Quotes about the past

I know it seems incredible, that already some of the younger men are beginning to doubt the greatness of the Change our world has undergone, but read — read the newspapers of that time. Every age becomes mitigated and a little ennobled in our minds as it recedes into the past. It is the part of those who like myself have stories of that time as well, to supply, by a scrupulous spiritual realism, some antidote to that glamour.

Your past is always your past. Even if you forget it, it remembers you.

Reality is always the story of a past, and what I love about the past is—it’s over.

Today, I will try to remember to regret the past. I will think of how many mistakes I have made throughout my life. I will say to myself, "If only I could go back in time and make different choices, so that my life could be the way it should have been." Then I will remind myself that I cannot.

There is a philosophical, or metaphysical position that can be taken–maybe its a scientific hypothesis–that the past cannot in fact exist. Everything that can possibly exist exists now. Things now may be expressive of some conceivable or describable past state of affairs, yes:but that's different from saying this this former state actually somehow exists in the form of "the past". Even in our memory[...]there is no past:no scenes preserved with all their sights and sounds. Merely fleeting states of mind, myriad points assembled for a moment to make a new picture (but "picture" is wrong too, too full, too fixed) of what we think are former states of things: things that once were, or may have been the case.

States of profound happiness, like all other forms of intoxication, are apt to befuddle the wits; intense enjoyment of the present always makes one forget the past.

The past was a jigsaw puzzle and you never had all the pieces.

It's not about knowin where you are. It's about thinkin you got there without takin anything with you. Your notions about startin over. Or anybody's. You dont start over. That's what it's about. Every step you take is forever. You cant make it go away. None of it.

You think when you wake up in the mornin yesterday dont count. But yesterday is all that does count. What else is there? Your life is made out of the days it's made out of. Nothin else. You might think you could run away and change your name and I dont know what all. Start over. And then one mornin you wake up and look at the ceilin and guess who's layin there?

It is a peculiarity of time that in retrospect it appears so compact, an indivisible solid object, a dish with only one smell and one flavor. (Page 4)

You should never fall in love with your own press clippings, because it is very much the nature of the beast that the same journalists who build you up between Monday and Friday tear you down for weekend fun...My family's habit of living in the past seems to me pathological, even dangerous. If all greatness lies in the past, what is the point of the future?

The more shared past there is in a relationship, the more present you need to be; otherwise, you will be forced to relive the past again and again.