Have you ever been on a holiday that went well, but a particular incident stands out in your memory that colours the whole experience? Maybe you missed your flight but caught the next one, lost a mobile phone, or a passport, or had some other upsetting experience. Apart from this event, you actually enjoyed just about every moment: the peaceful walks, the natural landscape, the amazing food, socialising, and the chance to really relax. Why is it that when you look back, the incident is so prominent in your memory?
When researching happiness and well-being, Daniel Kahneman, the Nobel Prize-winning psychologist, made the useful distinction between our experience in the moment and how we interpret our experience in memory. Inhabiting the real-time experience of the present moment is one of the main themes of mindfulness. When we’re open and aware we’re intimately connected with our experience, no matter how amazing or mundane. We may notice thoughts arise that interpret or comment on what’s happening but can choose to stay with the present, rather than entering the stream of thoughts. The interpretive part of our minds works away at the story of the experience. This sense-making of the mind can include problem-solving, exploring different scenarios, planning, decision-making, and judgement.
How we interpret events is also strongly influenced by how we feel at the time. One of the strongest influences is our built-in negativity bias. For our foraging, hunter-gatherer ancestors, the ability to quickly spot a threat, problem-solve, and act gave them a significant evolutionary advantage. This led to unpleasant events being processed with a higher priority than pleasant ones and stored in our memory as more significant, which then biases our recall of the experience.
When we’re mindfully present, simply being, we’re in our experience. When we are interpreting, remembering, or reflecting we’re thinking about our experience. Most of this mental activity occurs after the event, so is wholly reliant on our memory, which has this inbuilt bias.
Kahneman’s research has improved how we understand and measure happiness, by bringing greater balance between in-the-moment experience and how we feel when we consult our memory. The research also shows how we can feel better about our experiences. When we interpret our experience in memory, we tend to store the peak, whether this was positive or negative, as well as what happened at the end. So, for instance, doctors can influence a patient’s memory of a medical procedure by making sure that any discomfort they experience is not right at the end. We can also make use of these insights in our mindfulness practice by:
- Being present to our experience and working with whatever emerges – the positive as well as the negative.
- Acknowledging the evolutionary power of the negativity bias and realizing that the impressions we store in memory about an event may well emphasize the negative aspects of our experience.
- Making sure we notice, appreciate, and remember when we have good experiences. One simple way is to weave positive experiences into our internal dialogue. For instance, noting internally, “I feel really good on this walk with my friends.”
We rarely enter a new experience cleanly, without the baggage of memory that includes past thoughts and feelings. By developing the ability to clearly distinguish between being in the moment and thinking about an experience, we create the possibility of letting go of the burden of the past that we impose on our present. Without this distinction, we can easily conflate the two modes and believe that our experience was not as pleasant or nurturing as it actually was. By bringing a more balanced view to our experience that includes being as well as thinking, we can make sure we notice and include those passing moments of peace, bliss, and connection that may not be significant enough to be stored in memory. And by doing this, we open up the potential to access a richer, more fulfilling, and happier life.
Suggested weekly practice
- Using curiosity to explore the difference between direct experience and the interpretive overlay of the mind
- Consciously prioritising pleasant moments however mundane. For instance, this could be by saying internally, “This is a good experience”, when you appreciate a beautiful view on a walk
- Notice the negativity bias at work and bring yourself back to the direct experience, rather than how you may have interpreted it
Guided practice
- Find somewhere undisturbed and sit in a comfortable, dignified and upright posture, where you can remain alert and aware.
- Play the first settling practice, then read through the session content, which you can print off if that helps.
- Then close your eyes while the second meditation plays, to explore the difference between our experience of the present moment and thinking about our experience.
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