100 Days of Code: Day 38

I don’t really have anything to show for today, aside from a bunch of new green checkmarks at Free Code Camp. But that’s okay because today I want to go off on a bit of a tangent about the curiosities (and frustrations) of my brain and the way it works. I apologize in advance.

My first task for today was to spend 30 minutes to 1 hour going back and finishing up the last few JavaScript challenges that were just added with the big update. I was a bit frustrated after less than 5 minutes, but it had nothing to do with FCC and everything to do with me.

Just to remind you, I just completed this section 25 days ago and, in doing so, learned about JavaScript objects. I was really excited about what I had learned and even dedicated part of my blog post to talking about it.

Fast-forward to today when I was faced with a new JavaScript objects / JSON challenge and instantly realized that because I hadn’t used the information in the past few weeks, I had already forgotten pretty much everything. This is just how my brain works. I am constantly learning new information, but I also have really bad short-term memory so if I don’t use the information or at least think about it a few times, I will forget it almost immediately.

I’ve accepted the fact that this is how my brain works and how it has always worked my entire life. Sometimes I remember stupid things forever (I’m full of useless information), but sometimes I forget big important things almost instantly unless I set reminders and force myself to remember.

It can be frustrating for people around me, too, especially my husband (and my mom when I was younger). If I go to the theaters to watch a movie, unless I was seriously blown away (or annoyed) by the movie and spend some time reflecting on it, I can pretty much guarantee that in a few months, I may not even remember having watched it. I will usually remember that I saw it at some point, but won’t be able to recollect a single detail about the movie. Why? Because my brain got rid of all that information 2 weeks later when it decided I needed to remember that cute cat video instead.

Later, when Andrew makes a reference to the movie that I should remember, I look at him like he has two heads because I have no idea what he is talking about. He can still quote lines from the movie; I can’t even tell you who was in it. Poor guy. He’s learned to deal with it, but I honestly wish he didn’t have to.

This brings me to my point about why I was so frustrated.

I know this is how I operate — it’s just a fact at this point. So WHY WHYYY WHYYYYY do I, after 30 years, still forget to spend time studying/reviewing old information so my brain doesn’t dump it? If I could remember one thing, maybe it should be that.

This time around, I made sure to take copious notes in Evernote and I have already added a reminder to look over the information next week. When I’m done, I’ll set another reminder for the week later and maybe again a few weeks after that. That should be all it takes to be able to store the information in long-term memory, which means I am unlikely to forget it. It will take all of about 15-20 minutes total because I don’t have to re-learn it, I just have to read through my notes.

I didn’t get as far into the ES6 section as I would have liked, so tomorrow that’s where I will pick back up.