How accurate are your memories?

Creating memories are one of the most wonderful things we can do. Experiences are always rated as being more valuable than material items in the realm of producing happiness and engagement. What if I told you that over time our recollection of past experiences tends be more inaccurate of what actually occurred? Apparently we can only retain 'chunks' of our actual experiences then our brain fills in the gaps. How our brain fills in these gaps is determined by a variety of things one of which is how we feel about the experience. I thought that was weird when I first learned that. I started to think about so many past experiences and wondered if I was accurate in how I was replaying them. Have you ever experienced someone telling you a story about a past experience that seems like it has more things happening in it than you recall? Or sometimes the memory itself seems totally fabricated? As it turns out this is more normal than not. One way we can try to be as accurate as possible about our memories is to keep a journal. Writing down how we feel about something as close in time to when it occurred is a good way of accurately recalling the event itself. It can help to avoid those awkward moments I tend to experience when my mom is telling a past story about me and I have to tell her, "Mom I never did that." ....Or did I?