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Is it normal for a person to "feel" less as they get older? (lemm.ee)

submitted 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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I remember experiencing the world much more vividly when I was a little boy.

I would step outside on an autumn evening and feel joy as the cool breeze rustled the leaves and caressed my skin. In the summers, I would listen to the orchestra of insects buzzing around me. I would waddle out of the cold swimming pool and the most wonderful shiver would cascade out of me as I peed in the bathroom. In the winters, I would get mesmerized by the simple sound of my boots crunching the snow under me.

These were not experiences that I actively sought out. They just happened. I did not need to stop to smell the figurative roses, the roses themselves would stop me in my tracks.

As I got older, I started feeling less and less and thinking more and more.

I've tried meditation, recreation, vacation, resignation, and medication. Some of these things have helped but I am still left wondering... is this a side effect of getting older? Or is there something wrong with me?

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

On top of what everyone else said (I especially super agree with experiencing new things), I can recommend art, either experiencing it, or making it. Art is basically all about trying to capture or recapture a specific feeling, by heightening it.

Maybe the smell of roses doesn't move you much after all these years, but a well crafted poem, music, movie, or some video games (I guess Flower comes to mind for this particular example) can reignite some of that lost wonder. And if experiencing them isn't enough, you can always go after those feelings yourself, and make your own art, trying to bring back the sensations you miss the most. Heck, learning to cook an old dish a relative or friend used to make can evoke long forgotten feelings, "art" is a vague term.

I'm both getting older and suffering from really bad depression, and this sort of thing has been helping me cope with this loss of feelings.