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Memory Lane is a Dead End: Why Queens Don’t Look Back
43 Plays9 months ago
The Queens unpack the seductive pull of nostalgia and why romanticising the past is a losing game.
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Transcript
Introduction to Nostalgia: A Double-Edged Sword
00:00:00
Speaker
Welcome back to the Female Dating Strategy, the meanest female-only podcast on the internet.
00:00:05
Speaker
I'm your host, Diana.
00:00:06
Speaker
And I'm Rose.
00:00:07
Speaker
And today we're discussing the perils and pleasures of nostalgia, the ways in which it can conceal and elide experiences that are meant to educate us and lead us often to fall prey to the same pitfalls from our very past.
00:00:22
Speaker
So let's discuss this, Diana.
00:00:23
Speaker
When you first brought up this topic, what actually led to you landing on this topic?
00:00:27
Speaker
Because you sent it to me midweek and I was like, yes, this is a brilliant idea.
00:00:30
Speaker
What occurred to you there?
00:00:31
Speaker
You know what?
00:00:32
Speaker
I kept thinking about how people I know, like get back with their exes and they romanticize the relationship after they've had a period of distance from them.
00:00:41
Speaker
And actually what made me think about it was, you know, I was visiting another town that I had lived in after a really long time.
00:00:48
Speaker
And when I was staying there, I was really nostalgic for the memories I had in the space when I lived there.
00:00:54
Speaker
But then I realized I was like, oh, you can't ever really go back home.
00:00:57
Speaker
Like it's never going to be that space.
00:00:58
Speaker
It's changed so much drastically, even for me that even I don't recognize it anymore, you know, but like I was still holding on to this like idea I had to fit when I lived there.
00:01:07
Speaker
And I was like, well, it's not this town anymore, you know, and it's never been this town maybe, but it's not definitely not this town like anymore.
00:01:14
Speaker
And I thought about how like when I was reflecting when I was leaving the space and I was, you know, going back to get my flight or whatever, I was I was like, hmm, this is a weird feeling because I
00:01:24
Speaker
It's very painful to realize that you could never go back to that space and time ever, even though, you know, it's not really helping you.
00:01:32
Speaker
But like, you can never go back to that time.
00:01:35
Speaker
And so people latch on to this idea of like, it was better.
Media's Role in Romanticizing the Past
00:01:39
Speaker
And you see this a lot in media as well, right?
00:01:41
Speaker
People are like, oh, the music of our time was better.
00:01:43
Speaker
The fashion of our time was better.
00:01:45
Speaker
Like life was just better.
00:01:46
Speaker
I don't deny the fact that pre-internet, probably life was... I mean, I don't know that it's necessarily better because I feel like people are just as mean and people are bullying.
00:01:55
Speaker
Absolutely.
00:01:56
Speaker
Just as bigoted.
00:01:57
Speaker
Again, it comes back to nostalgia.
00:01:59
Speaker
People romanticize a time when people are nicer and friendlier and happier and more understanding.
00:02:03
Speaker
And it's like, well, was that ever the situation?
00:02:05
Speaker
Or is it just that social media has made you a lot more aware of how people aren't like that?
00:02:10
Speaker
You know, this makes me think about this idea of yearning.
00:02:14
Speaker
Even if it's yearning for something that no longer exists.
00:02:17
Speaker
In Portuguese, in Brazil, they have a term for that.
00:02:20
Speaker
They call it saudade.
00:02:21
Speaker
And it means like this longing to return to a place that maybe never was, or to a relationship where the person's dead or gone.
Nostalgia vs. Present Reality
00:02:30
Speaker
And just this idea of like, you're in this perpetual state of sort of dwelling in the twilight.
00:02:36
Speaker
You're neither there nor here, but all of your energy and desire is directed towards something that's never going to be attainable again.
00:02:44
Speaker
And I think that's basically what nostalgia ends up being for a lot of people.
00:02:47
Speaker
Yeah, because the other aspect of it is I think that when you're not that content with your present, you tend to lean more heavily on a happier make-believe past.
00:02:57
Speaker
And it doesn't matter if the past was actually good or not, because I know a lot of people who romanticize the past, even if they didn't, you know, they didn't like it when they were actually living through it, when they were going through a really difficult time.
00:03:08
Speaker
You know, I think with time, our pain is dulled.
00:03:10
Speaker
Like we just don't remember the pain as clearly as we did, as acutely as we did when we first experienced it.
00:03:17
Speaker
And then what you're left with is memories of a time that felt simpler, maybe was happier, but you're latching on to essentially nostalgia really is just hanging on to the past.
00:03:27
Speaker
not in a way that is useful.
00:03:29
Speaker
I think that people think that, okay, well, what if I'm not ruminating on the bad?
00:03:32
Speaker
And it's not like I have an inability to like, let go of the terrible things.
00:03:36
Speaker
It's like, what if I'm just reminiscing about the
The Pitfalls of Nostalgic Relationships
00:03:38
Speaker
good stuff?
00:03:38
Speaker
And I'm like, well, that's fine within reason if it's like, oh, I like listening to the music of the time period that I was, you know, a child or whatever.
00:03:45
Speaker
Yeah, that's fine.
00:03:46
Speaker
But like,
00:03:47
Speaker
When it comes down to I need to get back with my ex because I remember a time when we were happier in high school when we were dating.
00:03:52
Speaker
I'm going to be like shaking your head.
00:03:54
Speaker
You know what I mean?
00:03:55
Speaker
I'm going to be shaking your shoulders and being like, what the fuck is wrong with you?
00:03:58
Speaker
This is bad.
00:04:00
Speaker
I just had my childhood best friend, my K through 12 best friend visit.
00:04:04
Speaker
One of her children was here in my area for sports.
00:04:07
Speaker
sports conference.
00:04:08
Speaker
And I said, Why don't you come stay with me?
00:04:10
Speaker
And I didn't know it at the time, but she and her husband were coming.
00:04:14
Speaker
Actually, I've known her longer.
00:04:15
Speaker
But he came into our lives when they were like 17.
00:04:20
Speaker
We're all the same age, right?
00:04:22
Speaker
And they've been together ever since.
00:04:23
Speaker
And it's one of the most miserable relationships I've ever seen in my life.
00:04:26
Speaker
And I've had a lot of friends
00:04:28
Speaker
And I've said to her, you know, like, what is it that has you holding on to this?
00:04:32
Speaker
And she's like, Oh, I just can't imagine not being married to him.
00:04:34
Speaker
And like, we've just been together for so long.
00:04:37
Speaker
And nothing as far as like, I love him for XYZ reasons, or he's my reason for getting up in the morning, or he's somebody who's my rock.
00:04:46
Speaker
It's just like, he's all I've ever known.
00:04:48
Speaker
And I'd rather dwell in misery with that than chance the unknown.
00:04:53
Speaker
And I think that's kind of the bifurcation between those who have an unhealthy attachment to nostalgia versus those who can maybe dip their toes into it from time to time.
00:05:02
Speaker
But again, I think it's about where we put our energy because like you, if I go back last summer, I went back to my hometown.
00:05:09
Speaker
What's crazy about where I'm from, Diana, is that it hasn't changed.
00:05:13
Speaker
Like you're saying you went back and you couldn't even recognize it.
00:05:16
Speaker
It had changed so much.
00:05:17
Speaker
Literally where I'm from, nothing has changed.
00:05:20
Speaker
It's like a time capsule.
00:05:21
Speaker
It's insane.
00:05:23
Speaker
And when I'm there, you know, a part of me is like, oh, I loved how simple it was.
00:05:27
Speaker
Like there's no traffic.
00:05:29
Speaker
You know, it's so quiet because nobody lives there.
00:05:32
Speaker
Like the library is really good.
00:05:34
Speaker
You know, when I go into the only gas station in town, like I always get a friendly hello.
00:05:37
Speaker
I'm always saying hi to the neighbors.
00:05:39
Speaker
They still remember me.
00:05:40
Speaker
You know, even though I haven't lived there since 1999.
00:05:44
Speaker
That's how small that place is.
00:05:45
Speaker
Like, and I'm still recognized when I go into the bar, the one bar we have.
00:05:49
Speaker
And it's all too easy for me to kind of dwell in that.
00:05:53
Speaker
wasn't it so easy and simple?
00:05:55
Speaker
And then what ends up happening is because it's a small town, they'll ask me about my brother or they'll ask me about my dad.
