It is very difficult
for me to think that things or beings do not change over their life. I still
can not find a concrete example of something that never changes. Besides, if something does not change implies
that it is eternal. So far, the only things that I know as ‘eternal’, according
to some people, are soul, God or other metaphysical things from which, I think,
we do not have existing evidence to prove their existence.
Now, coming back to
my main question, do we consider people as beings that never change, as eternal
beings having always the same personality (to use the word identity will bring
us into another topic ) and doing the same actions or, at least, following the
same patron on their behaviour? If we think that things change over their life, we will be
contradicting our selves by expecting our friends to behave always in a certain
manner depending on the situation.
Many times, we tend to anticipate how our
friends would react to something because we think we know them enough. However,
at least I am not sure how well I can know some one when I even know that I am
in a constant change.
Should we claim that
we do not expect someone to do something when it depends on his/her voluntary
action? I think we should not. It seems something insignificant but we might
ignore the fact that we live in a constant process by believing that we could
make that claim. For example, how many
times do we tell to someone how disappointed we are with that person because
s/he done something that we did not expect without taking into consideration
his/her own ‘desires’ or tendency to change.
If we think we have
the right to claim when we do no expect one of our friends to do something, we
could imply that there is a promise between us. And, if that is the case, it
could also imply that our friendship is a kind of economical relationship where
each of us gets a benefit from it.
To tell our friends
what we are expecting from them it could even be a way to control them. Perhaps
yes, perhaps no, perhaps sometimes. Kant said that people never think that they
are going to die since they take it for grounded.
May be we
never think that we are always changing; therefore, we forget that the rest of people also changes.