Choices and Change

Five years ago I started a blog to document my college experience. True to form I let my enthusiasm peter out rather quickly (although looking back at the several months I managed to keep this thing going, I am rather impressed by my 18-year-old self.)

Also, true to form, some shit happened over the last five years that I certainly would not have dared to predict. For just a taste of it though:

• I graduated college a year early with a degree in Hospitality Management, with the intention of working my way up through the industry until I could open my own restaurant.

• I got a job in my industry, and worked my way up to a managerial position within a year.

• I questioned and redefined my sexuality, (I now identify as pansexual, more info here). I ended a nine year long friendship after finally realizing that it had not been a particularly healthy one for me. I moved back in with my parents. I went on medication for depression and anxiety.

• I was promoted and moved to a restaurant two hours away from my family and friends, struggled to find an apartment, struggled to effectively lead my employees, struggled to please my guests, and fell off of my medication.

• I had an emotional breakdown at my workplace, and went on medical leave for anxiety. I went back on medication, and began to see a therapist.

• Two months into my leave, I resigned from my job at the restaurant, and left the industry entirely.

So now, I'm sitting here staring at a blog that I started when I thought I had my life planned out. Where do I go from here?

I made a mistake, five years ago. Not because these things happened. I don't consider any of this a mistake. It was something I had to go through to figure out what I wanted to do with my life. The path I have since decided to take is not one that I would have discovered without these experiences. I failed at something, and somehow that has only made me more determined to succeed at something new.

No, the mistake I made was in a post on this blog five years ago. An essay I had titled "Paint Chips" in which I insisted that people did not change. That we were like houses, with layers of paint.

As I progressed through the restaurant industry, I began to change. I became more cynical, less understanding. I began to lose faith in others. I stopped trusting people. I found myself making decisions that I would not have been okay with making before I became a supervisor. I had a choice. I could accept these changes, or I could challenge them.

In the end, I decided that I did not like the person I had become. I wanted to be the type of person who loved people, and was excited about the things humanity had to offer. This job had not let me do that, so I chose to pursue one that would.

People are not like houses. We can make choices. A house cannot. We are not inanimate objects, tied to the whims of the world around us. We are living, breathing organisms. We can weather the storm, or we can move to avoid it. And how the storm affects us is up to us. When we choose how we respond to something, we are choosing whether or not we change.

People change. People choose to change.