life

After posting yesterday, I wanted to keep writing, but I sat staring at the screen, lost for words.

The day before yesterday, there was a moment when I caught a really good angle and thought it was well worth writing about.

But now, no matter how hard I rack my brain, the thought has evaporated. I can't remember it at all.

I always seem to feel regret only when it's too late to fix.

It would have taken no effort to pull out my phone and jot the idea down in flomo or Notes. But I didn't. Somewhere in my subconscious, I'd always felt: if something is really important, my brain will pop up a reminder at the right moment. Why bother writing it down?

That habit of thinking drove what I did.

I chose not to write it down without actually thinking about it.

It was a completely automatic move. Habit decided my behavior, and I didn't give my brain even a chance to push back.

When did my memory become so unreliable?

I can't pinpoint exactly when. Probably after I started working.

There's always a moment when you try to pull up a memory and find the link is dead.

You rack your brain for a long time with no luck, and all you can do is comfort yourself: "Forget it. Maybe it'll pop up on its own someday."

But the reality is often harsh. Once you forget some ideas, you may never get them back in this lifetime.

Even if someday you come up with exactly the same idea again, you won't remember ever having had it before.

More importantly, you can never recreate the state of mind and the situation you were in then. It looks like the same idea, but it's long since become something very different. These days I'm always forgetting things, but I can't just put that down to "being forgetful."

More precisely, our lives are crammed full of "fragmented information."

A short video, a pop-up message, a passing remark from a friend... even the thoughts that flash through our own minds are, at bottom, "short messages."

They show up fast, enter the brain fast, and get replaced and forgotten even faster.

The problem is this: among all this mostly useless clutter, something precious is often hidden.

If you don't give it a second round of memory, by hand or with a digital tool, the brain will judge that precious information to be trash and clear it out along with the rest of the clutter.

So I've started training myself on purpose: learn to record, and catch every spark in the details of life.

For now, I've set up a simple routine: flomo to capture stray ideas, and TickTick to plan writing topics.

But that routine is just a tool. The core is building the habit of recording.

Habit is a frightening force.

Right now, I regret missing an idea because I got used to "not recording." In the future, if I can build the habit of "recording anytime," maybe it will show a more positive, compounding power.

After all, inspiration has a shelf life.

It isn't hard like a stone. It's more like fog. Once new information comes in, or the sun comes out, it's gone.

Finally, I'd like to ask you:

Have you ever had that maddening moment when it's "right on the tip of my tongue, but I just can't remember"? What did you feel you'd missed in that moment?

Tell me in the comments. Let me know I'm not the only one kicking myself over forgetting.