Quotes & Sayings About Memories You Want To Forget

My chest tightens: seeing him so upset breaks my own heart. 'Don't you ever wish you could make that bit go away?" I say, feeling angry at the past. 'That you could erase those painful memories, forget they every happened, just remember the happy times you had together?'
'You must never say that,' he reprimands sternly.
'But why not?' I look at him in surprise.
'Because it's the bad memories that makes you appreciate the good ones. Don't ever wish them away. it's like your nan always used to say, "You need both the sun and the rain to make a rainbow". — Alexandra Potter

When I say I'm going to forget you I know it's impossible to forget someone I once knew. What I want is to erase you from my thoughts and purge you from my memories. I'm saying it's what I wish for, not what is or could ever be. — Donna Lynn Hope

Memory is so corrupt that you remember only what you want to; if you want to forget about something, slowly but surely you do. — Stefan Zweig

I can't help thinking that if we live long enough, we'll all eventually forget the lives we've lived. The faces of people closest to us, the memories we swore we'd hold on to for the rest of our lives. First kisses and last kisses and all the passion between the years...Memories aren't currency to spend; they're us. — Shaun David Hutchinson

Does it truly make a difference how I'm alive? I asked him.
But he didn't answer.
I walked over to where Hayden stood, resting my hand on his. I looked at the photo he held before making my way along the wall. Every photo was of our family. The family that existed before the accident. The family that existed before I was struck by a car. I wasn't supposed to remember it, but I did. When they exported my memories and my life from my body, every trace of the accident was supposed to be erased. But it still remained.
You can't erase death.
That was what Hayden was trying to tell me. No matter how much he wanted to forget, he couldn't. — Nicole Sobon

Sometimes forgetting is the gift that we give ourselves — Dathan Auerbach

I see the stars in the sky, and they make me think of life. Of the many plans dwelling inside my mind, but how few memories I have. No matter how hard I try, I can't choose which memories I want to keep or which I can forget. So I've been wondering what's the purpose of creating memories if I can't just keep them all? — J.C. Reed

I am the harvest of man's stupidity. I am the fruit of the holocaust. I prayed like you to survive, but look at me now. It is over for us who are dead, but you must struggle, and will carry the memories all your life. People back home will wonder why you can't forget. — Eugene B. Sledge

Have a short memory and a lot of forgiveness. Especially us girls who don't forget a thing. Move on ... — Gabrielle Reece

In the name of Jerusalem. If I forget the extermination of the Jews, may my right hand wither, may my tongue stick to my palate if I cease to think of you, if I do not keep the extermination of the Jews in memory even at my happiest hour. — Menachem Begin

It really is easy to forget the unpleasant if we simply refuse to recall it. Withdraw only positive thoughts from your memory bank. Let the others fade away. And your confidence, that feeling of being on top of the world, will zoom up-ward. You take a big step forward toward conquering your fear when you refuse to remember negative, self-deprecating thoughts. — David J. Schwartz

Ester asked why people are sad.
"That's simple," says the old man. "They are the prisoners of their personal history. Everyone believes that the main aim in life is to follow a plan. They never ask if that plan is theirs or if it was created by another person. They accumulate experiences, memories, things, other people's ideas, and it is more than they can possibly cope with. And that is why they forget their dreams. — Paulo Coelho

My heart's with you, Bill, no matter how it turns out. My heart is with all of them, and I think that, even if we forget each other, we'll remember in our dreams. — Stephen King

When my husband died, people kept telling me not to cry. People kept trying to help me to forget. But I didn't want to forget ... So I realize, that if it's hard for me, how much harder it must be for you. — Katherine Paterson

I don't know where dreams come from. Sometimes I wonder if they're genetic memories, or messages from something divine. Warnings perhaps. Maybe we do come with an instruction booklet but we're too dense to read it, because we've dismissed it as the irrational waste product of the 'rational' mind. Sometimes I think all the answers we need are buried in our slumbering subconscious, int he dreaming. The booklet right there, and ever night when we lay our heads down on the pillow it flips open. The wise read it, heed it. The rest of us try as hard as we can upon awakening to forget any disturbing revelations we might have found there. — Karen Marie Moning

I think I've got a peculiar disease. I call it the curse of history, and it has to do with the fugitive absence/presence of both personal and collective memory. At first I thought it was a kind of personal illness, just related to time, private time, time that passes in one's life. So I decided to forget and throw myself into the future. — Gilles Peress

The memories are very fucking great. I never want to forget. Ever. I'd rather die than not have these memories. Is that great enough for you? — Lucian Bane

Sure, occasionally a certain sappy song or romantic movie would come on, and you'd wonder what he or she was up to, but there was no way to know. Of course, you could always pick up the phone (and more recently, text or e-mail), but that would require that person's knowing you were thinking of him or her. Where's the fun in that? You never want them to know you're thinking of them, so you refrain. Before long the memories start to fade. One day, you realize you can't quite remember how she smelled or the exact color of his eyes. Eventually, without ever knowing it, you just forget that person altogether. You replace old memories with new ones, and life goes on. It was the clean break you needed to move forward. — Brandi Glanville