00:06:03
Speaker
And all of a sudden, like all of this trauma rushes back in.
00:06:06
Speaker
And I'm reminded like, there is a reason I went very far away and never came back.
00:06:10
Speaker
And so I do understand that pull.
00:06:13
Speaker
I really do.
00:06:13
Speaker
At the same time, I think because I have like this PTSD sort of thing, my trauma was so acute that I've never been able to forget it.
00:06:22
Speaker
But this is something we also mentioned in the pre-talk.
Memory, Defense Mechanisms, and Escapism
00:06:24
Speaker
Like there's a reason why you tend to romanticize the past.
00:06:27
Speaker
It's because your brain literally doesn't want you to recall painful events.
00:06:33
Speaker
It wants to erase them from your memory because it's so damaging to your body.
00:06:37
Speaker
So typically it tries to like overwrite those super traumatic things, unless of course you get, you know, some sort of complex trauma.
00:06:44
Speaker
But typically that's why your brain remembers the happier things versus the non-happy things, because that's a defense mechanism of the brain.
00:06:52
Speaker
Yeah, and that's the thing.
00:06:53
Speaker
I think another aspect of it is that people have an aversion to change.
00:06:57
Speaker
You know, when you're talking about your friend, right?
00:06:59
Speaker
And like, oh, this is all I've ever known.
00:07:01
Speaker
It's change seems carrier.
00:07:04
Speaker
You know, like she's with this person that she knows is not good for her because it feels comfortable.
00:07:09
Speaker
And that's the thing about nostalgia, right?
00:07:10
Speaker
It's like romanticizing a simpler time.
00:07:13
Speaker
is comfortable.
00:07:15
Speaker
It's even flattening your experience of the time, because really, truly, if you pay attention to your life at all, you know that even back then, there were challenges.
00:07:25
Speaker
But you tend to overlook those challenges, because they're not your current problems.
00:07:29
Speaker
You're so fixated on your current problems.
00:07:30
Speaker
You're like, this is such shit that going back to the past feels much nicer, much simpler.
00:07:35
Speaker
I can handle that now.
00:07:37
Speaker
Well, of course you can because now you're grown.
00:07:38
Speaker
You're more grown and more evolved than you were back then.
00:07:40
Speaker
So of course you can handle the challenges that life threw at you back then.
00:07:44
Speaker
But it's your inability to want to deal with change now.
00:07:47
Speaker
That's the issue.
00:07:48
Speaker
The inability to not want to change now and using nostalgia is basically escapism.
00:07:53
Speaker
It's another form of escapism, right?
The Exploitation of Nostalgia in Social Media
00:07:56
Speaker
You just simply can't bear where you're at right now.
00:07:58
Speaker
And it's easier.
00:07:59
Speaker
And it's this sort of fantasizing that lets you remove yourself from the troubles of today, because they are so overwhelming.
00:08:06
Speaker
I mean, especially, like you said, it wasn't better before the internet.
00:08:09
Speaker
Or was it just, you know, same thing, different story, like,
00:08:13
Speaker
Was it just the same but different?
00:08:15
Speaker
Probably.
00:08:15
Speaker
Like, I don't think humans have changed that much.
00:08:18
Speaker
I can't imagine that it's really that different.
00:08:20
Speaker
We just have a lot more access to sort of behavioral on a mass scale because of all the interfaces we have with social media.
00:08:27
Speaker
Yep.
00:08:28
Speaker
And social media manufactures this as like a constant trend, right?
00:08:32
Speaker
Like it feeds off of this feeling.
00:08:33
Speaker
Trad wife.
00:08:34
Speaker
Yeah.
00:08:35
Speaker
Dread wifery, right?
00:08:36
Speaker
That's all about this sort of nostalgia for a time when women couldn't vote or even have a bank account.
00:08:42
Speaker
But wasn't it so great that they could bake bread at home for their babies?
00:08:45
Speaker
So simple.
00:08:46
Speaker
Life was so simple back then when you had 16 children.
00:08:48
Speaker
Yeah.
00:08:50
Speaker
Right.
00:08:51
Speaker
And your husband could rape or beat you.
00:08:52
Speaker
And it didn't matter.
00:08:53
Speaker
Not that it matters that much.
00:08:54
Speaker
I mean, legally speaking, it's not like there's that many things in place today that are so different from before.
00:08:58
Speaker
You know what I'm saying?
00:08:59
Speaker
And so that's when I really start to get hot under the collar, because so many of these women are saying, like, I think the times were better before women could vote.
00:09:06
Speaker
Ever since women have been able to vote, look at how much worse off the world is.
00:09:09
Speaker
It's like, I don't care whether women can vote or not.
00:09:12
Speaker
All the people who are still in power are still men.
00:09:15
Speaker
So if you want to be pointing any fingers, please don't be pointing it at women, you know, quote unquote, voting for the wrong person or the wrong policy.
00:09:21
Speaker
What the fuck?
00:09:22
Speaker
Yeah.
00:09:23
Speaker
And you know, it's funny, I just think about this memory I had from the days of the forum on FDS.
Personal Experiences: Career, Relationships, and Nostalgia
00:09:28
Speaker
So like, you know, a few years ago, I was going through, obviously, just like many people, really rough time in my career because of COVID.
00:09:35
Speaker
You know, my industry, like a lot of industries were shut down.
00:09:38
Speaker
And I, you know, was trying to find work
00:09:40
Speaker
and it was like very early in my career, essentially.
00:09:42
Speaker
And I was like, okay, what the fuck do I do?
00:09:44
Speaker
My life is not going great.
00:09:45
Speaker
I came with all these plans and all these plans were thrown out of the window.
00:09:48
Speaker
And now what the fuck do I do?
00:09:49
Speaker
And that's kind of how I found the forum, right?
00:09:52
Speaker
Because I was in that space where I was like, well, nothing fulfilling is going on in my life.
00:09:56
Speaker
So let me fill it up with dating and boys.
00:09:58
Speaker
And I quickly found out that that was a very dumb thing to do.
00:10:00
Speaker
And I spent a lot of time being miserable because of it, you know?
00:10:03
Speaker
And when I found the forum, I was reading all these stories.
00:10:06
Speaker
And I remember,
00:10:07
Speaker
I started feeling extremely nostalgic about a boyfriend I had in high school.
00:10:11
Speaker
Okay.
00:10:11
Speaker
And the only reason why was because at that time, his career was going great.
00:10:16
Speaker
Like he was in the news.
00:10:17
Speaker
He had a very high profile career.
00:10:19
Speaker
He went to like an Ivy League school.
00:10:21
Speaker
Like he was basically like what I wanted to be.
00:10:24
Speaker
You know what I mean?
00:10:25
Speaker
Bear in mind that like when we broke up many, many, many, many years ago,
00:10:28
Speaker
Like it was not on the best of terms.
00:10:30
Speaker
Like we had a fine relationship, but towards the end, it was like, he was kind of a dick.
00:10:35
Speaker
And so I was like, okay, the way that we ended this relationship, like I don't really want to keep in touch with him because he used to keep in touch with me just to like tell me what was going on with like a new woman.
00:10:44
Speaker
And I was just like, okay, this guy just wants to like prove to me that he is so awesome or whatever.
00:10:49
Speaker
You know what I mean?
00:10:50
Speaker
I do know what you mean.
00:10:50
Speaker
I have a question for you.
00:10:51
Speaker
Was it Savannah who said this or am I misremembering?
00:10:54
Speaker
Or maybe it's Sheldon Lester who was like, do you really like him?
00:10:58
Speaker
Or do you like the life he's made for himself?
00:11:01
Speaker
And that's what's attracting you to him?
00:11:03
Speaker
Yep.
00:11:03
Speaker
Well, that was it for me.
00:11:04
Speaker
Because the thing is, so basically, you know, after our breakup, I never bothered hitting him up.
00:11:10
Speaker
Because I tried to do the whole let's stay friends thing.
00:11:13
Speaker
Because I was very young and I was stupid.
00:11:15
Speaker
I was gonna say you're a high schooler, of course.
00:11:17
Speaker
Yeah.
00:11:18
Speaker
I mean, no, but I mean, at the time when I was like, let's stay friends, you know, I was much older than that.
00:11:21
Speaker
I was like, in college or whatever.
