Nostalgia Is A Terrible Historian
What a dream about winning the lottery taught me about grief, longing, and the difference between familiar and safe
The Dream
I had a dream that I won the lottery.
One hundred forty-six million dollars, to be exact.
There was only one catch.
I had to go back to my old life.
If I'm honest, I actually considered it.
Even in my dream, I let myself wander there for a moment. I imagined what $146 million could do. The house I would buy. The financial pressure that would disappear. The freedom to be generous without wondering if I could afford it. My husband, alive again. Our family together, looking like the picture everyone on the outside believed we were living.
For just a moment, it was easy to romanticize, but then something shifted…
My mind stopped replaying the highlight reel and started remembering what that life actually felt like.
I remembered how desperately I hated who I was.
I remembered the woman who hid her feelings because it felt safer than speaking them. The woman who quietly lived inside someone else's dream while secretly dreaming of so much more. The woman who longed for an earthly love that would make her feel secure, seen, and fully loved, even in the parts of herself she struggled to accept.
I remembered the anxiety that quietly lived beneath my skin. It rarely erupted, but it never left either. It became the background noise of my life.
I remembered searching for validation everywhere except the One who had already declared my worth.
And then I woke up.
Not thinking about the money.
Wondering why, even for a moment, I wanted my old life back.
What Nostalgia Forgets
When I woke up, I couldn't quite name what I was feeling.
There was confusion.
There was guilt for even considering it.
There was sadness.
And strangely...there was peace.
A deep peace that whispered, You're exactly where you're supposed to be.
That realization stayed with me for the rest of the day because it forced me to ask a question I hadn't expected.
Why did this dream bother me so much?
The truth is, I dream about the past every now and then.
I think that's what grief does.
Death brought unfamiliarity to every corner of my life. It uprooted routines, relationships, identity, traditions, and the future I thought I knew. When everything changes, there is something inside us that instinctively longs for what is familiar.
A home.
A smell.
A person.
A memory.
Anything that makes us feel safe again.
I think that's what I was really longing for.
Not necessarily my old life.
But the feeling of safety I believed existed there.
The older I get, the more I realize we were created to long for that kind of security. We long to be known. We long to belong. We long for meaningful relationships. We long for someone to reach across the room and remind us we're not alone.
Yes, I know those things are ultimately found in God. I know that.
Not just because Scripture says it, but because I've lived it.
Still, sometimes I wish there were an earthly reflection of that kind of security. Someone whose presence calms your nervous system instead of keeping it on alert. A place that instantly feels like home, instead of a place you learned to read the air in before you walked through the door. A hug that reminds your body it's safe to exhale, not one it has to brace against.
I used to think I'd had that once. Nostalgia told me I had.
But that's the trick, isn't it? Nostalgia doesn't just soften what was hard. It can hand you a longing and let you misname who it was ever supposed to come from.
I don't think wanting that kind of security is weakness.
I think it's part of being human.
I just had to stop looking for it in the place I'd already looked.
What Nostalgia Edits
But somewhere in the middle of all that thinking, another realization surfaced.
It's the first time in my adult life that I can honestly say I've become comfortable in the unfamiliar.
Not because uncertainty has become easy.
But because I've discovered that God is already there.
Somewhere along this journey, He stopped being Someone I simply believed in and became the One I actually leaned on.
That's different.
It's one thing to know God is with you because you've read the verse.
It's another thing to know it deep in your bones because you've walked through the valley and found Him waiting there.
There is a kind of knowing that settles beneath words.
The kind you don't just think.
The kind you live.
That kind of knowing changes everything.
Healing didn't make the unfamiliar feel familiar, it taught me I was never walking into the unfamiliar alone.
As I continued reflecting on the dream, another thought wouldn't leave me.
Why is nostalgia such a terrible historian?
Why do we remember the beauty but forget the bondage?
Nostalgia has a way of editing our memories.
It remembers Christmas mornings, God remembers the panic attacks.
Nostalgia remembers the family dinners, God remembers the woman who had lost her voice.
Nostalgia remembers certainty, God remembers striving.
Nostalgia remembers what was familiar, God remembers what still needed healing.
For a long time I thought I was longing to go back.
Maybe what I was really longing for was a version of my past that never actually existed.
What I’d Tell Her
If I could sit across from that younger version of myself today, I wouldn't criticize her.
I wouldn't tell her to stop hiding her feelings.
I'd tell her I know why she does.
I remember the first time someone told her to get her shit together , instead of letting her fall apart for a moment, the way she needed to.
I remember how many days she was told her words cut. That she sounded like a bitch when she told the truth….so she learned to swallow it.
But I'd tell her this, too:
That same voice, the one they called too sharp, too much, too direct, was never the problem. It was the thing that let her speak straight to the core of people. It still does.
I'd tell her it's okay to fall apart.
Because every time she does, she's not breaking. She's healing.
I'd tell her that feeling isn't weakness, and speaking the truth isn't either, it's what finally let her stop lying to herself.
Her life isn't a performance anymore.
It's just... true, real, hers.
Would I?
And then comes the question I never imagined I could answer.
If I could have Joe back...
If I could have my old life back...
If all it required was becoming the woman I used to be...
Would I?
For a period of time, I think my answer would have been yes.
Today...It's no.
Not because I don't miss it.
Not because I wouldn’t want to step back into the familiar, even if just for a fleeting moment.
Not because grief has somehow become easy.
But because I cannot unknow the God I've met.
I cannot unknow the freedom He's given me.
I cannot unknow the woman He's been patiently rebuilding.
The greatest gift God has given me isn't the tragedy I walked through.
It's who He has faithfully formed in me: not through the tragedy, but through His presence in the middle of it.
Home
The dream wasn't about money.
It wasn't even about my old life.
It was about home.
For a long time, I believed home was a place.
Then I believed home was a person.
Then I believed home was a life I had carefully built.
Today, I know something different. Home isn't found in familiarity. Maybe that's why the dream stayed with me. It reminded me that familiarity and safety are not always the same thing.
Sometimes the places we long to return to are simply the places we learned to survive.
Nostalgia will always be a terrible historian. It will keep editing the record, keep handing me the highlight reel, keep asking me if I want to go back.
But I know my own story now. Every panic attack. Every silenced voice. Every valley He met me in.
And maybe that's what healing does. It doesn't erase the unfamiliar, it makes you brave enough to grow there.
Because wherever God is...you're already home.
If this resonated, you might also find these helpful:→ You Don't Have to Call Yourself Okay — When grief changes who you are
→ When You've Been Trying for Too Long — When God feels silent→ About Laura