Ok, here is something that I desperately needed to learn but only began to realize now: you can’t change people. They are who they are and the only choice you have is whether to love them, or move on.
I used to believe that communication (or demands) can change a person’s behavior, but the crucial—and the only—difference is that now the person will simply tell you what they are, instead of changing it.
I fought against this inevitable truth for a long time, but it’s kind of liberating, in a way, to know that this is your only job. To decide if someone is good for you, if there’s something there worth staying for, or to cut your losses and move on before—as life’s cruelties will inevitably have it—getting hurt.
It’s also kind of sad, with millions of years of human history behind us, with the benefits of progress staring us in the face; we invariably turn our backs to the past, and choose, against all wisdom of our predecessors, to not change. To stand still, stubbornly waiting for someone else to accept our imperfections. And the tragedy here is not our childish tenacity, but the fact that it’s so hard—so hard—to accept someone else’s.
Here is the paradox all over again, the self-loathing mingled with pride. Only this time, the irony weighs heavily upon the world, and becomes universal, too great to laugh at, yet too ordinary to be seen.
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Sunday, April 12, 2009
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