Nostalgia

Have you ever looked back on things with a sense of nostalgia - a tear in your eye and smile on your face?  I don’t know about you, but I love looking back at some things and remembering the good bits, and the parts of the bad that were good and brought me such peace in awful circumstances.

It was quite a surprise to me when Johnathan revived watching CBeeBies as his nostalgia.  I mean, he had only stopped it a few years ago, but then to a 9 year old boy, a few years is nostalgic and that’s ok.

Talking of nostalgia, I look back now on the late Queen Elizabeth II and when she first dedicated her life to her people and the Empire.  There are so many moments of her life that I can look back on with nostalgia because it means something to me that she devoted herself to her people and always did what she felt to be what the people wanted even when it meant daunting self loss both for herself and her family.

For me, I guess, nostalgia comes with the time I met Kevin online and when we married, when we lost 4 babies and the grace we had to continue, get our rainbow baby, then a further two losses with no guaranteeing things would change.

Nostalgia is also wrapped in the past.  But when I came to Scotland, this was my opportunity to start again and live out my purpose.  I suppose with nostalgia, there is also the opportunity to think about your future and the impact you can have on the world.

But then when you consider the future and what your plans, goals, desires, bucket list, whatever you want to call it I believe it’s also the time to contemplate what legacy you want to leave in the world behind you when you die.

I’m not trying to be morbid here, but if you look at the late Queen, you may not agree with every decision she made or action she took or didn’t, but I think we can all agree that on balance, her life was great and she left a wonderful legacy.  How it will continue, i don’t know, but we can all keep the “promise of Easter hope alive’” as she said in her Easter message to the Covid stricken world.

So whatever your nostalgia is, think of your future and the legacy you want to leave behind and make small small steps and you will get there in the end, even if you don’t see it.