Good friends let you try on new versions of yourself without saying “that’s not you.”
CREATIVITY
WHAT THIS MEANS
Anyone who has known you a long time holds a fixed model of you, and they defend it, usually meaning well. Being told something is out of character can stop a change before it becomes one, since it is hard to continue when everyone around you keeps restoring the old version. Room to experiment is one of the most generous things a friend provides.
Give it to others by treating a new interest as interesting rather than as a phase. And notice who does that for you, because those are the people to tell first the next time you want to try something.
A QUESTION TO SIT WITH
Who lets you change without reminding you who you were?
MORE IN GROWTH, CHANGE & REINVENTION
- Some questions disappear not because you answered them, but because you became someone who no longer needed them.
- You can escape somebody’s influence physically while continuing every behavior their influence created.
- You can spend your life avoiding becoming your parents and still let that avoidance decide who you become.
Free, with nothing to buy inside it.