Psychologists in Canada think they’ve identified an entirely new memory syndrome in healthy people characterised by a specific inability to re-live their past. This may sound like a form of amnesia, but the three individuals currently described have no history of brain damage or illness and have experienced no known recent psychological trauma or disturbance.
Source: Some perfectly healthy people can’t remember their own lives
I remember enough to re-experience a situation, and I knew someone who was a professional ballet dancer – they could as well. I wonder if it is more common in those who are athletic in some fashion? I don’t remember everything – common things like locking the door I forget, to the point I wonder how I got to the car (I will return home to check sometimes, to find it locked). I can’t always control it, and sometimes my recall surprises me – page numbers to stories I might have read once, sheet music after decades.
There is a reason the word “eidetic” exists in our vocabulary, and it doesn’t mean exactly photographic. Hypervigilance would also allow someone to take in enough detail to relive an experience.
I’ve dealt with abusive people, whom it has been my belief will play “dumb” about not remembering an incident. It’s convenient – they don’t remember, so they don’t apologize or care. But the behaviour repeats itself…