"Change everything except your loves." -Voltaire

"The moment at which Magwitch like reveals himself to Pip demonstrates Dickens' views on the relationship between society and man."

"Why don't you try that again?"

"The moment like at which Magwitch reveals himself --"

"Uh-uh-uh." I still remember a particular exchange between my 8th grade English teacher and me during our unit on Great Expectations. I had raised my hand to answer a question about social commentary in the work, but teacher seemed uninterested in my response. After a few more attempts like the one above (all in front of my peers, of course), I finally recognized the issue. I had been inserting the filler word, "like" into each of my statements. This particular teacher had a zero-tolerance policy for many things, and using the word "like" as thinking time was one of them.

Four years later, my AP Psychology teacher also had a "banned words" list. At the top of hers were the words "retarded" and "gay" to mean anything other than "mentally challenged" or "homosexual" respectively.

What my peers and I found to be especially difficult with these rules was that the misused words had become habits so deeply entrenched in our speech that we didn't even realize our utterances of them. Our teachers, so primed for them, were able to identify and reprimand us every time we slipped. So for at least 45 minutes everyday, we were able to change our unsophisticated and disrespectful speech patterns. Fast forward to today, I'm back to the "likes," (I rarely say "retarded" or "gay," but I have a degree in Psychology, so perhaps I'm an outlier) mostly when I'm talking a mile a minute (which is most of the time). It's hard to make longstanding change, even when it is the right change to make.

About a year ago, someone who knew me relatively well told me that I was too loud. "You get really animated when you tell stories, which feels inappropriate in public places." I remember sitting there silently as the words traveled through my auditory canals to my brain where I processed the information. I didn't know what to do with the statement, mostly because my energy and animation is something that I am generally proud of, something that I consider to be uniquely me. Because I respected my friend and was sensitive to his discomfort, I took his statement as an edict for myself. At least around him, I decided to censor my energy, my quips, the intonations in my voice. This quickly became exhausting for me. Not surprisingly, this change made me feel awkward and insecure; I was trying to be someone that I simply am not. And so finally, while I respected my friend for having shared his gripes, I just stopped spending as much time with him. The outcome that was better for both of us given his preference and my nature.

While my teachers desired only to make me and my peers better citizens of the world, this particular friend was motivated by his own preferences and what made him socially comfortable.

At every phase of our lives, we are driven by a deep need for social acceptance, making it tempting to alter our behaviors and sometimes even our beliefs. What is most important and equally difficult, however, is to identify the intention of the social pressure -- is it to make you a better person or to serve someone else? Evaluate criticism and new ideas to decide whether you are open to them, but maintain a sense of being true to yourself.

When I first arrived on my college campus as as bright-eyed and bushy-tailed freshman, I felt extremely uncomfortable by the (underage) drinking component. I had grown up in my own bubble, and had no real interest in breaking the rules. For the first couple months, I spent my Friday and Saturday nights in my dorm room under the premise of fatigue or insurmountable schoolwork. In reality, I didn't feel that the drinking culture was for me. It wasn't something I was willing to change, and at the same time, I was too embarrassed to admit it. Finally, I realized that I could not change my party-goer friends (and there was nothing wrong with that; they just weren't ideal company on Friday and Saturday nights.) Slowly but surely, I started to meet people who also didn't drink at the time. We became good friends, and I surrounded myself with them more often. They helped me to feel comfortable and confident with my choices. (Fun, maybe irrelevant, fact: I am still good friends with all of them; we all drink, at least socially, now.) Sometimes, it's about changing your surroundings, not yourself.

Recently, I've been spending quite a bit of time thinking about the people and personalities that motivate, encourage, and inspire me. And on the flip side, the ones that don't. I highly recommend the exercise once in a while, especially because both you and the people around you are constantly changing. At some point in this thought-exploration, I was struck by the reminder that I can't change people and they can't change me. Though it was at first a bit disappointing, I've decided that it's not such a bad thing. It makes it easier for us to realize our place -- where we belong and where we are appreciated and more importantly, where and with whom we want to spend each phase of our lives. One way or another, we will all eventually learn that going against what's true in our hearts or spending energy trying in vain to change someone else is like, retarded simply the wrong way to live.