Buddhism and Nostalgia

Bhikkhu Samāhita said it well in a recent email titled: “No Nostalgic Nausea!” In that insightful email came a series of Pāli canon quotations:

The Buddha once noted:
They do not ever lament over the past,
They do neither yearn for what has yet to come,
They maintain themselves in the present here & now,
therefore is their appearance so calm and serene!
Samyutta Nikaya I, 5

Let go of the past, let go of the future,
let go of the present, and cross over to the
further shore of all becoming and existence.
With mind wholly liberated and fully released,
you shall never come back to birth and death!
Dhammapada 348

The past should not be followed longing after
and the future neither desired nor urged for!
What is past, not real anymore, is dead & gone,
and the future, not real now, have yet to come!
Majjhima Nikaya III, 131

Wise words, and I am grateful to Bhikkhu Samāhita for compiling them and presenting them with such clarity. But knowing and trusting these words doesn’t stop me from falling into a pit (or wading pool) of nostalgia from time to time.

I think about where I was 5 years ago… 2004, single, diving into Geshe Michael Roach’s teachings on Tibetan Buddhism, striving toward finishing my B.A., hoping for someplace to go afterward (applying only to Purdue for Philosophy and Bristol for Buddhist Studies). It was, in a sense, a wonderful time. I was free. Bewildered by that freedom, but free. I had no idea what the future might hold. Graduate school was a fog. All I knew was that I loved Buddhism and Philosophy and I was fairly good at writing in these topics.

Fastforward to 2006… Back in Montana after a year in England finishing an MA in Buddhist Studies – perhaps the best year of my life (freedom, wonderful people, amazing education). Around this time that year Ana visited from Spain and we toured the West by car – Vegas, L.A., San Fran., Oregon. It was a blissful experience.

Then 2008… Caught between what I surely thought to be the romance and love of my life and the strange reality of one problem after another, eventually piling up over my head. (I take a deep breath even thinking about it now) It was a mixture I still cannot put into words; of seeming perfection and utter incomprehensiveness at once.

And so I sit today thinking back on it all. I laugh as I wish (a bit) that I could pleaaaaase start again as a 20 year old. But then I’m sure I’d make all the same mistakes and indulge on all that I had before.

“What is past, not real anymore, is dead & gone.”