I read again this morning an assertion (this one by a filmmaker) that people don’t change. He uses the parable about the scorpion and the lion as “proof”. The parable goes as follows: A scorpion asks a lion to carry him across a river on his back and the lion declines, concerned he’ll be stung. The scorpion promises this won’t happen, for then they’d both die. When the lion begins to cross, the scorpion stings him anyway, sealing both their fates. When the lion asks why, the scorpion says it’s simply his nature.
Human beings are not scorpions or lions, nor are scorpions or lions human beings (anthropomorphized as they may be for the sake of a parable). Human beings are complex animals. Yes, we have primal instincts that drive us, but we also have reason, as well as complex personalities. Most of the bad of us have some good in us, and most of the good of us have some bad in us. Yes we have personalities that determine who we are and how we behave, but those personalities are complex, and we have free will to shape our behavior.
I fully believe that in the richness and complexity of any individual, a shift can be made. If someone is essentially bad (moody, tempermental, self-centered, arrogant) with the good (caring, empathetic, generosity) present but taking a back seat, I believe they can use their ability to reason and free will to change, to amplify the good and retire the bad. And really, if someone decides to embrace their better self and cast aside their less-savory self, is that really a change? Or is it just another possibility, just another of the many choices to be made in a lifetime, for anyone willing to embrace it?
Here’s a brief article that asserts personality change is possible: http://www.livescience.com/9507-study-personality-change.html
And another from Psychology Today: http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/brainstorm/second-acts
ottomyhead 