Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
As I get older, I find myself going back to "old days".. memories of better times and it got me to wondering.. Is nostalgia real or are we deluding ourselves? And if so, why? I have bad memories as well as good ones, things I'd like to totally forget, but I love remembering the good times. I'm wondering if I'm over-glamorizing them.
I recall fun days of dating/dancing to Bee Gee's/ Saturday Nite Fever, doing "the bump".. buying a week's worth of groceries for $25, gas for .25/gal, bread a quarter. And it seems far more valuable and fun to me now than it did back then.. Did I appreciate it as much then as I do now?
I recall my parents talking about walking 10 miles in snow and rain to get to school (rolling my eyes as a teenager) and them telling us how fortunate we were to have this bk and white TV watching Ed Sullivan and Elvis (while covering my eyes) and I'm wondering now if they ever had their own moments of nostalgia. ??
Moderator cut: Off Topic
Last edited by TheViking85; 08-16-2012 at 08:36 PM..
As I get older, I find myself going back to "old days".. memories of better times and it got me to wondering.. Is nostalgia real or are we deluding ourselves? And if so, why? I have bad memories as well as good ones, things I'd like to totally forget, but I love remembering the good times. I'm wondering if I'm over-glamorizing them.
I recall fun days of dating/dancing to Bee Gee's/ Saturday Nite Fever, doing "the bump".. buying a week's worth of groceries for $25, gas for .25/gal, bread a quarter. And it seems far more valuable and fun to me now than it did back then.. Did I appreciate it as much then as I do now?
I recall my parents talking about walking 10 miles in snow and rain to get to school (rolling my eyes as a teenager) and them telling us how fortunate we were to have this bk and white TV watching Ed Sullivan and Elvis (while covering my eyes) and I'm wondering now if they ever had their own moments of nostalgia. ??
Pardon me for thinking I'm on the retirement forum.. maybe I should have posted this there. If so, feel free, oh great forum leader, to move me again.
As I get older it is harder and harder for me to deal with the way the world is. The only thing that keeps me from living in the past is the fact that I don't have very many happy memories.
My dad was in his eighties and you would swear that nothing had happened in the past 50 years because all he ever talked about was "the good old days" it was sad and pathetic. When you start living like that you might as well just die because all you have is frustration and misery.
I try very hard NOT to think of the past (even the few good times I had). There is nothing for me back there. My life is ahead of me.
Nostalgia is both. The real part is the memories are real. That world did exist, but the nostalgia is from the pov of one living it, maybe not the essay someone studying it would say. So if you didn't live it it sounds imagined.
It's imagined as well since unless you know both times and experienced both times and know all the particulars, you can't say which was best. Best and the glow of a long gone summer day don't go together. And yet, its a good thing to be nostalgic and inspire discussion, and learning and the knowledge that things always change, but we need to remember how they were to understand what that means.
Nostalgia is both. The real part is the memories are real. That world did exist, but the nostalgia is from the pov of one living it, maybe not the essay someone studying it would say. So if you didn't live it it sounds imagined.
It's imagined as well since unless you know both times and experienced both times and know all the particulars, you can't say which was best. Best and the glow of a long gone summer day don't go together. And yet, its a good thing to be nostalgic and inspire discussion, and learning and the knowledge that things always change, but we need to remember how they were to understand what that means.
It's real.. I do know that. I know that I'm not imagining anything; I'm just wondering how much I'm "over-glamorizing" the events.
As I get older it is harder and harder for me to deal with the way the world is. The only thing that keeps me from living in the past is the fact that I don't have very many happy memories.
I'm sorry you don't have many happy memories to fall back on. I grew up in a dysfunctional family, so I can understand that to a degree. But there are always those few and far between places in there.. life isn't all dismal; there's got to be bright spots somewhere in all those years, and I'm wondering if that's why I focus on them.
Quote:
My dad was in his eighties and you would swear that nothing had happened in the past 50 years because all he ever talked about was "the good old days" it was sad and pathetic. When you start living like that you might as well just die because all you have is frustration and misery.
I'd agree that the older we get the harder it is to deal with this world and it's problems. I mean look at your 80 yr old dad.. Obviously, he's having a similar problem if all he could talk about were the "good old days". Thats the whole point of this topic... do we over glamorize the good memories of our pasts?
Quote:
I try very hard NOT to think of the past (even the few good times I had). There is nothing for me back there. My life is ahead of me.
Surely you have SOME great memories to recall. I don't have life ahead of me as you do.. or not that many years. So maybe that's the difference.
There's obviously got to be some kind of balance between our nostalgic memories and life in the moment; but as you get older it sometimes seems that the best was "back when"..
