The author describes a connection between the first memory reported by a patient and the patient's response when asked to state his goal in life. He cites six cases with interesting and convincing material and concludes that not only is there a connection but that the memory plus the life plan portray an area of arrested development that corresponds to the latency period in the patient. This determines the future behavior of the patient. Besides this useful clinical observation, a mystical-philosophical section of the paper attempts to link this observation with racial unconscious, phylogeny, and evolution.