About Changing That
Post 1507:
Certain ideas and sayings stick in our heads more than others. Maybe it’s a common idea or aphorism that you can’t help but pick up on. One notion that hangs me up is the nature of human change—its prevalence or lack thereof.
Maybe I can make it more clear. In every third or fourth book or movie or TV show, a character will either say people never really change or people can change.
Couple things. Which one is it? In the books and movies and TV shows, it seems like the person making their declaration is completely convinced. It’s usually at the tail end of an argument. They sigh and pause for dramatic effect and then announce to the audience the ultimate nature of humanity, like it’s easy to encapsulate all of history down to a couple of words and a look that suggests total thought or a complete lack of it.
Seems a bit simplistic. And arrogant. Hell, even philosophers and psychologists usually require a book or two to describe the nature of everything. At least a lengthy paragraph.
I’ve gathered a substantial amount of data on the subject. Great change is possible, I say, though it doesn’t happen without a great amount of difficulty and therefore it isn’t the most common phenomenon in the universe.
To say people can’t change would be ridiculous. I’ve seen the worst turn into the best and the other way around. It’s hard to forget and impossible not to notice.
For myself, I find it as difficult as anyone else to be different than I was. Intransigence and the power of habit allied with fundamental predispositions can seem at times insurmountable.
Stories are devices that allow us to see characters change. Probably why we’re so drawn to them. The desire to go from this to that is deep. Resolving to embark is more complicated.
It’s gotta be a big part of my attraction to stories. It’s easier to read about somebody changing their ways than to do it myself. Could be my innate laziness or my bone-deep apathy or perhaps my fossilizing heart. I should probably think about changing that.
Cheers and see you after.
