The version of you that travels through gossip may have a busier life than you do.

There is a second version of you circulating that you have no access to. It is assembled from fragments, updated by people who have not seen you in years. You cannot correct it, because you never hear most of it, and chasing the parts you do hear tends to add material rather than remove it. The consolation is that everyone has one, and most people are too busy with their own to study yours closely.

Spend your attention on the people who know you directly rather than on the copy in circulation. And when something reaches you second-hand, decide whether it affects anything before you take it on.