Surely you have SOME great memories to recall. I don't have life ahead of me as you do.. or not that many years. So maybe that's the difference.
There's obviously got to be some kind of balance between our nostalgic memories and life in the moment; but as you get older it sometimes seems that the best was "back when"..
Maryjane55us, I am not sure how old you are but I am 57 and I know that the best years of my life are ahead of me, not behind. Unless you are 90 that can be true for you as well.
I have so many plans and projects and things that I want to do, I can't waste my time thinking about things that are past. My parents are both dead and gone and I loved them very much, but thinking about them does me no good in the here and now. And yes I have had some fairly decent times in my life, but they are NOTHING compared to the ones I haven't had yet.
My philosophy is either you are living and growing and looking ahead to the future or you are dying and I'm not ready to check out of the net just yet.
There are certain times in your life that are just REALLY GOOD. It can be due to any number of factors including your own perception of events.
It's impossible to describe it as real or delusional because only you know the facts of the matter and how correct your recollections are.
I miss the excitement of the county fair coming to my podunk town each summer. I however have no illusions about going back and seeing it as anything nearly as exciting.
I am 74. Of course the technological advances in my lifetime are impressive, particularly the medical ones that I have personally benefitted from. But I am not massively impressed on a personal level with the PC (despite working in a computer environment from the 70's to the 90's), don't give a pfffffffft about the cell phone, don't find the CD any improvement over the vinyl LP, etc., etc.
As far as American society goes nothing beats a childhood where you went outside all day to play all over town, into fields, woods and streams....no fears or worries, no locked houses, no locked cars, no burglaries. But that is to ignore racial prejudice, discrimination against women and prejudice against gay people of those same years. However, for me today's acrimonious, paranoid, conspiracy-ridden social atmosphere in America was totally repugnant.
I didn't identify with American society any longer, and this was a rapidly accelerating process that began in the 1980's. I have not been upset by getting old, and have found my life getting richer and deeper with every decade that has passed, while the social and cultural life of the country got crasser and more shallow.
My nostalgia is selective, of course. And I quite enjoy reverie over some phases of my past life. But I am very present oriented, and when my dissatisfaction with contemporary U.S. life became too profound - I emigrated. The years since then have been some of the most interesting and satisfying of my life. The new friends perhaps the best I have ever had. The discussions, the projects, perhaps the best so far.
So, I would not exchange my present as I personally have chosen it for any time in the past....and, quite frankly, I feel hardly the slimmest thread of connection between those various past eras I may have nostalgia about and the nation of today.
Maryjane55us, I am not sure how old you are but I am 57 and I know that the best years of my life are ahead of me, not behind. Unless you are 90 that can be true for you as well.
I have so many plans and projects and things that I want to do, I can't waste my time thinking about things that are past. My parents are both dead and gone and I loved them very much, but thinking about them does me no good in the here and now. And yes I have had some fairly decent times in my life, but they are NOTHING compared to the ones I haven't had yet.
My philosophy is either you are living and growing and looking ahead to the future or you are dying and I'm not ready to check out of the net just yet.
I'm mid 60's and actually doing well at the moment with lots of freedom to pursue things I want to do; And that's all great and wonderful and I enjoy daily living, but I think I'd be delusional thinking that "the best years of my life lie ahead of me".
Reality tells me differently. Friends are in and out of the hospital.. we discuss the aches and pains of being older. I spend my life "caregiving" while feeling fortunate to be able to do so.. BUT..
I love going back in my mind to the "good old days" and remembering how much fun it was. those carefree days of youth.. I'm just trying to figure out if they were real or delusional..
There are certain times in your life that are just REALLY GOOD. It can be due to any number of factors including your own perception of events.
It's impossible to describe it as real or delusional because only you know the facts of the matter and how correct your recollections are.
I miss the excitement of the county fair coming to my podunk town each summer. I however have no illusions about going back and seeing it as anything nearly as exciting.
See, that's what I'm wondering.. if we were to go back, would we see it as exciting as we recall it in our minds??
My recollections are pretty clear, I've never had a problem with memories. I can recall the bad memories just as well, knowing they were really bad and things I'd rather forget. I'm just wondering if I've dressed up the good ones.
It's kind of like that old saying.. "ya can't go home and expect it to be the same" after you've lived life differently.
We'll never really know, huh? But I do remember going home after college living a different life and it wasn't the same as growing up there... and feeling a kind of disappointement from it.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
But I am not massively impressed on a personal level with the PC (despite working in a computer environment from the 70's to the 90's), don't give a pfffffffft about the cell phone, don't find the CD any improvement over the vinyl LP, etc., etc. 
