My husband does this thing when he’s overwhelmed, he starts to romanticize a place where he was more comfortable. For example, sometimes when he’s overwhelmed with the house, he will talk about missing our tiny apartment that was easy to maintain (and easy to mess).
I understand where he’s coming from. I too sometimes miss former jobs that I had because I knew them so well I didn’t have to think about them, I just did the work and was able to be as successful in that role as that position allowed for. But that’s the catch…as successful as that position allowed.
The catch to moving forward in life is moving into the things which are uncomfortable. To stay stationary or regress is easy, but comes with it’s own unique pain; the pain of going nowhere. Getting comfortable with growth is getting comfortable with leaning into the discomfort-which is very hard to get used to because that doesn’t get more comfortable, but does become a different type of beacon showing you the direction in which to go.