Romanticism with the old times
It happened again...
You meet with your friends and start talking about the "good old times". You remember about all the good things that happened and it seems like there were nothing bad about those times. Remembering about the old times, you smile and you feel happy.
IT COULD GO OTHERWISE TOO.. If you are a bit pessimistic, you just remember about the sad times of past(Which is much more accurate but not healthy).
) (took this picture in france)
Why does this happen?
- Human brain is a perfect survival machine and thankfully it has a unique ability to filter unwanted memories. While going through real bad times, human brain zones out so that it doesn't have to feel everything that is happening in reality. Does it mean that our brain is altering our reality? ABSOLUTELY YES!!
- Our brain can get comfortable with any situation if it remains in that situation for long enough time.. It is called "conditioning of brain". Slavery, animal husbandry, abusive relationship, concentration camp, , , , the list goes on. Slavery was forced on people not because the oppressors were putting the gun on their head all the time, It was perpetuated because the slaves accepted the status quo and accepted the inferiority. Same applies to patriarchy, females have been conditioned to feel inferior over the period of centuries(technique of fighting back is technically flawed, but that is a topic of some other day).
- Our brain doesn't remember the past as accurately as we might think. memories are constantly changing as they are being edited by our brains. It has been repeatedly proven that even the visual memories get defected over a small period of 3 months. So when we remember our " good old past, we are actually making it all up to feel like we have seen good times.
(source- wikimedia)
It happens with the past that we haven't even seen....
Humans are flawed and history is written by humans too. Think about it, if you had to write about the present times in a book, what would you write?
Groundbreaking things that are happening now. Things on the news. But you wouldn't write about the people dying in hospital(you don't even go to the hospital). Same thing happened with most of the human history, simple things simply wasn't recorded..
- Infant mortality was so common that parents didn't even cry if their child died during birth.
- Average life expectancy was around 30-40 everywhere in the world.
- There was not a consistent food availability and 70% humans were suffering from hunger.
- Foul smell of mouth was not even a thing because every mouth has foul smell.
Why didn't we read about the real history that happened to 98% of the humans? our "modern" education system assumes that normal history doesn't matter, only events that shaped the history matters. Although events matter, but they don't really show what actually happened back then. In out daily life, we need to know what "normal" people of those times did and then only we can really appreciate our present life..
Our present is actually not too bad....
We are living in the most prosperous days the world has ever seen and because we are comfortable with the status quo, we never really compared it with past. We are living in the most peaceful times and most of us are dying because we are eating more(100 years ago, nobody would have thought about it).
Like this post? you might like one of my previous posts too.... https://steemit.com/photography/@betterbrain/we-ll-never-have-paris-an-introduction
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