We never change, do we

Disclaimer: this post may sound ultra-rationalistic and somewhat derived from Ayn Rand’s objectivism. Well it is not. Read closer.

Following the short Easter holidays, my topic for the day is departure. Leaving may sound like an escape from one state to another for most of us, but it comprises more than just a movement between two points, A and B. When leaving, one usually does it with a purpose and with the (sometimes shared) illusion of return to the point of origin of movement. While this may physically be correct, in spirit you never return the same. Leaving means journey, and each journey we undertake changes us, perhaps unknowingly, in most cases irreversibly.

Leaving means taking a direction and is thus an act of decision as well as an act of self-expression. When leaving a place, a job, a relationship, a life, one exits a system only to enter another system, breaks free from a set of dependencies only to accept another set of dependencies, so you might understand leaving more than just a signal of termination - it signifies commencement. It is the articulation of desire, of feeling harboured deep within us and is not meant to harm or to produce grief in what is left behind, but to fulfill one’s potential to the highest achievable level, by exploring potentialities.

Thus, I would not consider departure as an equivalent of breaking free as it is often understood, but as a state of continued dependence, which is probably more acceptable than the previous state. It is but feeling that causes us to change.

If you don’t need it every day
But sometimes don’t you just crave
To disappear within your mind
You never know what you might find
So come and spend some time with me
And we will spend it all at sea
(Jamie Cullum, All At Sea)