We don't forget ... Our heads may be small, but they are as full of memories as the sky may sometimes be full of swarming bees, thousands and thousands of memories, of smells, of places, of little things that happened to us and which came back, unexpectedly, to remind us who we are. — Alexander McCall Smith

I lit a fire and sat there in my rocking chair. We lit a candle for him. It was as simple as that. I knew that what I had done may have been a catalyst in Danny's death, but I also knew that there was really nothing else I could have done. I can never really lose that feeling. I wasn't guilty, but I felt responsible in a way. It's part of what I do. Managing the band and taking care of the music is very painful at times. It's a sad story. A moment I will never forget, years I can never replace, music the world will never hear, all gone in the turning of a second. — Neil Young

We may forget the pain, but the memories are always painted in our heart. — John

She knew that my memories of her would fade. Which is precisely why she begged me never to forget her, to remember that she had existed.
The thought fills me with an almost unbearable sorrow. Because Naoko never loved me. — Haruki Murakami

You can't escape it, no matter how you struggle. No matter where you go, the past will follow you. No matter how hard you try to forget, no matter if you die and let it all disappear, the past will always be right behind you, chasing you down. Chasing, chasing, chasing, chasing... Do you know why? Because it's lonely. The past, memories, and outcomes are all very lonely things. They want a companion. — Ryohgo Narita

Give me a chance, Gracie. I'm not a monster. I'm not going to hurt you. All I want to do is to make you scream with pleasure. To know each and every inch of your body. I will make you forget the pain you've been through and create beautiful memories for you with me." - Luke Bryce, Be Mine — Isobelle Cate

I do not know what you are supposed to do with memories likes these. It feels wrong to want to forget. Perhaps this is why we write these things down, so we can move on. — Lloyd Jones

It is natural to want to forget, Anna, when everyday is a brimful of sadness. But those souls also forgot those that they had loved. You do not want that, surely? I have heard some preach that God wants us to forget the dead, but I cannot believe so. I think He gives us precious recollections so that we may not be parted entirely from those He has given us to love. You must cherish your memories of your babes, Anna, until you see them again in Heaven. — Geraldine Brooks

Sometimes I forget what I put in. I want to capture things in that way, where you're looking into your memory, a dream or hallucination. The characters become a mixture of archetypes, [and] that's what I like. You're trying to figure it out and your brain wants to categorize things, but it can't because of this motion. You want to solve the problem, but it never gets solved. It's like when you read a really good book and the story never leaves you. — Ali Banisadr

Put that thing down, girl. Don't you know it steals part of your soul, that little mechanical masterpiece you hold so frivolously? Don't you know it's not just mine it seals into its gears and trick mirrors, but yours, too. What you feel at this moment, what you hope for, what your dreams are, what you think your future will unfold like, it steals it all from you, too. You aren't safe just because of the side of the lens you're on. And later, when everything is said and done, and you want to forget everything that happened in these walls, when you're all alone, this picture, this piece of your soul you didn't even know was gone, will haunt you. It will come bearing knives and AKs and nine millimeters, and it will destroy you from the inside out. Put that damned thing down and stop acting like any of this is something worth remembering. — Shannon Noelle Long

If we were scars, our memories would be the stitches holding us together. You couldn't cut them apart, and if you did, it would tear you in two."
"But my memories hurt," she said. "I want to forget. There's so much I just want to forget."
"How are you going to do that ? Everything that's happened to you is still happening today. Once something has begun, it doesn't end. There, in your head, it never ends. — Kai Meyer

I'll never stop loving you hard. It'll only get harder because every day that passes we create more memories. Memories I'll treasure, not memories I want to forget. My mind if being filled with beautiful images of us, and they are replacing a history that lingers. They're chasing away my past, Ava. I need them. I need you. — Jodi Ellen Malpas

Shazi,

I prefer the color blue to any other. The scent of lilacs in your hair is a source of constant torment. I despise figs. Lastly, I will never forget, all the days of my life, the memories of last night -
For nothing, not the sun, not the rain, not even the brightest star in the darkest sky, could begin to compare to the wonder of you.

Khalid. — Renee Ahdieh

If you never tell anyone the truth about yourself, eventually you start to forget. The love, the heartbreak, the joy, the despair, the things I did that were good, the things I did that were shameful
if I kept them all inside, my memories of them would start to disappear. And then I would disappear. — Cassandra Clare

Amanda had way too much time to think being at the hospital without any friends. She didn't want to dwell on her thoughts for too long lest the wrong ones might emerge. She was hoping to forget what happened to her. — Jason Medina

I want to live with all of my memories, even if they're sad memories. I believe that if I stay strong, someday I'll overcome the pain, and then I'll be glad that I have those memories. I believe that there are no memories that are okay to forget. — Natsuki Takaya

Maybe the reason my memory is so bad is that I always do at least two things at once. It's easier to forget something you only half-did or quarter did. — Andy Warhol

The moment you try so hard to forget becomes your sharpest memory.

