Yesterday was #oldheadshotday and it got me to look back on my childhood and the activities that I participated in as well as the past versus the present. I always find that we tend to look at the negative aspects of life over the ones that we enjoyed because they tend to stick in our minds longer and have a larger affect on us. I am no scientist, so I can't tell you the science behind that theory, but I do know from experience.
A quote that always sticks in my mind about nostalgia from one of my favorite authors William Faulkner is “How often have I lain beneath rain on a strange roof, thinking of home.” I always find that when I think of the word nostalgia that it leads to having a negative connotation to it. People believe that nostalgia is supposed to be looking at how your life used to be, and supposedly how much better it was then the life you currently live. My hope is that people stop looking at their past and how good it used to be and instead tell themselves that their lives can get better no matter how bad they could be. Like Søren Kierkegaard, a Danish Philosopher from the 1800's said, “Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.”
To prove my point, I'm going to share some moments from the past and the present to show that we can live in the past but move forward to have a good life in the present.
These pictures are a part of my past that I can fondly look back on and think of the good times I have had. I could live my whole life thinking why can't my life be as happy as when I was a young girl before any of the hardships in my life made me the person I am today, but I don't want to define myself by my past, I want people to know me for who I am in the present. Here are some present pictures of memories that I hold dear to me.
When we look on the past and compare it to the way we live life in the present, we are only living our lives backwards. In order to live a life of fulfillment, we need to stop worrying about
the past and looking forward to the new adventures that will come unto us in the present and future. As one of my college professors would say "the more that we live in the emptiness of the past, the less fulfillment of the future we will see." Enjoy what life you live and while it is okay to be nostalgic, don't let the "what if's" of one's past determine the way you live your future.
-Megan
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