I've Changed

I think one would be hard pressed to find anyone who maintains that they haven't changed since their teen years. They don't call it "forming years" for nothing.

I think my default attitude about many things has changed in the last decade or so. Adopting objectivity and accepting that fate does exist, but is blind and strikes at random, has allowed me to take a mellower view on life than before. I don't get upset about things I cannot change, which is quite liberating.

In becoming an independent adult you also invite responsibility into your life, something I feared when I was younger. I did not like the idea of accountability. Now it is relinquished and I feel I've settled into my own skin a bit more because of it.

It's all an ongoing process. That must be a shiny thread that is common to all our experiences.
 
I'd say I was a relatively consistent person throughout all my life. I've had people who have known me for over half a decade tell me "You haven't changed one bit, you even type the same way." Which is somewhat reassuring. However the big disruption in my personality came about because of college. I thought of myself as open minded before but I am more so now. I also embraced philosophy because of college.
 
flight said:
I actually don't know, believe it or not. I'm literally so detached and in a state of dysphoria these days that I really don't know what would really make me legitimately happy again.
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So, I suppose confiding with others is merely an idea you have in mind that may or may not be effective. There were many differences in your life between now and when you were younger, so it would seem logical to conclude that you would be happy again if you had more freedom and stable relationships just like before. Obviously, the free and stable circumstances are not currently realistic. Were you always a perfectionist, or is that a quality you developed over time?
 
I've changed in many ways, but what I can most identify as changed behaviour in myself at the moment is my attitude towards my own limits at work. Accepting and understanding my own limits has grounded me as far as who I am at work. I know what I need to do to get better. This, in turn, makes me a more open person with my colleagues, which makes me enjoy being at work and, surely, makes me a more enjoyable colleague. In the past, I wanted to believe I was already an A+ worker - that I was already the best version of myself as a worker. This delusion made me act in such a way to keep up the image I so badly wanted to portray. It made me hate being around people because that meant I had to act to fit into a mold that I created for myself. Truly an awful way to live.
 
Everyone changes, that's life. It's only natural for people to get more and more confident as they get more comfortable with different situations and in life. I'm a completely different person to the one who joined PC, but it's only natural as I was only 14 and I'm now 21. If you're still the same person as you were 7 years prior I'd suspect that something was untoward.
 
Over the years, I've learned to lower my expectations as a first line of defense against disappointment. Having myself put others or upcoming events to even a decent standard for me is that much steeper a drop when the expectation doesn't meet the standard.

The negative about it is that unless something about someone/thing proves interesting to me beforehand, initially I tend to not think much of other people or things, so I don't have much of a problem dropping either in a snap. But its purpose for me is that it makes the moment when something or someone exceeds my expectations all the more pleasantly surprising, and I am more willing to embrace it, so long as the trend continues. And when something turns out to not have been worth it, I walk away from it as no skin off my nose. Keeps me mellow.
 
So much of me has changed in recent years, but I think the core of my personality has continued to be the same.
I've become more confident in myself, cynical and sarcastic, but also more open to others. I've become more compassionate and loving, charismatic, but also perhaps bitter. Some changes for the better, and others I could not say. Change is just change, and I hope I continue to be this dynamic.
 
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