Inherited Meaning
Beginnings are special moments in any situation, because everything can change then. After things have been established for a while, nothing will change until the situation materially fades away. Some examples:
Changing jobs lets you cash in all of the social skills you learned, establish a new work identity, and get significantly higher compensation. It doesn’t matter whether you were forced out or chose to leave. If you stayed, you’d get a minimal annual raise, and everyone would see you as ‘that person who’s stuck in that role’, your reputation sticking to you like glue.
Changing relationships lets you restart things fresh, establish new boundaries you either didn’t know or forgot to establish, to set up relationship dynamics in a way that satisfies you. It doesn’t matter whether you were the one doing the breaking up, or were broken up with. If you stayed, the potentially random dice roll of events may be your fate forever, consigning you to the level of learning/skill you have outgrown for years.
People in general cling too hard to situations that are really no longer serving them, justifying their fears of conflict, embarassment, uncertainty, and other unpleasant emotions by maintaining the status quo. They delude themselves, telling themselves “things will change,” even though there are usually signs things never will. The attitude to intentionally initiate the change or conflict on their own terms, brace for the suffering that comes, and summon the conviction to fight through to the end would serve them much better.
But there is one place in life where this attitude cannot work, and it really is best to make the most of the situation—- your own psychology.
When you are a kid just growing up, several very important dice are thrown in your life, and to an extent, they write a part of your fate for the rest of your life. They make up your character, your emotional disposition, your self-image, and more. They directly influence how you interact with the world, how you show up in various social situations, how you dream, how you cope with suffering. The combination of psychological forces that press in upon you as a child becomes your Inherited Meaning, a unique blend of your personal emotional and mental traits.
Because of how impressionable you were as a kid, the influence of Inherited Meaning in your life is particularly profound. It generally cannot be overridden or changed in a long-term or permanent sense. It can certainly be disguised, masked, repressed, etc., but this is a stressful, exhausting, and generally unsatisfying path to stay on for too long. Forced to, or choosing to repeatedly go against this current of Inherited Meaning means to swim upstream, either suffering as you do so, or failing to fight the current, and being pushed downstream anyway.
Because Inherited Meaning is a beginning that you cannot restart, it is best to use this constant force in your life to your advantage, and not waste time and energy fighting against it. Think of Inherited Meaning as a psychological current that will repeated push you to follow certain paths, react in certain ways, and feel certain emotions time and time again. To the extent you can, this is one thing about yourself you should not just accept, but accept wholeheartedly.
What is the exact character of your Inherited Meaning, to the extent you can clearly define it?
What direction is your Inherited Meaning constantly pushing you?
What positions or stations in life would be well suited for someone of your nature?