I have a general question for people who don't have very long memories, or don't consider themselves to be particularly smart or wise: do you ever feel like you're pressed up on a wall in your brain?

It's driving me nuts. I can see my own ignorance, like I'm standing at the edge of a map and looking out into blackness that I know contains things, I just can't figure out how to penetrate it. I make up stuff, draw conclusions from patterns I see in the world I can experience, but I can't hold on to enough stuff long enough to make any conclusions that reveal more about the world. My brain must have a tiny capacity for retaining knowledge - is there any relief for this sense of helplessness?

It's depressing to be 'slow', or 'dumb'. I'm interested in the world, and I'm sure many people that have trouble remembering things and retaining information feel the same way I do. To those people, and to anyone else who feels like responding: what are your strategies to learn? How do you handle large bursts of information?

Thank you :)