00:11:23
Speaker
But like, okay, I was like, let's stay friends.
00:11:25
Speaker
And like, you know, I was like, very naive and stupid.
00:11:28
Speaker
And like I said, it was very hard to stay friends with him, because he only wanted to like, essentially rub it in my face that he was going out with other new people.
00:11:34
Speaker
And I was like, okay, this guy doesn't really want to be a friend.
00:11:36
Speaker
Like, he's bitter about the fact that I broke up with him.
00:11:39
Speaker
He's a
00:11:39
Speaker
frenemy is what he is.
00:11:41
Speaker
Yeah, we're never going to be friends.
00:11:42
Speaker
And so like, over the years, I just removed him from everything because I was like, well, there's no point.
00:11:47
Speaker
I don't keep in touch with this person.
00:11:48
Speaker
And I don't want these memories.
00:11:50
Speaker
Like I had a lot more clarity when I was younger than I was at that stage when I was like, during COVID, you know what I mean?
00:11:55
Speaker
Because I knew I was like, this is not what I wanted in my life.
00:11:57
Speaker
Because when I really needed them to be there, they were not there.
00:12:00
Speaker
And I had other ex-boyfriends who were like a lot more present, who were actually friendly people who had like the appropriate level of distance were also
00:12:07
Speaker
kind and gentle in their dealings with me, you know?
00:12:10
Speaker
So anyway, like as time moves on, I haven't kept in touch with this guy for years.
00:12:14
Speaker
I don't have him on any social media, like, you know, obviously no contact whatsoever.
00:12:19
Speaker
And then out of nowhere, I started feeling a lot of nostalgia for our relationship, which was crazy because I'd never felt like that before, right?
00:12:26
Speaker
I had a period of insanity, listeners.
00:12:28
Speaker
Oh,
00:12:29
Speaker
It happens.
00:12:30
Speaker
It happens because I can tell you exactly why with so much clarity now is because my life was not going that well.
00:12:36
Speaker
And so seeing how successful he was becoming, seeing how successful his life was, the fact that he did all these things that I wanted to do, I was envious of him.
00:12:45
Speaker
And like the only reason I wanted to get back in touch with him was not because I was like, oh, I hope he'll take me back and I hope we can become an item again.
00:12:51
Speaker
Because again, I was like, we're such different people now that likelihood of us actually getting along is even slimmer, you know, but because I didn't feel sorted in my own life, I felt out of sorts.
00:13:02
Speaker
And he seemed like he had his life together.
00:13:04
Speaker
And I remember I went to the forum and I was like, do you think I should start off this conversation
Nostalgia in Friendships: Growth vs. Stagnation
00:13:09
Speaker
with him again?
00:13:09
Speaker
Like, what if we're different people and we're more compatible now?
00:13:12
Speaker
And the FDS community.
00:13:14
Speaker
You can imagine what the FDS community had to say about that.
00:13:20
Speaker
I love that you actually posted it to the forum.
00:13:22
Speaker
That's what I really miss about it.
00:13:23
Speaker
It was like you would get immediate answers.
00:13:26
Speaker
More like an immediate resounding reality check, right?
00:13:29
Speaker
Because I was just like, what if I just did this?
00:13:32
Speaker
Also, bear in mind, I knew it was stupid.
00:13:34
Speaker
But I needed to hear it.
00:13:35
Speaker
You know what I mean?
00:13:35
Speaker
I knew it was stupid.
00:13:37
Speaker
Even in my heart of hearts, I knew it was stupid.
00:13:38
Speaker
I knew why I was doing it.
00:13:40
Speaker
And that's the thing.
00:13:40
Speaker
Somebody clocked it almost immediately.
00:13:42
Speaker
They were like, are you actually missing him?
00:13:44
Speaker
And do you actually want to get back with him?
00:13:45
Speaker
Or is it just his life is going so well, your life is shit right now.
00:13:48
Speaker
And so...
00:13:49
Speaker
You want him back for that reason alone.
00:13:51
Speaker
Because you've never expressed this interest in like more than a decade that it's been.
00:13:56
Speaker
You know what I mean?
00:13:57
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely.
00:13:58
Speaker
If it's been more than a decade since you've had this second thought, like maybe take a step back.
00:14:02
Speaker
But you know, something I wanted to just point out to you, like you said, like I was much older when I started like in college.
00:14:06
Speaker
Honestly, from what I've seen from the trends of the decades as I passed through them, it's like teens and 20s girls into womanhood all tend to try to toe the line of like, we can still be friends.
00:14:19
Speaker
Whether it's from not being able to be assertive or, you know, not having that sense of self to kind of stand your ground and say, this is it.
00:14:26
Speaker
I don't want to hear from you anymore.
00:14:27
Speaker
Like you're no longer in my life, period.
00:14:29
Speaker
I think by the time you get to late 20s, early 30s, by then you might have had like one adult relationship that crashed and burned, where it was so painful that you didn't want anything to do with them.
00:14:38
Speaker
So I think by the time you get into your 30s, that's when you're like, we're never going to be friends.
00:14:43
Speaker
So I don't think it's fair to younger you or any of the younger ladies who might be listening.
00:14:47
Speaker
Like, don't beat yourself up.
00:14:48
Speaker
Also learn from us and quit that shit.
00:14:50
Speaker
Like, they're no friend of yours.
00:14:52
Speaker
Okay, let me just put it that way.
00:14:53
Speaker
You may be a friend to them.
00:14:54
Speaker
They're no friend of yours.
00:14:56
Speaker
And they rely on that.
00:14:58
Speaker
Also, at that time, our social circles were still very similar.
00:15:02
Speaker
As you get older, you start becoming a lot more intentional about your social circle.
00:15:06
Speaker
There's a lot of friends I have now, and I had this conversation with my friend just yesterday being like, would I have still been friends with them if I had met them older at a different stage of life?
00:15:14
Speaker
And I was like, well, when I met them, I was definitely a lot more open because I was a lot younger.
00:15:18
Speaker
But the fact that we still stayed friends has more to do with the fact that we still have compatible values because I've made a lot of friends from my late teens, early 20s.
00:15:28
Speaker
who didn't make it because we didn't have similar values as time went on.
00:15:31
Speaker
And when you're younger, honestly, these things don't matter because it's like, oh, just as long as Josh has a car and just as long as we can get into the frat house, you know what I mean?
00:15:38
Speaker
Like your priorities are like, can I drink this weekend?
00:15:41
Speaker
And like, can I go party?
00:15:42
Speaker
And does this person have like nice hookups or whatever?
00:15:44
Speaker
Like, can they hook me up with something real fun?
00:15:46
Speaker
But as you get older, like that becomes less and less and less important.
00:15:49
Speaker
And you can curate what you want to experience and where you want to go out because you have money and you can choose to be friends with who you want to be friends with because, again, you have money.
00:15:58
Speaker
You're not like, you know, dependent on the good graces of other people.
00:16:01
Speaker
And that's what I mean.
00:16:02
Speaker
You romanticize that as well.
00:16:04
Speaker
You romanticize the circumstances.
00:16:05
Speaker
Like, you know, when people talk about like this is a classic trope in American cinema, like the washed up jock reminiscing about the good old days in high school, the glory days.
00:16:15
Speaker
Right.
00:16:16
Speaker
Glory days.
00:16:18
Speaker
Literally songs are written about it.
00:16:19
Speaker
And it's so true that like high school was, you know, the high tide for so many.
00:16:24
Speaker
And then afterwards, well, I think it's because, you know, back then the friends that they had, they were very simple friendships.
00:16:29
Speaker
They were friendships of circumstance and they were friendships of close proximity where like you had to see them every day because that's what your day consisted of.
00:16:37
Speaker
As you get older, you're
00:16:38
Speaker
post-college, whether it's work friends or, you know, hobby friends or friends from your friends, friends, et cetera.
00:16:45
Speaker
Like you have so many more different circles to choose from, which means of course you have to be more selective because there's only so much time in a day.
00:16:51
Speaker
But I think that's a huge part of why people romanticize the past is they like, they remember these friendships that were so pure and so wonderful.
00:16:57
Speaker
And it's like, well, yeah, before you had a mortgage and a two-year-old and, you know, a 50 hour a week job, like I'm sure hanging out with Josh and Jenny was a blast because you had nothing better to do.
00:17:07
Speaker
You know, you were just trying to while away the time.
