How I escape the nostalgia trap
June 2026
June can be an emotional month. Joyful and bittersweet. Graduations, weddings, the end of school year routines and the return of summer traditions … all sorts of life transitions and celebrations. The tender, “sad pleasure” of nostalgia can paint everything rosy as well as dredge up some heavier feelings — remorse, regret, grief, resentment, pain.
Whether memory lane feels sun-dappled and lilac-scented or like a treacherous minefield of trip-wires, both can have a tricky stickiness that keeps us from the truth of the present.
When I find myself struggling to disentangle from painful memories or return from nostalgic reverie, I try to take Aldous Huxley’s advice to heart:
"It’s dark because you are trying too hard. Lightly child, lightly. Learn to do everything lightly. Yes, feel lightly even though you’re feeling deeply. Just lightly let things happen and lightly cope with them. I was so preposterously serious in those days… Lightly, lightly – it’s the best advice ever given me… So throw away your baggage and go forward. There are quicksands all about you, sucking at your feet, trying to suck you down into fear and self-pity and despair. That’s why you must walk so lightly. Lightly my darling…"
Feel deeply, feel all the things, yet step lightly — keep moving. Be mindful of what can make your steps heavy. Shed your baggage — anything you’re still carrying that doesn’t serve you, that doesn’t belong to you, that weighs you down.
Can you conjure that image, that sensation of moving through the world lightly? What would it feel like to “lightly let things happen and lightly cope with them”? What comes to mind? Do you notice any resistance? I would love to hear about it.
If you’re feeling weighed down, mired, pulled out of yourself, or having difficulty accessing tender-hearted joy, energy healing can bring light, spaciousness, intention, and compassion to the nooks and crannies of your memories and experiences, making the present a more pleasant and loving place to be. I hope you’ll consider working with me one-on-one or joining my next online group session this Thursday!
