“You don’t like yourself, but you do admire yourself. . .You’re afraid that if you change, you’ll lose what makes you special . . ”
These words of insight were spoken by a character on House – a television show that I rarely watch. I know many people probably consider it trite to write about something spoken by a fictional character, but it occurred to me that this is the reason that many people stay committed to a personna even when they’ve rather behave differently. The person that they are, is the person that they are familiar with, and changing involves quite a bit of risk. Not only may you stop liking your new self, others may too.
It’s funny the things that define us. We’re the goofy ones, and so we stay goofy even when we’re in pain. We’re the quiet ones so we stay quiet even when we have words to say. Angry, friendly, beautiful, loud – they all can be masks that we put on in order to ensure that we meet the expectations of people. We’re comfortable with the image we’ve created – and we’re too afraid of the risks to create something too.
The problem with remaining the same is that you’ll never experience anything new – and you’ll never know if there was something you missed.