"Nostalgia is a beautiful liar"

What is it about nostalgia that draws us in? Why do we always feels a need to seek out what is no longer around us? Why do we think that what we used to have will somehow be better than what we can get in the future? I often think about this, I wonder in my head about the what-if's, the could haves or shouldn't haves. I think back on my child hood memories and see a world that was more colourful, more curious. A world that was more open to exploration, and sometimes I wonder, why that no longer feels like that world.

Sometimes I think about what my world could have looked like if i had done somethings differently. maybe if I had listened to or ignored someone. Say or not say something and it always leads back to one thought. Things could have been different, they could have been better. There's a quote by Milan Kundera that says “The Greek word for "return" is nostos. Algos means "suffering." So nostalgia is the suffering caused by an unappeased yearning to return.” 

 

I feel like this is very much true. Nostalgia gives me a a sense of something that is unfinished, something that no longer needs me but I need it more than I ever thought I would. When I think about the people I used to know, or the opportunities I could have had, I feel like there was something there. A lesson that should have been learned, or a memory that that wants to be remembered but it can't because nobody remembers it well enough. Its like a story that's been retold so many times, the ending doesn't make sense anymore.

When I think back on the people and places that used to make me feel joy, I start to feel the pull back to realty. Those people and places are no longer around. People grow up and find new things to love and grow up with. Places change and create new memories for the new people that visit them. Hopefully one day I can look back on those memories and feel at peace, feel like everything that should have been was, and everything that could have been did. Maybe one day I can wake up happy in the place I'm in, and remember that no matter what I think I feel, No matter what I think i could have done better, if I had done it wrong I wouldn't be where I'm at today.