Dr. Arthur Brooks explains why holidays and past moments feel better than they actually were: memory editing filters out the bad stuff. Knowing this works lets you appreciate what's happening now instead of chasing an idealized version of yesterday.
People always say the old days were better, as a matter of fact, but holidays in particular seem like they were more fun, they were more warm, they were more wonderful, they were sweeter. But that's not true, actually. I don't want to ruin your memories of 1978, but I want you to be accurate about them and to say, look, I remember these really good things, but I know there were some things that weren't so good, too. And what I'm experiencing right now is what I'm going to remember later, probably mostly in terms of the nice things that are happening right now that you shouldn't go through life being disappointed because the current seems worse than the past past. You should go through life with a body of knowledge about the way that memory actually works. This is how knowledge is power. This is the science actually gives you power. And then you can chuckle to yourself, I'm going to edit out all the bad parts of this day. And you know, all the bad parts of this day, they were happening back in the old days, too. And it's actually okay. It won't solve the problem entirely, But I guarantee you this has really helped me a lot. You will realize that it may feel like the present never lives up to the past, but in plain fact, the present does live up to the past.
