Humble Beginnings Blog

What if nostalgia isn’t actually what we think it is?

What if nostalgia isn’t really about missing old places, old people, or even a particular period of time? What if what we’re actually grieving is the version of ourselves who existed before we knew what we know now…the version of ourselves that lived in ignorance.

Sometimes it almost hurts to look back. There is a strange kind of mourning that comes with remembering a time that no longer exists. Not because the places are gone or because the people have all disappeared, but because you no longer exist in the way you once did.

I remember being six years old, and somehow the sky seemed brighter. Everything around me felt more colorful. The world felt lighter, safer, and infinitely more exciting. Looking back, it would be easy to assume that life really was better then, but I don’t think that’s true. There wasn’t actually less bad in the world. There wasn’t less pain, less suffering, or fewer problems. I simply hadn’t been introduced to them yet.

I was living in ignorance.

Because of that, my perception of reality was completely different. I interpreted everything differently, not because I was younger, but because I had been exposed to so much less. The further we move through life, every day, every hour, every second, we accumulate more experience. We gain knowledge whether we ask for it or not. And once you know something, there is no returning to the version of yourself who didn’t.

Think about something as ordinary as your car.

A week ago, you didn’t know whether it was going to pass inspection. You didn’t know how much the repairs would cost, what your grocery bill would be, or whether that person was finally going to ask you out. Today, you know the answers.

Maybe your car failed inspection.

The reality is that your car probably needed those repairs long before you found out. Maybe it had needed them for months. The problem already existed, but it didn’t occupy your mind because you didn’t know about it. The moment you learned, your experience of reality changed even though reality itself did not.

Nothing about the car became worse.

Your awareness did.

And strangely enough, you’ll miss the version of your life where you didn’t have that problem to worry about.

I think nostalgia works in much the same way.

At the end of the day, a tree is just a tree. That restaurant your family always went to is, objectively, just another restaurant. A pair of tiny plastic Disney Princess heels is just molded plastic.

Yet none of those things stay ordinary.

They become containers for entire versions of ourselves.

Whenever I see those little plastic Disney Princess heels with the princess picture on top, I don’t just remember the shoes. I remember begging my mom to let me wear them to school. I remember finding every excuse imaginable to put them on. I remember my feet hurting after wearing them with my Halloween costume, and my mom smiling as she reminded me she told me not to wear them, before carrying me back to the car anyway.

But it’s never really been about the shoes.

When I think about those heels, I’m also remembering a version of my life that existed before I knew my mom and stepdad were going to divorce. Before I knew I would leave the home I grew up in to live with my dad. Before the years of trauma that would follow. Before I had to watch my mom struggle with depression, lose pieces of herself, and spend years trying to become someone untouched by everything life had done to her.

It was before I looked in the mirror wondering what I looked like or whether boys would ever like me.

Back then, my biggest concerns were making little iMovies on the iPad with my twin sister, deciding when we’d play Barbies next, or reminding my mom about the birthday party coming up that weekend.

I don’t actually miss those Disney Princess heels.

I don’t actually miss that perfume my mom used to wear simply because it smelled good.

I don’t actually miss my great-grandma’s house because I thought it was beautiful.

I miss walking into her house and telling her she smelled like Cheetos before immediately being attacked by her five or six dachshunds, with Prince always being mine and my sister’s favorite.

I miss waking up early when we stayed at their house, smelling coffee before I even opened my eyes while we waited for my great-grandma to wake up and make us blina, her German breakfast that somehow tasted better than anything I’ve had since.

I miss how her house felt like one of the safest places in the world. I genuinely believed there was no better place on Earth.

Not because the house itself possessed some magical quality, but because I experienced it through a mind that hadn’t yet been introduced to everything that would come later.

At that point in my life, I didn’t understand what depression was.

I didn’t know what it felt like to lose someone I loved.

I didn’t know how complicated people could be.

I didn’t know how intricate, overwhelming, and relentless the real world could become.

I still believed in mermaids. I was convinced that one day I would find one.

I had hope in people without questioning whether they deserved it.

The world felt limitless because I hadn’t yet discovered its limits.

And maybe that’s why nostalgia feels so painful.

Old movies don’t change. The script is still the same. The plot hasn’t been rewritten. Yet somehow, every time you revisit one, it feels different.

The movie isn’t different.

You are.

What you miss isn’t the film itself. You miss watching it while hearing your mom cook in the kitchen. You miss sitting on that same couch believing tomorrow would probably look just like today. You miss interpreting that story through the mind of someone who hadn’t yet experienced heartbreak, grief, disappointment, insecurity, or loss.

The movie stayed exactly the same.

The person watching it didn’t.

Maybe that’s why nostalgia can make you physically sick. That hollow feeling in your stomach isn’t just remembering places. It’s remembering people as they once were. It’s remembering your parents before life wore them down. Your grandparents before they became old. Your friends before they drifted away. And maybe most painfully, it’s remembering yourself before time quietly reshaped you into someone else.

Because nostalgia isn’t simply a sentimental longing for the past.

It isn’t just missing the way things were.

It’s missing the version of yourself that existed within that reality.

The places were never just places.

The objects were never just objects.

The memories were never valuable because of what happened there.

They were valuable because of who you were while they were happening.

Maybe nostalgia isn’t longing for another time at all.

Maybe it’s grieving a consciousness you can never return to.