-Tara — Amita Trasi

I don't want to be here. I missed my dream world where everything was sunshine and smiles, away from whatever memories snarled on the out skirts of comprehension.
I want to forget ... just for a little longer. — Pepper Winters

You never forget where you were when you write a song; it's a very proper memory, so I knew exactly where I was and what I was doing for each track. It was like going into a time machine. — Dido Armstrong

Somehow I cannot let it go yet, funeral though it is,
Let it remain back there on its nail suspended,
With pink, blue, yellow, all blanch'd, and the white now gray
and ashy,
One wither'd rose put years ago for thee, dear friend;
But I do not forget thee. Hast thou then faded?
Is the odor exhaled? Are the colors, vitalities, dead?
No, while memories subtly play - the past vivid as ever;
For but last night I woke, and in that spectral ring saw thee,
Thy smile, eyes, face, calm, silent, loving as ever:
So let the wreath hang still awhile within my eye-reach,
It is not yet dead to me, nor even pallid. — Walt Whitman

Much later, she would go back and read the entry, and think to herself that memories were that way, too. When you wanted to forget, everything would return in raw, brutal focus. When you wanted to remember, the details would slip away like a dream at dawn. — Emily Giffin

Memory is ever active, ever true. Alas, if it were only as easy to forget! — Ninon De L'Enclos

Sidonie, I know you don't remember it, but you once promised to trust me beyond all reason. And I swear to you that all that I am, all that I possess, including this gem-stone, is yours. I need you. I can't do this alone. Forget your memories. Look into your heart. And if you can find somewhere there, some lingering spark of trust that owes naught to reason, I beg you to speak the word written here. — Jacqueline Carey

But ... I think ... I want to live with all my memories. Even if they're sad memories. Even if they're memories that only hurt me. Even ... even if they're memories that I'd rather forget. If I keep them and I keep trying, without running away ... if I keep trying, then someday ... someday I'll be strong enough that those memories can't defeat me. I believe that ... I want to ... believe that. Because I want to think ... that there's no such thing ... as a memory that's okay to forget. -Momiji — Natsuki Takaya

I looked around. This house only the night before had been a home, and serves as a storage locker for memories that I could barely remember and a bunch of things I'd rather forget. — Laurie Notaro

For people who have something in the present it is easier to forget the past, although you never wholly do so. When winter comes, spring is a vague memory, something looked back at with nostalgia, but winter is the here and now and requires all your energies. If spring were to vanish and there were nothing, an abyss, if that were even possible to imagine, then you would live with memories of spring for ever and ever or else become a part of the abyss itself. The same can sometimes be said for love, but not always. There are some loves that live on for years, inexplicably, although the lovers are parted and there is no hope that they may ever reunite except as polite and distant friends. — Rona Jaffe

There'll be moments in life, sweet pea, that stand out in your memories like a photograph. Scenes captured perfectly in your mind, frozen in time with each detail as colorful as it was that first time you saw it. 'Flashbulb memories,' some people call them," she'd told me, her eyes crinkling up and nearly disappearing in a face etched with too many laugh lines to count. "Most people don't recognize those moments as they happen. They look back fifty years later, and realize that those were the most important parts of their entire life. But at the time, they're so busy looking ahead to what's coming down the line or worrying about their future, they don't enjoy their present. Don't be like them, sweet pea. Don't get so caught up in chasing your dreams that you forget to live them. — Julie Johnson

A human being survives by his ability to forget. Memory is always ready to blot out the bad and retain only the good. — Varlam Shalamov

Love is hard to find, hard to keep, and hard to forget. — Alysha Speer

Sometimes people walk out of your life never to return, and all you have left are bitter memories and what ifs. And though you try to move on and forget them, they become regrets that cut deeper than the sharpest knife, slashing you over and over again. — Mia Asher

Memories: some can be sucker punching, others carry you forward; some stay with you forever, others you forget on your own. You can't really know which ones you'll survive if you don't stay on the battlefield, bad times shooting at you like bullets. But if you're lucky, you'll have plenty of good times to shield you. — Adam Silvera

Some memories were harder to forget than others. Especially the painful ones. — Elizabeth Eulberg

I used to say I would pay good money to forget most of my life. Now I want the memories back. — Michael Robotham

We should have stories in common, I found myself thinking. We should have stories, and jokes no one understands, and memories that we know will stay alive because neither of us will let the other forget. — Kamila Shamsie

I kind of forget what it's like to be a dude who grew up in the south sometimes. I want to refresh my memory and remember why I love it [there] so much. — Drake

You will live in me always. Your words, your heart, your soul are all part of me. My heart is full of your memories. Thank you for the gift of your life. I will never forget you. — Amy Eldon

It's hard to forget hurtful things, isn't it? Children with autism have good memories. So it's much harder for them to forget bad experiences than it is for us. So fill them with as many good experiences as possible. — Keiko Tobe