why our brains can form arbitrary memories from seemingly random events and recall them perfectly but its hard to memorize something when you are intentionally trying to memorize it?

Question

why our brains can form arbitrary memories from seemingly random events and recall them perfectly but its hard to memorize something when you are intentionally trying to memorize it?

In: Biology

Answer 1

We’re primarily wired to remember good things like a moment worth reliving or how good food tastes. As well as bad things like fire will burn us or that time Karen was an asshole to us. Anything without a survival aspect or without a strong emotional response attached is just filler to our brains. The needs we want to remember are different than the needs we evolved to remember. Try studying while eating a really good meal. Then eat the same meal before you need to recall info. Helps.