7 Signs You’re Still Stuck in the Past

Someone wise once said, “When I was a child, I kept wishing I’d grow up already. But now that I’m older, I only want to be a child again.” So many of us live our lives longing for the time we’ve lost, fixated on a certain person or memory we can never get back. Whether it’s a lost love, a missed opportunity, or a regrettable choice we’ve made, we struggle to break free of the things that bind us to our past and keep us there. 

Understanding and coming to terms with our past is the key to learning, growth, and gratitude. But dwelling too much on it will only hold us back in life. Memories should never substitute experiences and nostalgia is nothing but a denial of our present. It’s a bittersweet longing for something that doesn’t exist anymore. Letting go of the past is something we all need to do if we ever want to make room for better things to come.

With that said, here are 7 signs that can help you realize if you’re still stuck living in the past:

1. You hold on to grudges.

Another way we keep ourselves tethered to our past is by refusing to forgive others and holding grudges against them for the ways that they’ve wronged us (Holman & Silver, 1998). When you hold a grudge against someone, you are choosing to waste your time and energy on a negative past experience you can’t do anything to change. Letting your resentment fester and grow will only make you bitter and hinder your own healing. The best thing any of us can do is to simply accept our pain and move on. 

2. You blame yourself for everything.

It takes a lot of maturity to own up to your mistakes and acknowledge your own shortcomings, but there’s a difference between holding yourself accountable and just blaming yourself for everything that goes wrong in your life! Beating yourself up over every tiny mistake isn’t going to do you any good, and drowning yourself in self-pity won’t solve any of your problems either. These feelings of guilt, shame, regret, and self-blame are what’s keeping you stuck in the past and making it so hard for you to be happy. And until you learn how to forgive yourself, they will never go away (Habermas, Ott, Schubert, & Schneider, 2008).

3. You lose yourself in your nostalgia.

Do you often talk to your friends about the “good old days” you used to have together? Or reminisce about all the happy memories you’ve made? Do you regale your loved ones with stories about your past but come up empty when they ask you about your future? Nostalgia is an easy psychological trap to fall into, but it’s never healthy to dwell too much on our past (Wildschut, et al., 2006). Too many of us are guilty of romanticizing our younger years to the point where we start to lose sight of all the great things we have with us right now, in our present. And by overindulging in it, we are moving backward instead of forwards with our lives.

4. You wonder about what could have been.

Always wondering about all the things that could have been keeps you from living in the present moment. Every missed opportunity, every chance you never took, or choice you never made still haunts you, and no matter how much time has passed since then, you can’t help but ask yourself if things would’ve been different if you would be happier. You’re clinging to this idea that “the grass is greener on the other side”. But the truth is, the Universe doesn’t reward you for one decision and punish you for another; there’s no such thing as the right or wrong choice because they’re all just possibilities. And obsessing over what might have been is only going to lead to more misery, more discontentment, and more wasted time (Wilson, 2005). 

5. You reject new opportunities.

Is there a promotion you turned down recently? Or a certain position you’re too afraid to run for? Are you choosing to stay in your hometown for college because you’re too afraid to move away? Or be with someone you’re no longer in love with because you’re too scared to let go? As scary as these choices may seem, they are all opportunities for us to grow and change for the better as people. And the more we reject them out of fear, the more we stay rooted in the past while everyone around us moves on with their lives. 

6. You’re not looking forward to anything.

Maybe you’ve just achieved your ultimate goal or failed at something important to you. Maybe you’ve reached a certain age or attained a certain milestone that has you asking yourself, “Okay, now what?” Whatever the reason may be, right now you feel like you don’t have anything to look forward to anymore. Nothing in your future excites you and you just feel like you’re now aimlessly coasting your way through life. You’re worried that all your best days are behind you and your life is only going to go downhill from here. You’re stuck in a rut of meaningless, monotonous routine and you’re retreating into the comfort of your past because you think there’s nothing good waiting for you in the future.

7. You don’t have any plans for the future.

Every time someone asks you, “So what are your plans for the future?”, you never have an answer for them. Why? Because you’re still in denial that your past is over and that it’s time for a new chapter in your life to begin. You want everything to stay exactly the way it is because you’re frightened by all the uncertainty that tomorrow brings. You don’t plan where to go for college, what city to live in next, or what to do after you graduate because it scares you too much to think about it. But life is fluid and ever changing, and when one door closes another one opens.

Change can be difficult but it can also be beautiful. And it’s going to happen whether you want it to or not, so it’s time to just accept it, embrace it, and stop trying to fight it. Do you relate to any of the signs mentioned here? Are you still stuck living in the past? As the famous quote goes, “Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around every once in a while, you might miss it.”

References:

• Holman, E. A., & Silver, R. C. (1998). Getting” stuck” in the past: temporal orientation and coping with trauma. Journal of personality and social psychology, 74(5), 1146.
• Habermas, T., Ott, L. M., Schubert, M., Schneider, B., & Pate, A. (2008). Stuck in the past: Negative bias, explanatory style, temporal order, and evaluative perspectives in life narratives of clinically depressed individuals. Depression and Anxiety, 25(11), E121-E132.
• Wildschut, T., Sedikides, C., Arndt, J., & Routledge, C. (2006). Nostalgia: content, triggers, functions. Journal of personality and social psychology, 91(5), 975.
• Wilson, J. L. (2005). Nostalgia: Sanctuary of meaning. Bucknell University Press.