F. Behrendt: The guru of serenity
Nostalgia – a feeling that everyone should allow. Because it helps
Frank Behrendt’s nostalgia room with the dreams of his childhood
© private
Last Saturday brought “Wetten, dass ..?” an almost forgotten feeling back: like a wave it swept across the country, warmed like a terrycloth pajamas from childhood, made for moist eyes and memories. Of course, the outrage society’s Twitter chorus erupted reflexively. But there were also others who had a thing for nostalgia, like me.
When we used to chew on a word, my mother advised us to look it up in the Duden. I still do it today, but now digitally. I wanted to fathom the meaning of nostalgia and received an answer within seconds: “A mood triggered by unease about the present, filled with indefinite longing, which expresses itself in the return to a past, glorified time, whose fashion, art, music, etc. Ä. One resuscitated. “
Now I’m not one to complain about the present, even if I dislike a lot about it. But as a long-term optimist whose glass is always half full and never half empty, I still see a lot of good and beautiful things along the way and sometimes on the main roads of life. Nevertheless, I often travel back in my mind, not as an escape, more as a wellness trip. I also went to that on TV when the familiar intro melody of “Wetten dass ..?” rang out. I hadn’t heard them for a long time, but recognized them immediately.
14 million nostalgic people
When the tall, autumn-blonde showmaster Gottschalk took possession of the hall in the usual manner, his outstretched arms were an invitation to a hug for me. For the show, for a piece of ideal world, for the entertainment that was once experienced in the family circle with pretzel sticks, children’s chocolate and delicious coke. I wouldn’t have the idea of criticizing the retro infusion, it doesn’t make any sense to me, because the show comes from another time. I just wanted the old experience back and I got the old experience. If you didn’t want it, you didn’t have to turn it on. Almost 14 million wanted it.
For me, “Wetten dass ..?” just a memory trip. I am by no means part of the “Everything used to be better” group. Because, to be honest, there were a lot of things that weren’t so great in the past. But our memory likes to build in a dazzling filter – negative memories are sorted out, positive memories slide up and become stuck.The look back often turns rosy and for many, especially in the emotionally charged pre-Christmas period, grows into a bell-ringing longing: nostalgia.
You can shake your head and roll your eyes over it, but this chocolate-sweet emotional state is important for the balance of the soul, despite the slight glorification of the past. Studies from the universities of Southampton and Missouri have found that nostalgic feelings can even point out ways out of emotional crisis. Thoughts of happiness moments or lasting, formative encounters are free mood enhancers, fear dispensers and hidden sources of strength.
Central heating for the soul
The scientists have shown through experiments that the test subjects behaved much more relaxed when dealing with positively triggering memory anchors and looked much more positively into the future, regardless of the other framework conditions in everyday life and the world. Nostalgia has the effect of downloading a correction program when things get stuck in the mental gears.
The sentimental journey not only ensures a readjustment of the current emotional balance, it even warms you physically. Don’t you think so? But that’s how it is: Researchers at the Chinese Sun Yatsen University have found that test subjects who plunged into nostalgic memories in their heads immediately felt warmer. Their tolerance to the cold increased, and they estimated the room temperature to be up to four degrees higher than it actually was. Crazy but real. In the end, nostalgia works like a kind of central heating for the soul.
The industry has been doing really good business with nostalgia for a long time. The trick is ultimately too tempting: The clever marketing strategists grab consumers exactly where they are almost completely defenseless – with their sentimentality. Anyone who is struck by a shot of melancholy in the nostalgic beating heart is happy to pay because they buy back a piece of eternal youth. “Shared memories are the glue that holds the fragile community together”, writes the author Daniel Rettig in his book “The Good Old Times – Why Nostalgia Makes Us Happy”, which is well worth reading.
So he hits the surprising phenomenon of the recent success of the ZDF show classic around childish betting and celebrities chatting gently on a large couch very well. Millions were traveling together in a time capsule and escaped everyday life for three and a half hours with its mostly unpleasant news about corona numbers, the climate crisis and disputes all over the world. But so successful is the “Wetten dass ..?” Revival was also unsuitable as a monthly flashback drug. Once a year in the run-up to Christmas, when we are already blessed with a different mildness and are more receptive to nostalgic light, yes. Let’s see if it happens that way.
I won’t have any withdrawal symptoms by then. When I need a shot of nostalgia, I just go downstairs to the basement at home. There I put everything together in one room that meant something to me in my childhood and youth. A quick look into the room makes me happy, so I check it out at least once a day.