With nostalgia, we remember something from the past that perhaps wasn’t as good as we recall. Do we tend to idealize our past?

There’s a saying, “any past time was better.” But this is an idealization of reality. We tend to forget the bad in order to survive. However, when we analyze it critically and objectively, there is generally no evidence that the past was better than the present. What happens is that as we get older, it’s inevitable to think, "when I was young... I had my whole life ahead of me, with hope and excitement to live." Now, as I get older, it’s not the same, I have less time left, and I no longer have the same energy and enthusiasm as before. But this is another issue that can confuse our perception of the past.