May 7th, 2021
Nobody changes.
I hear it all the time. It’s ingrained as a moral in our stories and popular culture. Folks say it about other folks regularly, like those other folks don’t say the same thing about them.
Nobody changes.
I think it makes people comfortable to think this.
Everyone is something, and once you know what that something is, you never have to learn anything about them again. They are what they are.
Nobody changes.
Except.
Except, maybe, if they have a conscience. A person who can feel the difference between right and wrong might begin making choices that feel good as opposed to bad.
Or except, possibly, if they’re an adaptive or rational thinker. Doing a thing wrong and realizing it’s wrong is a good way to find out how to do that thing right.
Or except, probably, if a person has survived a hard time. Because most people can imagine what it would be like to have to get up, but it’s different when you actually fall down.
Or except, I don’t know, if they start to put away parts of their personality they developed initially as a socially-acceptable construct and start revealing aspects of themselves that reflect who they truly are.
Or except, on the off-chance, that humans are more than their wiring. That we’re more than individuals. That we’re more than just one action or reaction or catchphrase.
They keep telling me nobody changes.
And I just keep being a nobody.
The Den 