Only, I don't think people do change. The basic building blocks of someone's personality stay constant, unchanging, unyielding. What changes is not us, but the significance of those basic traits.
Imagine a house, painted eight different colors, each right on top of the layer before it. Eight layers of colors. When it starts, the top color is fresh and vibrant, but as time goes on, the paint chips. The colors from underneath peak out, whether in small specks or huge clumps. Depending on the weariness of the house's life, more or fewer colors will reveal themselves.
People are like that. We start with all our personality traits set, just unable to be seen. But as we experience the world, whether through tragedy or good fortune, those colors reveal themselves. That's why some people never seem to change, while others seem to do donuts in life.
Take my friend for example. He's grown more reserved, more quiet, and more reckless over the last few years. Yet he still listens to every trivial problem I could possibly have. He still puts the safety of the women around him above even his own. He still deals with my idiosyncrasies as if nothing's changed.
Yes, he gets angry easier. Yes, he's harder to predict. Yes, he's drifted away from most of his old friends. But he hasn't changed. The most important aspects of his personality--the bottom layers of paint--they haven't changed. The boy that became one of my best friends is still there. I still recognize him underneath the paint chips.
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