00:17:11
Speaker
Yep.
00:17:11
Speaker
And that's the other thing.
00:17:12
Speaker
Like another red flag I find in men when I date them, like just to bring up the nostalgia thing with them is I'm really wary of men whose entire social circle is still their friends from high school.
00:17:23
Speaker
Well, it's ironic that you say that, Diana, because, you know, I have two brothers.
00:17:28
Speaker
Everybody's older than I am.
00:17:30
Speaker
And like I said, my whole family's trash.
00:17:32
Speaker
Like, I'm no, no shame.
00:17:33
Speaker
It's just simply we're super dysfunctional and we're just very fractured.
00:17:37
Speaker
And this is generational trauma that we're working through or I'm working through it.
00:17:41
Speaker
And so I have one brother who I call him the best of the worst.
00:17:43
Speaker
He's the only one I actually still talk to.
00:17:45
Speaker
We have somewhat of a relationship, although he lives overseas.
00:17:48
Speaker
So I see him like once every two, three years.
00:17:49
Speaker
That's probably also why we get along well.
00:17:51
Speaker
But the brother who lives closer, who's still in my home state, he has never made, I mean, he'll like have work acquaintances, but he literally only ever hangs out with his high school.
00:18:03
Speaker
I mean, they've been friends since elementary school.
00:18:05
Speaker
And that's, those are the only ones he wants to hang out with.
00:18:07
Speaker
And they're basically his like family, you know, because he doesn't actually like his family, which I get it.
00:18:12
Speaker
Cause I don't like him either.
00:18:13
Speaker
Yeah.
00:18:14
Speaker
But as I've gotten older, I've really started to notice like how retrograde, how immature, how base their friendships are.
00:18:22
Speaker
It's not like they're like really warm and welcoming and loving.
00:18:25
Speaker
It's a lot of like, you know, the guys are like, they're giving each other a hard time.
00:18:28
Speaker
They're insulting.
00:18:29
Speaker
Like they talk about sports or like the kids education, but it's always just very surface level stuff.
00:18:34
Speaker
And I'm like, I'm glad you have a friend who's there for you.
00:18:36
Speaker
But at the same time, like, are you growing at all in this friendship?
00:18:39
Speaker
Or is it just like stasis at this point?
00:18:42
Speaker
No, no, I think a lot of men get comfortable with that as well.
00:18:45
Speaker
Because like in my observations, right, of like the men that I went to high school with when we graduated, I remember them saying something like, well, the boys will stay in touch because we're just closer than the girls are.
00:18:55
Speaker
And I remember I was like, thinking at that time, I was like, are y'all closer?
00:18:58
Speaker
Or is it just that you enable each other more and like nobody else in life is going to do that for you, right?
00:19:03
Speaker
Because you meet people from a different time period, and they're not going to put up with the same bullshit that like the people that you knew from high school are going to necessarily you know, and
00:19:10
Speaker
And that's the thing.
00:19:11
Speaker
It was like, they would regress back into high school when I would like catch them in like reunions or hangouts and stuff like in the early days, like now I don't go to these things anymore, because I can't stand them.
00:19:20
Speaker
But when I used to meet them, it was like, they would recreate the dynamics of how things were in high school.
00:19:24
Speaker
So like the popular high school jock guy gets to feel like the popular high school jock guy again.
00:19:28
Speaker
Like it's minions, like they all behave like as minions.
00:19:31
Speaker
And it's like, these are 30 something year old adults or 40 something year old adults.
00:19:34
Speaker
And like they're behaving like they were when they were 16.
00:19:37
Speaker
You know what I mean?
00:19:38
Speaker
And it's like still like still making the same jokes.
00:19:40
Speaker
Like men are so hierarchy coded.
00:19:42
Speaker
It's like wild.
00:19:43
Speaker
Like it's like they can't survive anywhere without knowing, okay, who's the alpha?
00:19:47
Speaker
Okay, who's this beta?
00:19:49
Speaker
You know what I mean?
00:19:49
Speaker
It's like the entire dynamic is screaming that it's like not a collaborative friendship at all.
00:19:55
Speaker
It's not a friendship that's evolved to time.
00:19:56
Speaker
Like these are guys who go on holidays with each other.
00:19:59
Speaker
These are guys who are like, you know, they don't have any friends from work.
00:20:02
Speaker
They don't have any friends from college.
00:20:03
Speaker
They just have each other.
00:20:05
Speaker
And I'm like, how can you still have just this friend group?
00:20:07
Speaker
Like they may have made like one or two friends from college, but that group also knows the people from the school.
00:20:12
Speaker
Like they're all like just one ginormous hangout group.
00:20:15
Speaker
And like they go on holidays and shit together.
00:20:17
Speaker
They're like, oh, we're just closer.
00:20:18
Speaker
And it's like, no, you have an inability to let go.
00:20:20
Speaker
That's crazy because actually that brother and all of his elementary to high school friends, they all go to the same lake resort every summer with their families so they can vacation together.
00:20:31
Speaker
And I'm always like...
00:20:32
Speaker
What?
00:20:34
Speaker
Every year the same place?
00:20:36
Speaker
Exactly.
00:20:37
Speaker
See, look, it's not that there's anything wrong with having a friend that you've known a really long time.
00:20:41
Speaker
But just like if your entire social circle is just that, then I start to question you.
00:20:45
Speaker
Because I have a couple of friends from high school, like,
00:20:47
Speaker
The friend group I had in high school are not even the friend group I'm friends with anymore because we evolved and we grew and we were no longer compatible.
00:20:54
Speaker
And that's just life.
00:20:55
Speaker
You know, it's not like there was nothing dramatic behind it.
00:20:57
Speaker
We just weren't the same people.
00:20:58
Speaker
But like the friends that I still have were from the school days that we weren't even friends at school.
00:21:03
Speaker
We were friends after.
00:21:04
Speaker
You know what I mean?
00:21:04
Speaker
Like we just became friends by the circumstances of time and because we had similar life experiences and like we started to understand each other as we evolved and grew.
00:21:13
Speaker
And so I can imagine that with those people, I would have been friends with them even if I hadn't met them in the circumstance of school, you know, because we shared similar values.
00:21:21
Speaker
With a lot of the men, it's like I still feel like a lot of their friendships are very circumstantial.
00:21:25
Speaker
It's not with intention.
00:21:26
Speaker
It's not like I chose Danny because Danny is a sweet guy and he's nice and he looks after his wife and like he also plays a mean game of catch or whatever.
00:21:34
Speaker
I don't know.
00:21:35
Speaker
Men's reasons for me befriending other men is always baffling to me.
00:21:39
Speaker
Like, I don't think I'll ever understand that, you know, I don't I'm like, you don't even like to hug each other.
00:21:43
Speaker
Like, and I'm not saying you have to be a hugger.
00:21:45
Speaker
But like, for me, I don't understand why I have relationships with people if there isn't this love and respect.
Generational Differences in Nostalgia
00:21:51
Speaker
And you know, this amity between us.
00:21:53
Speaker
Like, otherwise, you're just a regular degular person in the world that I have to deal with, you know, you're not my friend at that point.
00:22:00
Speaker
You're simply an acquaintance or something less.
00:22:02
Speaker
Or a friendly acquaintance.
00:22:04
Speaker
Or a friendly acquaintance, like a neighbor, you know, that's fine too.
00:22:07
Speaker
Like we don't need to be friends with everybody.
00:22:09
Speaker
But younger Rose would have had a really hard time with that.
00:22:13
Speaker
So thinking about how things are often with, you know, we look at the past with rose colored glasses for a variety of reasons.
00:22:20
Speaker
And I think it's become a huge part of marketing as well as like marketing has saturated the market and is now like on every single ad on YouTube and in all of your social medias.
00:22:30
Speaker
I mean, it's just like,
00:22:31
Speaker
When I remember how the internet was back when it first started, there was no advertising on the internet.
00:22:36
Speaker
I feel so bad for the youngins who have never known this world of like internet without advertising.
00:22:41
Speaker
It was amazing.
00:22:41
Speaker
It was just the information you wanted or looked up.
00:22:44
Speaker
And maybe it wasn't like the hugest, you know, algorithm as far as getting you all the information you wanted.
00:22:49
Speaker
But like,
00:22:49
Speaker
You were being bombarded by these pop ups and these noises.
