When you feel nostalgia, you journey back to your authentic self—a self that was perhaps younger, happier, or healthier. This can make you feel happy or sad or a bittersweet combination of both.

Here’s something really interesting: there are two kinds of nostalgia. There’s reflective nostalgia, which inspires positive thoughts and emotions. Here’s an example. A friend and I were shopping one Saturday morning, and we ventured into a retro-toy shop. Inside were all of these toys that we used to play with when we were kids. We were delighted! We spent a long time just going through the store merchandise, asking each other, “Didn’t you have one of these?”

Then there’s restorative nostalgia, which evokes sadness and the yearning to rebuild the past—to rebuild the “home”. That’s the painful feeling you describe. There used to be a little coffee shop my uni pals and I used to go to when we studied together. It’s been replaced with something else now, a bank, I think. Whenever I walk by the location, I feel a pang of sorrow, because that coffee shop represents the me I was before life took its toll—innocent, joyful, and carefree. A strong yearning takes over me, and I feel like I’d give one of my fingers just to go back to those days again and spend time with my college pals.

Nostalgia is such a complex feeling!

“To live only in the moment would not only be undesirable, it would not be possible in any meaningful way."

-Melissa Myer, University of Texas