I miss my childhood.

[7thLetter]

I miss when I had no responsibilities as a kid, I often always think about all the things that I did. Waking up early on a Saturday morning to watch my favorite TV shows. Especially with the feeling of Christmas, the time when it snows. I miss all the junk food I used to eat, the icecream, the pizza, the cookies, and the colored food. Man all of that stuff was so good. I miss everything about the 90's.

I literally was about to write a whole poem but thought, what am I doing.

Anyways, is this "normal" for young adults, maybe even adults in general, to go through this feeling or is this just another "trap"? I'm 22 now, turning 23 in 3 months, and this feeling started to come along for me halfway through 21. I've been trying to re-live my past through old video games I used to play, old music I used to listen to, but its just not the same anymore. What does this usually mean? Maybe its just another phase that people go through? Could it be a sense of loneliness, or should I work on my detachment more? If I were to be honest with myself, I don't feel depressed, and I have a neutral feeling about where I'm at in life at the moment. Although I can feel slightly lonely at times, but I have worked on dealing with my loneliness quite a bit.

Anyone else feel the same way sometimes? Thoughts?

[Shadowraix]

Don't worry about if its normal or not.

Go contemplate about it.

[okulele]

Throw yourself fully into the feeling of nostalgia and discover what it is that you are REALLY missing.

[BeOne]

I am more than double your age and suffer from the same thing. I was part of a somewhat disfunctional big family. Gambling, food stamps and paying the rent were always the biggest topics. Yet i still miss being younger and not having much. I don't have much now either. I don't know where i am really going with this but i do know i feel lonely, lost and have no sense of purpose. Which is why i watch Leo's videos and joined this forum recently.

[Forestluv]

@7thLetter Perhaps there are better ways to revisit a child-like mindset than video games. I'm in my 40s and I climb trees

[aurum]

@7thLetter

Your old toys don't have the same effect because they were not the cause of your happiness. You've made a false correlation.

What you miss is the sense of freedom and lightness that comes from being a kid. A sense that everything is going to be "okay". But as we grow up, the mind gets conditioned out of that.

The good news is you don't have to watch old cartoons to get that feeling back. You can be an adult, live in the present and still have that sense of ease. Spiritual growth is the key.

[7thLetter]

@okulele  I guess I'm slowly figuring it out by already doing so.

@see_on_see Well I mean, as a kid, the experience of life is all new to us, everything was so fascinating. Plus those are the times that we go through, without all the social conditioning, insecurities from our teenage years, and everything else that has been dragged along into our adulthood. That's basically why we are here to self-actualize, to get rid of all that stuff and to feel like a kid again.

People enjoy novelty. One example I thought of that is relative to this, is couples that have been in a long-term relationship. I'm pretty sure that there's usually a loss of attraction to their partner after several years in these long-term relationships, and I think its mainly because the relationship doesn't feel "new" anymore.

I'm not as interested in "fun" or "candy" these days as I used to be, but I do a little bit.

18 hours ago, see_on_see said:

By the way, one thing that nostalgia is great for, is channeling it into artistic pursuits. 

Interesting point, made me think about the different EDM artists out there incorporating their favorite 90's video game music into their songs.

@BeOne Welcome!

@Serotoninluv Made me chuckle

@aurum I get the theory of it but I guess it would take a lot more consistency and time for me to fully embody it. I would not say I'm there yet if I were to be honest with myself.

[Pelin]

@7thLetter Do you miss your childhood, or your false ideas about it? 

Thinking about the past and worrying about the future are both common in all ages, I believe, unless we work towards freeing ourselves and starting living in the now. I often hear young kids talking about the time when they were even younger, like a five year old tells memories from when they were two-three years old, as if it is the distant past. The thing is, I realized, what I remember from those memories and the kid remembers are entirely different. So it is actually the kid's ideas about what happened make them remember and cherish those memories.

Let me clarify with an example. I remember when I was in primary school, I spent most nights with my mum and sister watching TV series and playing games. When I looked closely into these memories, I remembered something my mum said: Your father's not home on the days starting with P (that is three days in Turkish). She even made a game out of it, and we were not traumatized, we never questioned why our dad wasn't at home with us. I later understood that he used to go out and possibly gamble those nights. Basically, half of the week we didn't know where exactly my dad was. And my mum, despite being very frustrated with him, cheerfully played games with us. Many years later I learned that this was a huge problem in their marriage, and that they argued a lot. I never saw them arguing until I was like 16 or so, and never suspected they were unhappy, because both have always been very loving parents. Now, looking back, I cherish those memories, yes, but I don't miss my childhood knowing that my mum suffered.

I still listen to music from high school times, or play "street fighter" with my husband at times. Just yesterday we were talking about the cartoons we watched as a child and watched a few episodes. I don't see it as a problem, though, or an issue of not staying in the now. Childhood and adolescence are the times we start to develop a taste for things, and we are not bound to change them. Of course we grow, for example, I don't listen to metal music any more, or I have developed an ear for classical music over the past years. But I still listen to Green Day from time to time, and sometimes it brings memories, too, but that doesn't mean I miss my adolescence or get stuck in it.

I agree with @see_on_see  on nostalgia being a channel for art, and also good for redemption and moving on (and as a plus, not just for the creator, but for the viewer too). I like writing short stories, and I see myself coming back to my childhood neighbourhood in one way or another when I write a story. Our house was demolished when I was 12 and it still is a traumatic memory, but writing helped me quite a lot in neutralizing my memories.

[7thLetter]

@Pelin I think you’re talking about something different. I miss my childhood, the feelings, the emotions. Not the content, or what exactly happened in my childhood, only partially though. People in general tend to remember how they felt about someone or something in the past more often than what exactly happened in that moment. When looking at a potential partner, would you love them for their resume or how they make you feel? I mean, I hope its not the first one.

[bejapuskas]

@7thLetter  You must understand that ego will never be satisfied. For ego, every age is a problem - Medieval age, Iron age, Stone age - huge stage red problems, teenage - hormonal problems, relationship problems, young age - adults are too superior, cant do everything I want etc...

Try to become more conscious!

[Brittany]

My childhood was a living hell. 

 

Edited September 28, 2018 by Brittany

[Brittany]

On 9/25/2018 at 2:47 AM, 7thLetter said:

I miss when I had no responsibilities as a kid, I often always think about all the things that I did. Waking up early on a Saturday morning to watch my favorite TV shows. Especially with the feeling of Christmas, the time when it snows. I miss all the junk food I used to eat, the icecream, the pizza, the cookies, and the colored food. Man all of that stuff was so good. I miss everything about the 90's.

I literally was about to write a whole poem but thought, what am I doing.

Anyways, is this "normal" for young adults, maybe even adults in general, to go through this feeling or is this just another "trap"? I'm 22 now, turning 23 in 3 months, and this feeling started to come along for me halfway through 21. I've been trying to re-live my past through old video games I used to play, old music I used to listen to, but its just not the same anymore. What does this usually mean? Maybe its just another phase that people go through? Could it be a sense of loneliness, or should I work on my detachment more? If I were to be honest with myself, I don't feel depressed, and I have a neutral feeling about where I'm at in life at the moment. Although I can feel slightly lonely at times, but I have worked on dealing with my loneliness quite a bit.

Anyone else feel the same way sometimes? Thoughts?

Do everything that you love without putting an age limit on it.

Don't worry about what is "normal".

Try new things.

Go into your town and do activities you haven't done before. 

[MikeT]

Be a kid NOW!  Adults beat the sense of wonder, the creativity and our uniqueness out of us with time.. Get it back and you'll feel even more as a kid now than you felt when you actually were one.

My girlfriend just bought some paintbrushes a few days ago. (She never thought she'd be any good at anything cuz parents beat that out of her). Now she thinks painting might be her life purpose and and she paints non-stop after she gets off work. She's become a kid again!

 

Make your life Better every year and you will never miss the past... Why would you miss a time when things were worse?

 

[c_wave_arts]

@aurum Well said! It is the sense of freedom that comes from our childhood that we desire and feel nostalgia towards.

@7thLetter I don't relate so much to the part of loneliness. Maybe the loneliness you feel comes from the intimacy of the moment when you were a child. If you mean detachment from the pains of not experiencing childhood with the same freedom as before, then maybe you should do more contemplation. I think you need to keep facing these emotions, contemplate, and meditate. I'm in my 20's like you and I experience this a lot. I think that you should contemplate the question "What is youth?" or "What is childhood?" Maybe we are always children and we just have more responsibilities. I don't want to believe it's something we grow out of but something that is a part of who we are. We grow from a set point and we have a lot of responsibilities we pick up, but we never lose our youthfulness. That's how I see it.

Great post! I need to contemplate this myself! 

[7thLetter]

@c_wave_arts I mention loneliness because I’m trying to figure out what this means to miss my childhood. Maybe its because I feel a bit of a sense of loneliness which causes me to miss my childhood? I don’t feel super lonely, but I did get rid of a lot of relationships that I had in my life. Due to them being very toxic, and me wanting to focus on working on myself. I’d say I’ve came a long way by doing so because I’ve definitely grown to be a lot more independant.

I’m not sure what you mean by “If you mean detachment from the pains of not experiencing childhood with the same freedom as before.” I mean on my detachment overall. To work on your “being” is to be detached. Detached from validation, money, sex, drugs, etc. So I mention detachment because again I’m trying to figure out why I’m missing my childhood and where it could stem from. So maybe working on my overall detachment, or being, in life would make me think about the past less, and focus more on the present.

I mean I guess we could say out childhood is a part of us but I personally would say a lot has changed for me. Change is good of course, I grow everyday, but life for me is just so much different than what it used to be. Life was fun as a kid, but these days I’ve worked on my detachment quite a bit from “needing” fun. I don’t go out and party anymore and all that. So hmm, that makes me wonder what I’m missing if I don’t desire fun.

[LastThursday]

I often think about my childhood. My early childhood was full of two different cultures, sunshine, always being outdoors with my younger sister, who was my best buddy, being adored for being the eldest grandchild, and for having insatiable curiosity about everything. My teenagehood was full of arguing and absent parents, unwanted responsibility, bullying at school, social awkwardness, loneliness, high introversion, lots and lots of TV, books, staying indoors and home computers! And what do you think I thought I missed the most? Being a teenager: that was the closest thing I could identify with, now.

That is, until I went on holiday one time. I was in my late thirties. And I was with a bunch of friends. The setting was a huge converted barn in the middle of the French countryside. We drank wine, ate cheese. I ate sunflower seeds swinging gently in a hammock most days, sipping wine and reading. I discovered a beaten up old bike in a shed and re-learned to ride a bike and took it around most days for an hour or so and got lost. I would wake up before everyone else just as the sun was coming up and take a plunge in the freezing cold pool before doing some Tai Chi. I was also inexplicably struck by the beauty of a ruined old brick barn next to our lodgings. So much so, I just had an overwhelming desire to sketch it. The amazing sunsets and the warm stillness in the evenings nearly made me cry. It was then I realised what I had really been missing.

I had been totally disconnected with the authentic, curious, adventurous, outdoor-loving me and with that sensation of just being for the sake of being, and the inherent beauty in the world, and a deep knowing that I was part of the world  - the sensations I last had as a young kid.