We’re flying away from the nest.

You get older. You evolve. Your friends change and you drift apart. Sometimes the friendship’s rekindled and sometimes it isn’t.

You move out and you begin to explore. You learn about yourself and discover parts of yourself that you didn’t know existed. You become a new person.

It feels weird. It’s like you’re a weird little butterfly breaking out of the cocoon. Yet everyone you’ve ever known still views you as that little caterpillar.

Yea, you can change. You’re expected to change. But there’s always a weird invisible unspoken suggestion “Hey, stay the same” “We don’t like change” “Hey, stay the same”

It’s never vocalized. There are no rules that you should stay the same. There’s not even a tangible expectation to stay the same.

In fact, generally speaking, people are supportive of growth and finding your own way.

And still, it feels as if there’s and invisible force suggesting that we should plateau and stay the same.

The social rifts are only experienced after the. You mature. You age. People in our lives aren’t always ready for that.

But it’s called growing up for a reason.

And it doesn’t matter if you’re already grown up. You keep growing up. Our whole lives we’ll just keep growing, keep changing.

We don’t realize it until checking up on a few of those subtle mile markers that we unconsciously steak out throughout our lives:

Meeting up with an old friend.
Growing out of old clothes.
A family reunion.
A childhood home visitation.

There’s shifts. There are subtle changes within us that we don’t notice until after the fact. Maybe our feelings towards friends or interests or sometimes even family feel just a little bit… funny.

There’s a faint taste of ‘difference’ in the air. The things you used to do together don’t quite feel the same. Old habits don’t quite feel as natural. There’s a little bit of distance between you.

Congrats. You’re growing up. You’re evolving. You’re becoming more you.

The childhood markers. The old friends. The memories. The pictures. Perhaps even a city.

They serve as weird time capsule, holding within them a part of you that you no longer hold within yourself.

It’s like waving to yourself through a cracked mirror. Still you, but different.

You’re growing up.

That’s life. And that’s ok. That’s what should be happening.

We should look back at all the embarrassing things we used to do. We should laugh at our younger selves. It means we grew up. And we still are.

Who am I? Who are you?

We’ve got to keep living and experiencing to find out. Walk in to the change. Embrace it.

Reinvent yourself. You owe it to yourself.

Because as the Doctor says: