Why You Shouldn’t Look Back on Old Pictures
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Recently I made my sister a scrapbook and it was surprisingly fun. The whole process — going through old photos, organizing them, arranging them — sparked a huge creative buzz in me. It ignited my interest in doing more creative things.
Looking back on old photos was nice, but it was also sad. As I looked through all our old photographs, I remembered times from the past and relived experiences. It was nostalgic. All our old photos reminded me of better times. Then, I realized that looking at all these old photos and videos made me sad.
As someone who struggles with mental illness, it’s easy for me to glamorize the past for being better than it was. Especially as a kid, before I was hit by the brunt of depression. Before I grew up and became a head case.
There’s something magical about being a kid. You don’t have worries in the same way and you see the world through rose tinted glasses. And I miss that.
And that’s what all the old photos reminded me of. It reminded me of better days, better times. Before.
All that time, I spent comparing who I am today versus who I was back then and I gotta say, it’s not entirely pleasant.
That’s the feeling I was left with when I was looking through photos. I felt sadness and remorse. While it was certainly nostalgic to view them, I couldn’t help but feel cheated. And the more I looked, the worse I felt.
Then I realized that maybe I shouldn’t look back on them. For one, I glorified times that were bad in their own ways.
Two, when we look at these old photos and memorabilia it transports us to a different time and place. That’s not entirely a bad thing, but spending too much time in the past can lead to even more unhappiness.
You don’t want to spend too much time in the past or future, as it distracts from the present moment.
I know that when I look at them it’s always fun. But there’s a line that is easy to cross when we start to live in the past.
We start thinking about better times. We start thinking of old friends, old memories, old. And it’s easy to slip right back there. And that’s not a good thing.
We can’t live in the past. By reliving those experiences over, we take away from our present moment and our future. Instead of being here and now, it’s an escape.
Sometimes it’s a necessary escape. When things now feel insurmountable and painful, we want to escape to better times and the past is a good place to go. But the future is a good place to go too.
I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about my past life. It always felt easier back then and a little bit like I took it for granted. There’s a lesson in that too. About being grateful for your life and learning how to be appreciative of the current moment.
This is all to say that we have to be mindful. It’s great to reminisce, but not at your expense. It can be detrimental to my mental health because I think of once being carefree and then remembering I’m not now, and it makes me feel even lower. And that’s counterproductive.