00:22:52
Speaker
You know, it's just such an attention economy.
00:22:54
Speaker
And I think that's a key part of marketing strategy and getting people's attention and getting them to want to buy things is using nostalgia as a marketing technique.
Nostalgia in Marketing and Self-Image
00:23:04
Speaker
Yep.
00:23:05
Speaker
And they know that, right?
00:23:06
Speaker
They know that people understand on some level that, yeah, there are aspects of human life now that are much harder and much worse.
00:23:12
Speaker
And why not manufacture and sell this back to people as like, oh, trendy Y2K, 90s supermodel era, micro trends.
00:23:21
Speaker
And it's very distracting because again, it's back into overconsumption, right?
00:23:24
Speaker
They just want you to consume to recreate the same emotion and the same feeling.
00:23:28
Speaker
And it'd be like, well, if you buy our toasted lipstick, you'll probably feel like Cindy Crawford and go
00:23:32
Speaker
We'll be transported back into the 90s.
00:23:34
Speaker
Back to the 90s, right?
00:23:36
Speaker
I mean, yeah, I'm just I'm even thinking about how oftentimes, you know, like cars will do vintage editions of like, I don't know, a Corvette or they just redid the Bronco car, the Ford Bronco in America to reimagine how the 70s Bronco would look today, if that makes sense.
00:23:53
Speaker
like updating the same prototype just to look a little more modern, but they, but it had to have the look of the old one.
00:23:59
Speaker
And I'm just like, like, what is the point of all this though?
00:24:02
Speaker
And of course it's to sell.
00:24:03
Speaker
And then they've been all over the streets.
00:24:05
Speaker
I've been seeing them more and more because like people love this element of nostalgia.
00:24:09
Speaker
Like, Oh, car design used to be so much better.
00:24:11
Speaker
Maybe some things were better, but you know what?
00:24:13
Speaker
A lot more people died in car accidents back then because the safety features weren't involved.
00:24:17
Speaker
So like, I'll take my brand new car, you know, over like a 1970, uh,
00:24:21
Speaker
Mercedes, although I would love a diesel Mercedes from the 70s, but don't get me started.
00:24:24
Speaker
Okay, the point is, so many of the things that we look back on with fondness, it's an incomplete vision and remembrance of
00:24:32
Speaker
Yep.
00:24:33
Speaker
And you know what else is really insidious?
00:24:35
Speaker
How nostalgia gets you to look at like old photos of yourself from the past and compare them with how you look now in your full grown adult body.
00:24:43
Speaker
And like how you convince yourself like, I think the person who really made me think about this was Selena Gomez, and how people kind of talk about what she looked like 10 years ago versus what she looks like now.
00:24:52
Speaker
And of course, she's still a beautiful woman now.
00:24:54
Speaker
But last year, especially people gave her a lot of shit because, you know, for the listeners who don't know much about Selena Gomez, you know, she's a musician and she's an actor.
00:25:02
Speaker
And she also battles lupus.
00:25:03
Speaker
And part of the side effects of lupus is that there's a lot of weight fluctuation.
00:25:08
Speaker
You know, you go up and down a lot in terms of weight.
00:25:11
Speaker
And people gave her a really hard time last year for putting on weight.
00:25:15
Speaker
And this year, it seems like she's lost some of it because, I mean, that's the nature of the illness, right?
00:25:18
Speaker
It like goes up and down.
00:25:20
Speaker
But people keep comparing her with what she looked like when she was basically a newly minted 20-something.
00:25:24
Speaker
Yeah.
00:25:26
Speaker
Cause she's just 30 now.
00:25:28
Speaker
She's 30 years old.
00:25:29
Speaker
Can you imagine your body between 20 and 30?
00:25:31
Speaker
It's not the same body.
00:25:33
Speaker
Hormones have made its changes.
00:25:35
Speaker
No, but that's the thing, right?
00:25:37
Speaker
That's another thing that nostalgia does.
00:25:38
Speaker
It makes you look at these old Tumblr photos of yourself and like all these old pictures of yourself from your MySpace days.
00:25:44
Speaker
And like, you look at like this very young form of you and like not again, incompatible with who you are now, things have changed so drastically, but it's like, Oh, I'm never going to be as pretty as I was when I was a teen.
00:25:54
Speaker
oh my god, like, how have we reached that stage of humanity, that we're getting women to compete with not just younger versions of other women were younger versions of themselves and like feeling like they're not enough.
00:26:05
Speaker
It's an AI nightmare.
00:26:06
Speaker
And actually, what you're reminding me of is like, you're reminding me of how so much of like men's desires for women center around these completely unrealistic and unattainable standards where like a 35 year old is supposed to look like a 22 year old or
00:26:19
Speaker
Or they use that to justify, well, like girls are so much hotter when they're younger.
00:26:23
Speaker
Like, you know, look at pictures from when you were younger.
00:26:25
Speaker
Like you were so much hotter than it's like, dude, you have had your brain rotted by porn.
00:26:30
Speaker
If you cannot see a woman who's your age is beautiful in any form, everybody's a beautiful.
00:26:35
Speaker
Okay.
00:26:36
Speaker
But if you are attracted to her now, there's no reason why who she is now wouldn't be the same sort of attractiveness before.
00:26:44
Speaker
And also that's just simply a time in life that has passed.
00:26:47
Speaker
That person no longer exists.
00:26:49
Speaker
So like,
00:26:50
Speaker
why are you asking for the literal impossible and why do we like strive to fill that i mean this whole rise of botox face preventative botox fillers what the fuck oh my god yep like the fact that ozempic blew up so much in the last year was also wild like ozempic became like
00:27:09
Speaker
the number one drug for everyone.
00:27:10
Speaker
Now, again, if you struggle with obesity and your doctors recommended it for you, that's a different matter, right?
00:27:15
Speaker
But the fact that everybody's chasing it to be skinny, like, that's the other thing, you know, porn was bad enough.
00:27:20
Speaker
But I think that the way of AI is going to make it so like very few men are attracted to women at all.
00:27:25
Speaker
Because there's a lot of AI features now that are like design your perfect woman, she'll behave exactly the way you want, she'll look exactly the way you want, and then generate porn with this AI actor.
00:27:34
Speaker
And then you never have to live in the real world anymore.
00:27:37
Speaker
It's like an episode of Black Mirror.
00:27:38
Speaker
That's
00:27:38
Speaker
That sounds like Black Mirror, although I've never actually watched it, but from hearing about it, it's like, that sounds like a literal nightmare fuel.
00:27:44
Speaker
Yep, that's what it is.
00:27:46
Speaker
And also, like, I'll never understand it.
00:27:48
Speaker
And I can like go into sociological treatises and anthropology.
00:27:52
Speaker
There's so much that I've read and learned.
00:27:54
Speaker
But like, I will never understand and I will continue to always abhor this obsession men have with trying to control how women look and behave.
00:28:05
Speaker
Like, why don't you just mind your own business, sir?
00:28:07
Speaker
Why don't you attend to yourself and mind your business?
00:28:10
Speaker
And that's the thing that they also make it seem like, oh, being attracted to a woman when she's very, very young is normal.
00:28:16
Speaker
And that's like, there's nothing wrong with that.
00:28:18
Speaker
It's like, I'm a 50 something year old man.
00:28:19
Speaker
And I remember, oh my God, there was this guy on Instagram recently that got roasted by his comment section because he was like, it's so hard for me to date as a 50 something year old man.
00:28:28
Speaker
And it's like, are you trying to date other 50 something year old women?
00:28:30
Speaker
Are you trying to date people in their 20s?
00:28:31
Speaker
What?
00:28:34
Speaker
Okay.
00:28:35
Speaker
And there was a guy who stitched him or something.
00:28:37
Speaker
And he was like, it's not that hard when you're dating women your own age.
00:28:40
Speaker
Are you trying to compete with 20 something and 30 something year old men for 20 something year old women, then yes, you're gonna struggle.
00:28:47
Speaker
You know, I think too many men buy into the bullshit of like, you know, you age like fine wine, and you have all your money.
00:28:53
Speaker
And like, all these girls from out of high school will just want to be with you.
00:28:57
Speaker
That's a fantasy they feed to like, you know, the dregs of society to like keep them slaving forward towards a future that they'll never be able to earn, which is once, you know, they've got their retirement fund and their paunchy belly, they're going to be hotter than all these other 20 and 30 something year olds who, you know, have a fraction of his wealth, but who are actually attractive to these young women, right?
