Have you ever met someone that changes with the people they are surrounded by? It’s as if they are a social chameleon. Whoever they are dating, whoever their friends are at the time, whoever has the most pull in their life–that becomes who they are. Or at least who they are being for the time. The problem with these social chameleons are that you never can tell who they REALLY are. They seem to appear as different versions of who everyone else thinks they should be at the time. What happened to being real? And I mean REALLY being REAL. What happened to individuality? What happened to thinking and acting outside the box?
I think it is all hidden under false expectations and unrealistic stereotypes. If you are a musician you act this way. If you are an athlete you act that way. If you have these friends they expect you do this but those friends expect you to do that. It is a twisted circle that continues until we are so confused as to who we really are that we never quite get back to normal.
As we grow up we have more and more opportunities to become a victim to our stereotipical social surroundings. If we aren’t careful the influences of everything and everyone around us can cause us to completely lose ourselves–completely lose what makes us different from the person sitting next to us. The worst part about it, is that we start to believe that fitting into this cookie cutter mold that everyone else fits into, is a good thing.
All of this is just to say that I miss individuality. I miss people not being afraid to be who they are. I miss meeting new and different people. I miss many different people from different cultures and backgrounds coming together to form a diverse group of friends.
So my friends feel empowered to be yourself and be different. Be a multicolored chameleon–one that is whatever color it wants to be, regardless of its surroundings.
Love, American Beautiful 