The me that I have been

There's a podcast I listen to, of the "2 dudes talking" variety (according to the podcasters). One of them wrote this blog post about how he's died many deaths, meaning as he's grown and had new experiences and changed and he's basically no longer the same person as he was a year or two years or three years ago or whatever. And in that sense, he's died many times. At least, that's what I think the gist of it is.

It's an interesting way of thinking about things, and not an entirely inaccurate one. At the basic level I tend to agree. But I'm getting ready to move and in saying farewells, I'm a little worried. There are people near and dear to me and we keep up those relationships through consistent contact. So what happens when I go away, when we don't interact with each other the same way? I know moving on to a new job is going to change me--I'll 'die' in the way this guy is talking about. But I want the new me to have those same relationships. I want to be the same kind of person they would want to be friends with. And I want to be the same kind of person who values them. How do you balance that, changing and adapting to new things in new places while still being the person you are and were?

I've done this before, and haven't ever really thought about it. I know that some people stick in life, and some people properly 'fade' out and that's okay. But I don't know if I've ever wanted to have people stick like I do right now. And there are qualities I've discovered about myself that I want to stick, too, and this move--I worry that it will kill off those qualities, qualities that I want to keep. And being so aware of it will make losing them a slow and painful death, if that happens.

I know I shouldn't worry about it, but everything--EVERYTHING--has been so uncertain and so off that I do worry about it. It's what we do when life is crazy. We hold on to what we care about.