00:29:18
Speaker
Like it's so DeLulu.
00:29:20
Speaker
I want us to have more of that kind of delusional sense of self, right?
00:29:24
Speaker
because they certainly do.
00:29:26
Speaker
And we actually come much closer to it.
00:29:28
Speaker
Like, we all know how women take care of ourselves.
00:29:31
Speaker
We all know we tend to age gracefully, we work out, we go to the doctor, we get our hormones checked, like we take the meds that we're supposed to take when we need to take them.
00:29:39
Speaker
Women are known for this in the medical field, like there have been various studies done about medical compliance versus non compliance gendered wise, right.
00:29:47
Speaker
And like men die all the time if they don't have wives, because wives will often
00:29:52
Speaker
force their husbands to go to the doctor and get things diagnosed like, you know, an imminent heart attack or, you know, their danger of stroke because of high blood pressure, like they get the shit taken care of.
00:30:03
Speaker
Whereas men who don't marry or who are no longer married at older ages, they tend to drop down easily preventable things because they literally refuse to go to the doctor and take care of themselves.
00:30:13
Speaker
So this delusion, ladies, like, can we start to be more delusional about things?
00:30:17
Speaker
Like, I think we need to be more delusional about our now and our future.
00:30:22
Speaker
And I think we need to, like, put down the past.
00:30:25
Speaker
That's what I think we're talking about today, Diana.
00:30:28
Speaker
I think it's like our ego is so attached to past events.
00:30:34
Speaker
We cannot dwell in the here and now.
00:30:37
Speaker
And we're missing out on so much.
00:30:40
Speaker
And that's the thing.
00:30:40
Speaker
It's like, if you're able to attach this much optimism to the past, why can't you attach this much optimism to your future?
00:30:47
Speaker
Wait, I need you to repeat that.
00:30:48
Speaker
That was such a fucking golden nugget of wisdom.
00:30:51
Speaker
Well, if like, you know, if you can attribute this much optimism to the past, why can't you do this with your future?
00:30:57
Speaker
Why can't you also express similar?
00:30:59
Speaker
Like, that's the thing, right?
00:31:00
Speaker
People are like, it's never going to get better.
00:31:01
Speaker
Well, not with that attitude.
00:31:04
Speaker
Yeah, exactly.
00:31:05
Speaker
You know what I mean?
00:31:06
Speaker
I know.
00:31:07
Speaker
Nobody ever succeeded who was like, well, I guess that's the best it ever got.
00:31:10
Speaker
And then just sat there.
00:31:12
Speaker
Also, there's this idea that like in the past, they didn't have things that they were doom and gloom about.
00:31:16
Speaker
I mean, like at every stage of human history, there's been something that human beings have been panicking about.
00:31:21
Speaker
Y2K.
00:31:22
Speaker
Nuclear.
00:31:23
Speaker
Cold War.
00:31:24
Speaker
Yeah.
00:31:25
Speaker
When 9-11 happened.
00:31:27
Speaker
Like different kinds of wars.
00:31:28
Speaker
World War.
00:31:29
Speaker
Like
00:31:29
Speaker
Every generation has had to deal with something that was like, well, what if life never gets better?
00:31:33
Speaker
What if it's shit?
00:31:34
Speaker
You think all of those English people living in London in little shelters while their city was being bombed were like, oh my god, life is never going to get better.
00:31:41
Speaker
You think that they didn't think that too?
00:31:44
Speaker
People have been through actual hardship.
00:31:46
Speaker
are trying to find a nugget of optimism with which to, because that's the human spirit, it's enduring, right?
00:31:52
Speaker
You have to have some kind of hope about your future if you want to make it work.
00:31:56
Speaker
Again, you are investing all of your resources, all of your finite energy, all of your, I believe that things can get better to the wrong period in time.
00:32:04
Speaker
What would focusing on the past and romanticizing and being optimistic about the past do for your present or your future?
00:32:10
Speaker
Nothing.
00:32:11
Speaker
It does nothing.
00:32:12
Speaker
It doesn't change your current reality and it's not going to do anything for your future either.
00:32:15
Speaker
I think about it like investing, you know, which I've been slowly getting into.
00:32:19
Speaker
And I'm always preaching about like financial wealth and independence for women.
00:32:22
Speaker
So I'm like, oh, I guess I better take my own advice.
00:32:25
Speaker
But one thing I use investing principles in my own life is to be like, well, if I would invest all this time that I spend, and all this mental energy and all of this emotional energy, if I take that from dwelling on the past and things that are literally unchangeable,
00:32:42
Speaker
and never able to be attained again, right?
00:32:45
Speaker
Like it's a dream.
00:32:46
Speaker
It's a fantasy.
00:32:47
Speaker
It's done.
00:32:47
Speaker
It's not going to happen.
00:32:48
Speaker
If I can take that investment and move it to now in the future, like that's where it'll pay dividends.
Nostalgia, Personal Growth, and Gratitude
00:32:53
Speaker
But if I'm investing it all in the past, like it's going into a black hole and I'm actually detracting from future potentials because I refuse to actually move my investments to where it can yield fruit, so to speak.
00:33:06
Speaker
Yep.
00:33:07
Speaker
That's why this episode is focused on why even reminiscing about the past in a good way is not helpful to you.
00:33:13
Speaker
Because we know when you sit and ruminate about all the bad shit that went on to you in life, you're like, oh, my life is never going to get better.
00:33:19
Speaker
My life has been a shit show.
00:33:21
Speaker
Like it's been one bad thing after another.
00:33:23
Speaker
We know that that attitude is not helpful.
00:33:25
Speaker
We don't need to tell you that because you know that as well, right?
00:33:28
Speaker
But people don't realize how being stuck in the past of like, oh, everything was so much better then and like things were good.
00:33:33
Speaker
And oh my God, I'm stuck with all these like positive memories.
00:33:36
Speaker
That's not helping you either because being rooted in your current reality, that's what's going to get you into a better future.
00:33:42
Speaker
Being fixated on everything was so much better then and like, oh, I miss it so much.
00:33:46
Speaker
This is not a helpful way to look at life at all.
00:33:49
Speaker
See, it's one thing to honor your experiences and be like, you know what, I'm so grateful for these experiences I've had.
00:33:54
Speaker
I'm so grateful for the people who are there who share that time with me.
00:33:57
Speaker
I'm so grateful for what they've done in my life.
00:33:59
Speaker
Like gratitude is not what we're diminishing here.
00:34:03
Speaker
You know what I mean?
00:34:03
Speaker
We're not trying to say you shouldn't be grateful for good things that have happened.
00:34:07
Speaker
But the ability to move on from that is going to be important.
00:34:11
Speaker
Because well, a lot of people talk about maturity, right?
00:34:14
Speaker
It's like,
00:34:15
Speaker
Oh, I'm super mature because I'm still in touch with my ex.
00:34:18
Speaker
And like, we have a really good relationship.
00:34:20
Speaker
And I'm so grateful for him for that time period in my life where he looked after me when my mom was sick or whatever, you know, whatever, they make up some reason.
00:34:27
Speaker
And they're like, Okay, this guy was a great person for doing what is essentially expected of him.
00:34:32
Speaker
And we're supposed to be like, Oh, my God, wow, I should totally get back with him.
00:34:36
Speaker
Seems like he's such a wonderful guy.
00:34:38
Speaker
No, it has nothing to do with maturity.
00:34:40
Speaker
It has everything to do with the fact that you have an inability to move on, right?
00:34:43
Speaker
You have an inability to move on and let go.
00:34:45
Speaker
And you need to start evaluating whether that is holding you back from embracing your fullest potential from being the baddie you are meant to be.
00:34:51
Speaker
That's right.
00:34:52
Speaker
And you know, I really enjoy how you phrase things, Diana, because one thing I was thinking about was, you know, when my friends get to really know me, they're always shocked at the
00:35:00
Speaker
how bad it was for me growing up.
00:35:02
Speaker
Like when I start to drop some of my anecdotes about my family and my childhood, they're like, what?
00:35:07
Speaker
Like they're horrified, you know, which is why I don't often drop a lot of those things in early phases of acquaintanceship and even into the friendship, because that's not who I am now.
00:35:15
Speaker
That was my past, right?
