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Monday, March 19, 2012

you are who you are, and you can't change that.

If I've learned anything in the past eighteen years and 11-ish months it's that trying to get your opinion accepted by someone else who doesn't share your views is nearly impossible.  Pushing opinions on others causes fights, lost friendships, hurt feelings, and cross words.  Heck, unwanted opinion pushing is what starts wars.

People get really upset when they are told that something they hold true is wrong or is not what another person believes in.  People get so upset, in fact, that it can turn into a full-blown arguement and it doesn't matter if the difference of opinion is over something small (wrestling or basketball) or something large (starting a war, abortion, marijuana's health benefits or lack thereof). 

Throw a philisophical or religious topic up in the air and people go nuts.  It doesn't matter if they have never studied a single thing about the topic, everyone will jump in with opinions and beliefs that they hold true.  Sure, the debate may take place under the pretense of a friendly conversation or a group study-question...but when it comes down to it, it is a God-honest arguement and noone wants to back down.

Think about it; when someone's statement threatens what you hold as truth, don't you automatically bristle at the idea that you could have been believing in something that was wrong for X amount of years?  And when somebody pushes that "lie" of an idea onto you isn't it your first reaction to correct them and make sure that they are aware they are in fact wrong?

But, who are we to say what is right or wrong?  We are nobody...at least when it comes to deciding things like that.  And because we are nobody, we have taken to underhanded comments and passive-agressive behaviors so that our opinions get through in a more politically and socially correct manner...but either way, a person will believe what a person believes and what others say will very rarely change that.

In fact, I have recently come to a conclusion that people don't change.  I mean sure, a persons favorite band, food, color, hairstyle, the way he/she dresses, and all other superficial things can change in the blink of an eye.  But the moral compass built into a person doesn't change.  The beliefs that a person has held onto for as long as he/she can remember won't change.  The personality that a person was born with won't change.

This gets tricky because on the outside people do seem to be able to change, but I honestly believe that a persons core is unshakeable.  I will always be more of an introvert, a little too hard on myself, self-consious, forever working to feel loved, an avid reader, too quick to speak, a little snatchy and more confident in my opinions than I should be.  I have been this way for as long as I can remember, and through every stage of life and every so-called change in my personality, I am still the same person when it comes down to it. It doesn't matter if I have God in my life or if I go out and get drunk every weekend.  It doesn't matter if I start failing classes or graduate at the top of my class in three years.  It won't matter if I suddenly become a nudist because all of these things are exterior of my core being.  In the end, when I am stripped down to nothing and it is just me looking into a mirror, I will still see the same person I was when I was twelve, eight, and three. 

People who continually hurt others aren't going to be able to stop doing that.  People who are outrageously caring can't stop being caring.  They can thow a layer over who they really are, try to blend in and be more moderate in thier actions, but when you strip away any sort of wall and tear away their strength, it's going to be the orginal person, the same one they were for an entire lifetime.

And maybe that is offensive to you because it goes against your core beleif.  My friend preached the bible at me when I tried to explain this to her, telling me that I was wrong because Jesus says that we are wiped clean and get to start over when we accept Him into our hearts (which I've done).  But to me, this is just a prime example of a person's beliefs getting threatened and a full-out bristle.  We eventually just agreed to disagree, because a diffrerence of opinion that involves religion rarely ends any other way.