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Series: Longing and Belonging (1/3) - Nostalgia
- Mar 9
- 4 min read
Updated: Apr 9
The Ache for a Time You (Did or Never) Lived Through?
Loneliness, Nostalgia, and the Need for Real-World Connection
Lately, I’ve had more than a few conversations with clients and friends who say they feel like they’re missing something.
"Nostalgia?" I offer. A wistful longing for a past time full of oft-romanticized personal associations. "Or, Anemoia." (Coined by John Koenig*) A similar feeling, but a yearning and reverence for a time and place not personally experienced.
They describe feeling lonely even when they’re constantly engaged: trading memes, keeping streaks alive, gaming with others, chatting online, doom-scrolling, bed-rotting, or matching on dating apps. They’re “connected,” technically, but not fulfilled. From Zoomers to Boomers, people are voicing texts, ignoring the phone and door, and sliding through micro-reels. And with the advent of consumer delivery apps, human interaction is reduced even further.
Researchers Qin et al. (2025) note that loneliness is shaped by a complex mix of factors, including demographic traits, social roles, personality, relationship quality, and (most powerfully) everyday experiences of prejudice and discrimination. And, while often associated with older adults, their analysis found that people aged 16–25 reported the highest levels of loneliness.
Young people are yearning for connection, IRL: Face-to-face time, shared physical spaces, to be seen, known, understood, safe, and celebrated. They are craving despite (or in spite of) the constant availability of digital communication. Anecdotally, the younger the person I'm speaking with, the less they have words for what they... miss.
Energetic and tactile experience with other humans; a room full of laughter; music that isn’t curated by an algorithm; and, eye contact that isn’t streamed.
Think: Belonging in “analog”.
“I wish I could’ve lived through the 90s. Could you really greet someone right at the gate (before TSA)?"
“I want to ride bikes with friends until dark.”
“I want to go to a house party. Like, the kind where someone’s playing guitar, and people actually talk.”
Tudehope et al., 2024, in their study, described the primary atmosphere of emotion in their sample of mental health posts on TikTok, to be around themes of sadness, loneliness, and despair.
What can we take from today's Nostalgia or Anemoia
What does it mean if we feel wisful or mobilizing desire when we imagine:
Hanging out after classes or work
House parties where phones and screens weren’t a distraction
Neighborhoods where people dropped in for coffee
Moments of presence that weren’t interrupted by notifications
Going out on the regular rather than as an occasion - frisbee, water-slides, mini-golf, river trips, bbq in the park
Whether or not the past was objectively “better,” our longing is less about the decade itself and more about what it represents:
Belonging. Connection. Presence. Safety.
We Are Wired for Connection
There’s a biological reason this kind of nostalgia hits us so deeply.
As humans, we are wired for social connection; it’s not a luxury, it’s a core survival need.
From infancy through adulthood, our brains and bodies are shaped in relationship to others. Eye contact, shared meals, proximity, unstructured time, these are the conditions under which our nervous systems learn to regulate and feel safe.
When we are physically near people we trust, our bodies release oxytocin, the bonding hormone, which reduces stress and signals safety. It helps calm the fight-or-flight system, brings our heart rate down, and tells us: you’re not alone.
Real-world connection, the kind that builds trust, takes time and repeated exposure to others in the same physical space.
Connection and trust are built over time, in shared, real-time experiences.
Scaffolded conversations that start light and grow in depth
Reciprocal sharing, where one person opens up and the other gently follows
Reading the room, picking up on breath, tone, posture, eye contact, gesture
Watching someone lean in or pull back, soften or stay guarded
Small tests of vulnerability: a story offered, a joke shared, a truth admitted
Vulnerability building intimacy and connection
And, how those bids for connection are received, remembered, and mirrored
Spending time IRL allows for a mutual exchange of presence: micro-expressions, subtle shifts in posture, breathing patterns, eye contact dynamics, and the shared sense of space or task.
Obvious or subtle, these real time cues help us determine:
Can I trust this person? Can I be more of myself here?
Your Longing Makes Sense
Our nervous systems crave co-regulation, a mutual exchange of presence, and when we are with one another in person, micro-expressions, subtle shifts in posture, breathing patterns, eye contact dynamics, and the shared sense of space or task are richly available. In online interactions, many of these cues are altered, making that exchange feel different and sometimes less satisfying.
You may find yourself yearning for a time you never lived through, or missing a kind of closeness you can’t quite describe. That ache is your body’s way of remembering what it needs. Not a filtered version of connection, but the real thing.
Presence. Proximity. People.
Why is a trauma therapist writing about loneliness and connection?
Well, I pay attention to the patterns that consistently show up in people’s lived experience. Isolation, loneliness, autonomic arousal, and disconnection are often woven into what it feels like to live through and move beyond traumatic events or histories. These are not separate issues, they are part of the same system. And importantly, they are not fixed. They can be shifted, softened, and mediated through meaningful connection with others.
Up Next: What Happens When We Stay Disconnected?
In the next post, we’ll look at what can happen when our nervous systems go too long without the connection they’re built for. We’ll explore the psychological and physiological toll of chronic loneliness and why it’s more than just an emotion. It’s a signal from your body, asking you to come home to others.
Next in the series: Loneliness in a Hyperconnected World
Do you feel developing deep human connections happens more
0%Online
0%In Person
0%Both
0%Both, but qualitatively different
*John Koenig, author of The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows
About the Post & References
This post is for general educational purposes only and does not constitute psychological advice or therapy and is not intended to replace personalized care from a licensed mental health professional in Canada.
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