00:35:17
Speaker
But they're like, why don't you go home for Christmas?
00:35:18
Speaker
And I'm like, well, let me tell you about the last Christmas I was home.
00:35:21
Speaker
And then I'll tell them, they're like, oh my God, that's like, that's your family.
00:35:23
Speaker
Like, I wouldn't wish that on my worst enemy.
00:35:25
Speaker
I'm like, I know who needs enemies with family like this, right?
00:35:28
Speaker
They're like, okay, so they've really started to understand.
00:35:30
Speaker
This is all saying, when I actually let people see some of the background from which I come, like they cannot understand or believe that I'm as like happy natured as I am.
00:35:42
Speaker
They're like, how did you come from that?
00:35:46
Speaker
And it's like, well, because I've always been a very grateful person.
00:35:48
Speaker
Okay, I've always practiced gratitude.
00:35:51
Speaker
And I also had my oldest sibling as a sister.
00:35:55
Speaker
We both had, you know, pretty similar upbringings.
00:35:57
Speaker
We both had like when we compare memories, you know, it's not like she was living in this fantasy world of like everything was great.
00:36:04
Speaker
And it wasn't for me.
00:36:05
Speaker
We have very similar experiences when we share them.
00:36:08
Speaker
But this is a woman who has only ever dwelled on all the ways in which she's been wronged.
00:36:14
Speaker
in her life.
00:36:15
Speaker
And she has never gone on to do anything with herself.
00:36:18
Speaker
And I think she's like 50 something now.
00:36:21
Speaker
I haven't talked to her in the last couple years.
00:36:23
Speaker
Oh God, I know people like that.
00:36:24
Speaker
It's terrifying to think that they're still like that when they get older.
00:36:27
Speaker
They are.
00:36:27
Speaker
Like her envy and her bitterness and her like...
Family Dynamics and the Weight of the Past
00:36:31
Speaker
rage finally drove me away after our last living parent died.
00:36:35
Speaker
I was like, you know what?
00:36:36
Speaker
All this does is literally weigh my soul down with sadness and terror.
00:36:41
Speaker
Like that's all you bring to my life.
00:36:42
Speaker
I call her like a stalker ex-boyfriend who just never leaves me alone because she's obsessed with me because she thinks I live the life that she should have had.
00:36:50
Speaker
And that's the thing, right?
00:36:51
Speaker
Like that can happen with friends too, because I had a friend who was very similar to that.
00:36:56
Speaker
And like, that's the thing, when you're miserable in life, the automatic assumption is to latch on to somebody who's doing a lot better.
00:37:02
Speaker
And the thing is, they never make you happier.
00:37:05
Speaker
I've been on both ends of this.
00:37:06
Speaker
I've been both the person who's like, oh my God, I really envy this person and I want to have their life.
00:37:12
Speaker
And at the same time, I've also been the person who's the object of envy.
00:37:16
Speaker
And in both situations, I've been like, oh my god, this is an unhealthy way to be.
00:37:20
Speaker
This is not going to get me anywhere in life.
00:37:22
Speaker
You know, it's wild.
00:37:23
Speaker
Like I realized that with time, I was like, anybody who's like this, someone I should avoid as well.
00:37:28
Speaker
Because having been that person myself, I'm like, I was not good company back then.
00:37:32
Speaker
I was a person who had a lot of envy and hatred in my heart.
00:37:34
Speaker
And I was upset with my life circumstances.
00:37:37
Speaker
And I was not, you know, a particularly good friend in that time period.
00:37:40
Speaker
And the person I met who was like this as well, it's like they were miserable.
00:37:43
Speaker
And they were envious of me because I was making moves to ascend.
00:37:46
Speaker
And that's the thing, right?
00:37:47
Speaker
Like people have to understand that just because you are on a path to glowing up and you've taken the decision that like, I don't want to be in this like low vibrational energy anymore.
00:37:56
Speaker
I want to actually make some moves in my life and I want to ascend.
00:37:58
Speaker
I want to get better.
00:37:59
Speaker
I want to evolve.
00:38:00
Speaker
I want to do more with my life.
00:38:02
Speaker
Not everybody is going to be happy for you and you have to watch out for the people who aren't.
00:38:06
Speaker
Because those are the friends that you're going to have to call, unfortunately, because they're not going to be able to be happy for you.
00:38:12
Speaker
Like anybody who's like, well, I think I'm not that smart.
00:38:15
Speaker
I think I'm not that beautiful.
00:38:16
Speaker
I don't think I'm doing much in life.
00:38:17
Speaker
Eventually, that's going to be like, you think I'm not that smart because they're projecting.
00:38:20
Speaker
They're projecting a lot of their own uncertainty and fears and anger on you.
00:38:24
Speaker
So you have to be careful and you have to make sure that you befriend people and you surround yourself with people who are on the same level who are trying to also improve their life.
00:38:32
Speaker
Like they don't have to be identical to you, but they have to have that drive.
00:38:36
Speaker
in common with you.
00:38:38
Speaker
The desire to improve their circumstances, you know, not feeling satisfied with the bare minimum.
00:38:43
Speaker
That's a very hard thing to find in other people.
00:38:45
Speaker
It really is like not just wallowing in sort of the stew of their life and all of their recriminations and regrets and like, you know, bitterness and going into Facebook and Instagram to like look at their exes and being like, Oh, look at how happy he is now.
00:38:58
Speaker
I don't know why I ever woke up with him.
00:39:00
Speaker
And it's like,
00:39:01
Speaker
Oh my God.
00:39:02
Speaker
You know, and I understand because, you know, prior to my relationship and work with my therapist, old Rose was very much like that.
00:39:08
Speaker
Although I actually, if you look back on my life, it's a pretty glamorous life, but that wasn't how I felt.
00:39:13
Speaker
I couldn't be content in my life because I was always looking and comparing.
00:39:17
Speaker
Right.
00:39:17
Speaker
And one thing that my therapist told me that, you know, has become one of my mantras is comparison is the thief of joy.
Friendship Dynamics and Personal Development
00:39:25
Speaker
Comparing yourself to others will literally steal everything.
00:39:29
Speaker
the joy from you, from your heart.
00:39:31
Speaker
And I think, you know, joy and lightness of heart is one of the most valuable intangibles that we can have in this world, because that's something that I've kept cultivating and kept cultivating.
00:39:44
Speaker
And like, it's uncanny.
00:39:45
Speaker
I can just be out and about doing nothing.
00:39:47
Speaker
And the way people treat me and the way they come up to me or a worker wants to like offer me this or that.
00:39:53
Speaker
I mean,
00:39:54
Speaker
I'm not doing anything other than simply existing.
00:39:56
Speaker
But people are drawn to vibrations, man.
00:39:58
Speaker
People like the vibe.
00:40:00
Speaker
And so that's something else you have to think about.
00:40:01
Speaker
If you're like spending all this time and energy looking to the past and looking at who you were, like all you're doing is hollowing out the current person and the current soul that you have because you're not nourishing it with what's here and now and with what's going to keep propelling you forward.
00:40:17
Speaker
Also, you have to be careful about the energy that you cultivate as well, because like attracts like.
00:40:22
Speaker
Oh, yeah.
00:40:23
Speaker
That's the other thing as well, right?
00:40:25
Speaker
When I look back at that time period of my life when I was not doing well and I was miserable, I was attracting exactly the sort of friendships that I'd have to spend time getting rid of when I was getting better.
00:40:34
Speaker
Because at the time, it was very easy for someone who was also insecure to be my friend.
00:40:39
Speaker
Because on some level, you know, they were kind of secret haters.
00:40:42
Speaker
They were secret haters, right?
00:40:43
Speaker
Like they were like, Oh, her life's not going well.
00:40:45
Speaker
And like, it was very easy to be my friend and be like, Oh my God, things will get better for you.
00:40:48
Speaker
But the truth is they didn't want that.
00:40:49
Speaker
Yeah.
00:40:50
Speaker
Because when my life did start getting better, because again, I wasn't in that phase forever.
00:40:53
Speaker
Right.
00:40:54
Speaker
Once I had my head straight.
00:40:56
Speaker
And once I had a little time with my emotions and I was like, well, you know, this is not helpful.
00:41:00
Speaker
And that's the thing, right?
00:41:01
Speaker
Everybody has a flop era.
00:41:03
Speaker
I would like to think that through our lives, we're probably going to go through multiple and each one is going to be crucial to our development, right?
