Romanticize The Past

Hi.

I have recently realized that people have the tendency to romanticize experiences that are more temporary than others.

What I mean by that is when a person goes on a holiday trip, he or she is most likely coming back from the trip wishing they had decided to stay longer, visited more places, went to the place more often, and constantly revisiting memories that had happened during the trip, and forgetting about the bad things that went along with it.

I am guilty of doing this. I went to Bangkok and came back, wishing I had done things a lot differently, but still happy with how things turned out. I thought about Sunday mornings and how I missed getting woken up by the recordings outside, when in actual fact, I hated those things. I wish I could spend my days with my course mates in a building, when I actually disliked people who come to our room as and when they please.

We, as humans with feelings and emotions, romanticize these memories, thinking that they were more than they were, just because they meant more to us than they probably should. When we miss something, we pick the memory out from the others and hold them up to a better posture, seeing them in a much better light than the rest. 

When looking back at past memories, people will most likely only remember the good things. We are just programmed to work that way. No matter how awful or amazing your destination is, you'll always remember how much fun you had during the trip. I think people need to be more impartial and subjective to realize what went wrong and make sure that never happens again.

But I guess since things are constantly changing, we might as well make full use of what we think we enjoyed in the past.

I hope I haven't bummed you all out, and that you're feeling fine.

Good evening.