A radically different you

Every once in a while, I experience swooping changes in my personality that happen over a relatively short period of time. There’s a radical shift in perspective, an almost spontaneous dropping of deeply ingrained habit patterns, and an adoption of new desires and hopes. I come out of this experience feeling like a brand new person. As if I’ve entered a new epoch in life.

Before the summer of 2020, I, who until that point hadn’t given a second thought to computers, would have never guessed that programming would become a cherished hobby. I certainly did not know that I would go on to make it the bulk of my working day. I felt an intensity in those weeks that cemented my then-newfound fascination for code.

I can also think of many situations where I did something—often enthusiastically—without knowing that it would be the last time. When I made this painting (will update this post when I find it) in 8th grade, I had no idea that I would never pick up the brush again. I’m also reminded of “very important problems” that often occupy my time and energy for months, but a sudden change in perspective renders them completely insignificant.

Oddly, some people don’t like this kind of change. It saddens me to watch someone refuse to let go of a clearly defunct hobby/project/friendship that no longer excites them. I guess this comes from the guilt felt over broken promises. People are too eager to announce lifelong commitments, which is frankly, quite naive and misguided. Apart from the guilt, I think there is also an assumption that dropping a ‘‘once-cherished-thing’’ now somehow invalidates any value it had in the past. This is not true of course.

The really strange part about all this is that most of these changes in personality happen in the dark. The surface might look still, but the tectonic plates underneath are constantly shifting. It’s funny how little you can predict your own inclinations1. You almost never see it coming.

But every once in a while, you can tell! You get this premonition that things are going to change. It’s like the scene in fight club, where the bombs have gone off and it’s a radically different future tomorrow. But dawn hasn’t broken yet. For now, you’re just watching the wreckage from the window. Distant. Not yet implicated.

The 20s especially are peppered with opportunities for radical self-transformation: leaving home for university, getting a job, and getting married. Uprooting your entire life—perhaps unsurprisingly—can dramatically change your relationship with it. But sometimes even seemingly trivial things, like reading the right book, having an inspired conversation with a friend, or introspecting, can make you feel like things are going to be very different.

Of course, this intuition might be false. Perhaps nothing will change. But that is not the point. What matters is the intuition itself and the emotions it invokes. It brings excitement for the future, sweet nostalgia for the past, and a greater appreciation of the present moment. It is also a reminder of the impermanence of our inclinations. To me, it is a reminder to take myself and my plans less seriously. Strangely enough, this makes me better at executing my plans, not worse.

I’m looking at my calendar now and realizing that there are a handful of upcoming events that have the potential to be quite transformative. This hits extra hard because I recently celebrated my five-year anniversary of moving to Singapore. My time here has by no means been stale, but nonetheless, the five-year mark feels like the perfect moment to enter a new epoch.