00:41:09
Speaker
And so that was my development stage.
00:41:11
Speaker
I wouldn't even call it my healing era.
00:41:13
Speaker
That was like my development stage where I was like, okay, I need to reassess what kind of person I want to be and who I am, you know?
00:41:19
Speaker
And when I started reassessing and I was like, okay, let's start taking more chances.
00:41:22
Speaker
Let's start making more moves.
00:41:23
Speaker
Let's start doing things differently.
00:41:25
Speaker
Those same friends didn't want to stay friends.
00:41:27
Speaker
And they were envious and they were like, you know, sabotaging because they realized they were like, wow, this person is going to leave us behind.
00:41:33
Speaker
And that's the thing.
00:41:34
Speaker
People are in that position who don't want to do anything about it, recognize the reality that they might get left behind.
00:41:39
Speaker
And so they try to pick people who they don't think have a lot of chances to actually move up in life.
00:41:45
Speaker
That's why they selected you.
00:41:46
Speaker
But when you start changing up on them, and you start showing that, hey, I'm actually capable of change, they're going to be like upset about it.
00:41:52
Speaker
They're not going to be happy about it, because it means that you're going to leave them behind too.
00:41:56
Speaker
And that's the thing, right?
00:41:57
Speaker
It's like, that was a stage of my life where I started realizing I got to be very, very conscious and awake when I'm making friends, like, I got to vet them with the same seriousness with which I vet a potential romantic partner.
00:42:08
Speaker
Because the environment I surround myself in is going to be conducive to my overall mental health and my ability to evolve.
00:42:15
Speaker
If I'm in a shit soup surrounded by shit people, I can't blame myself for not doing more than I can because I'm trying to put in twice the level of energy to get the same results.
00:42:25
Speaker
Right.
00:42:26
Speaker
We want to maximize female benefit.
00:42:29
Speaker
It's really about being as selective and discerning as possible.
00:42:33
Speaker
And it's very hard to be selective and discerning when we're looking back instead of looking forward.
00:42:38
Speaker
And I think that's what we have to take away when we look at nostalgia.
00:42:41
Speaker
From this episode.
00:42:43
Speaker
That's right.
00:42:44
Speaker
And that's the thing, right?
00:42:45
Speaker
Like when you look at the grand scheme of life, you have to like, think about, well, you know, am I making friendships and relationships with people who are holding me back from embracing the future from holding me back from being able to move on?
00:42:58
Speaker
Because if the reality is that you're in this position where you're constantly ruminating on the past, and this person is also there with you, they're also like, Oh, wasn't it so much better?
00:43:07
Speaker
you're depriving yourself of what can be.
00:43:09
Speaker
Yes.
00:43:10
Speaker
You're depriving yourself of like the potential for you to experience so much more, to have a much better life.
00:43:15
Speaker
And, you know, I've heard this before too.
00:43:17
Speaker
Like when people talk about, you know, why you should break up with him or whatever, it's like, well, he's occupying space and time and place.
00:43:26
Speaker
that if he were not there would be freed up for a much better match to come in.
00:43:31
Speaker
So it's like, don't think about it as losing a boyfriend.
00:43:33
Speaker
Think about it as gaining, you know, a much better version of what you need in your life somewhere down the line, right?
00:43:40
Speaker
Because if it's meant to be, it's meant to be.
00:43:42
Speaker
But like keeping this person in your life because they're already there, like what kind of rationale is that?
00:43:48
Speaker
It's for the weak and you're not weak.
00:43:50
Speaker
So again, I just think I loved this episode, Diana, this episode, because I think, especially with the U S the current state of affairs in the U S it's such a shit show.
Nostalgia as an Obstacle to Progress
00:43:59
Speaker
It's like we're seeing these really regressive retrograde attitudes, you know, surge in popularity.
00:44:05
Speaker
And I understand because, you know, like life is really hard for so many and things are only getting more expensive.
00:44:11
Speaker
And, you know, all of the things that make it seem really hopeless in the world, those are the forces that are trying to sell you on.
00:44:19
Speaker
If we just return to the past, everything will be better, right?
00:44:22
Speaker
Like eggs will be cheaper and women will take care of the family again.
00:44:26
Speaker
So we won't have broken families.
00:44:28
Speaker
And men will be happier because they'll have families to look out for and to provide for.
00:44:32
Speaker
It's like, it's all a lie.
00:44:33
Speaker
It's all just marketing to harness these people's energies in ways that are destructive.
00:44:39
Speaker
And I think if we're going to have a chance, if we're going to have a shot at a future that we want for our children and our children's children and for this planet, like we have got to break away from this antiquated mentality and start really dreaming big and dreaming of a future that, you know, where we break free of all of these chains of the past, because that's really ultimately what nostalgia is.
00:44:59
Speaker
At the end of the day, they're chains from the past.
00:45:02
Speaker
Won't you free yourself?
00:45:03
Speaker
Oh, I love that.
00:45:04
Speaker
Nostalgia is a chain.
00:45:05
Speaker
Yep.
00:45:05
Speaker
Yep.
00:45:06
Speaker
sympathy is a knife chain of fools that's what it is yeah nostalgia is a chain but yeah i mean just wanted to add one last point before we close out for the day but that's the thing right i think that people always attribute all of the good to the past and they're like oh my god everything that's happening that was ever good was all in the past like well what we have right now is shit because of the past
00:45:28
Speaker
You attribute all the good to the past.
00:45:30
Speaker
You forget the fact that it's past actions that have compounded, that have resulted in our current reality.
00:45:35
Speaker
And it's like every step that you made in the past is what is resulting in what you have now.
00:45:40
Speaker
You know what I mean?
00:45:40
Speaker
Damn, Diana.
00:45:41
Speaker
Damn.
00:45:42
Speaker
This idea that it's like, oh yeah, just everything good exists in the past.
00:45:45
Speaker
And it's like this vacuum space that had no impact in your present reality.
00:45:50
Speaker
It's just so funny to me.
00:45:51
Speaker
It's like, oh, yeah, like, it's not like, oh, it's like, oh, it's so wonderful that women didn't have any human rights and just had to like cook and clean all day back in the past.
00:45:58
Speaker
It's like, yep.
00:45:59
Speaker
And if you're wondering why your so-called modern feminist girlfriend feels that way now, it's because of her grandmother that probably had to live through that.
00:46:08
Speaker
You know what I mean?
00:46:08
Speaker
Like, she didn't hear about that.
00:46:10
Speaker
Like, she didn't live through it.
00:46:11
Speaker
So obviously, it's not through experience that she feels that way.
00:46:14
Speaker
But she heard about it through the experiences of people that she respects.
00:46:17
Speaker
And they were like, it's a shit deal.
00:46:19
Speaker
And some people learn through trial and error and experience and some people learn through observation.
00:46:23
Speaker
And honestly, if you're able to avoid a lot of trauma through observation, you're doing all right.
00:46:28
Speaker
You're doing all right.
00:46:29
Speaker
You're doing better than all right.
00:46:30
Speaker
Okay, you're saving yourself a lot of heartache and a lot of time.
00:46:33
Speaker
Oh my gosh, Diana.
00:46:35
Speaker
Your powers of observation are saving you.
00:46:37
Speaker
So at the end of the day, you know, leave the past, stay in the present and look forward to the future.
00:46:44
Speaker
That's the main gist.
00:46:45
Speaker
Boom.
00:46:46
Speaker
There it is.
00:46:47
Speaker
And scrotes continue to die mad.
00:46:50
Speaker
Die mad.
00:46:51
Speaker
See you again.
00:46:52
Speaker
And also don't forget to follow us on our socials and listen to our Patreon episode.
00:46:58
Speaker
We have bonus episodes.
00:47:00
Speaker
We're going to get all this stuff back.
00:47:02
Speaker
I want us to make t-shirts.
00:47:03
Speaker
Like we're on it now.
00:47:05
Speaker
We're on it.
00:47:05
Speaker
We're on it.
00:47:06
Speaker
But yes, please do listen to our bonus content.
00:47:08
Speaker
And as usual, give us feedback.
00:47:09
Speaker
We love to hear back from you and have a nice week, everyone.
00:47:13
Speaker
Bye.
00:47:14
Speaker
See you next week, Diana.
00:47:15
Speaker
Bye-bye.