I’ve been thinking a lot about the past this year.

Guess you can call it “being nostalgic”.

I’ve been thinking more about the good times in the past where for whatever reason I seemed to feel as if I “was in my element”, a time where I seemed to have a carefree attitude without negative thoughts, in the moment and happy.

I can’t say they’ve been long periods of my life such as “childhood” or my time in my most favourite job I’ve had in my life which was the Navy because in all periods, there were good and bad, ups and downs.  I seem to be nostalgic for “moments”.

I’ve been seeing a lot of articles, videos and podcasts about this.  It must be something in everyone’s collective psyche around the world at the moment where we are experiencing these nostalgic moments.

Being of Greek background, the word is derived from Greek words (nostos meaning home coming – although it can also be ‘nostimon’ (which has since changed meaning over the years because currently it means ‘delicious’ so I need to check this with my dad who knows ancient greek –  and algia meaning pain) but it wasn’t a word used in ancient Greece – it was created in 1688 by a Swiss medical student who noticed the same pattern in his patients when they were far from home.

A sense of sadness and melancholy.

Well anyway, this has been a feeling I have been feeling for some time and it gets me ‘out of sorts’, a tinge of sadness with everything in some way.  An acceptance that something has shifted but I’m unable to place my finger on it.

A realisation that I have (probably, more than likely) have gone through a mental journey or trip of some kind (without me realising because there was no plane, train or automobile)  and now I’m at this new place in my head (country and place unknown) and I’m experiencing this nostalgia for what was.

What would you do if you found yourself in a new place or new country? You’d accept and acknowledge your situation and make the best of it knowing that your life will never again be the same.  I think I now have some work to do with my mindset now and find delight in some new moments, new friends, new beginnings and to allow the moments of melancholy to wash over me.

Tomorrow is another day.

Here are some excellent videos I found about this very feeling.  Nathaniel Drew shares what he did to go back to those great feelings he experienced in his youth by removing social media from his life for 30 days.

Here is one by journalist Johnny Harris and his investigation into Nostalgia Thoery which is a lovely video to watch.

Read:

The Origin of the Word Nostalgia 

The Etymology of Nostalgia