Even as you forget the details, your brain forces your memories into a 'movie' structure with a clear climax and ending.
Researchers found that autobiographical memories follow a 'sticky' narrative arc that remains consistent even as time passes. Even when you forget the actual facts of what happened, your brain preserves the 'skeleton' of the story, essentially formatting your life into a standard literary plot.
A Canonical Narrative Structure in Autobiographical Recall
PsyArXiv · rx76d_v1
Storytelling is a defining feature of human cognition, and among the most common stories we tell are those of our own lives, that is, our autobiographical memories. In English-Speaking Western cultures, stories follow a reliable arc: context sets the stage, a plot builds towards a climax, and resolution follows. Yet memory itself is malleable. Whether the reconstructive nature of memory bends or preserves the architecture of story is unknown. Across three large-scale studies we show that memory