It’s an early snowy morning, and as I’m preparing to share my thoughts here, I start painting my nails. They keep chipping so I’ve been researching best techniques to prevent that. It’s not ideal timing, typing with wet nails and needing to make another cup of coffee. But I love how pretty they look so I am making do. The funny thing is that up until a few months ago, I never painted my fingers, just my toes. Then I heard a conversation on a podcast about how our identity, that we have created for ourselves, and that the world has helped informed, is just that, a creation. And that it can be altered at anytime. They used the example of red nail polish. Maybe you think you’re not the girl that wears red nail polish, but you might be. Just try it. That can actually help rewire a neural pathway. It seems like a trite example but like with anything, it carries layers deeper. That conversation stuck in my head, and I painted my fingernails soon after. It did feel different and not “like me.”

A month or so later, I copied a girlfriend and got those newishly popular stick on nails. Her hands looked incredible and she had shared how easy it was. You have to really file your nails down to create the ideal surface. I applied the nails the night before a trip to go meet someone I was dating. I woke up the next morning to a couple nails in my hair, a couple in the bed and some still attached. Gross. I had to pick the rest off, and now my hands, pre-date trip, looked awful. A couple months after that, a girlfriend texted that she was getting a manicure and pedicure in my neighborhood, and invited me to meet her. As a lover of spontaneous plans, I had her book me a parallel appointment. As I’m standing in the salon at the large wall of nail polishes, with that over-analysis paralysis, I ultimately choose one in the red wine family. Maybe I am that girl. I’ll give it another shot.

Note to self: remember that mantra on your post it note: Fully Committed, Totally Unattached.

I have since discovered that I love how I feel with my nails looking pretty. What this, again seemingly superficial experience, has really affirmed is that we can always change. And evolve. And switch. And it’s all a season of life. And the restrictions and limitations are self imposed. In college, I was a vegan before it was really mainstream. Studying Nutritional Science, I learned too much about meat, processing, etc and one day gave up everything that had anything to do with animals. This lasted a year or two and then one summer, I studied in Europe. We were in Austria, and everyone was eating bratwurst. I remember thinking how good it looked, but that I couldn’t have it. But I really wished I could. Then it dawned on me that I was the only one telling myself that. I ate one delicious bratwurst and then more meat as the travel continued. We put so many limitations and restrictions on ourselves, in the search of shaping an identity. But why? And relaxing those restrictions sure made life a lot easier and more enjoyable that summer.

It’s not that it’s bad to have opinions. Everything has an associated cost. It’s just that it’s okay to change. If YOU want to. There is something punishing about restrictions and that is what I am trying to unpack. Don’t we want to live a life of discovery and evolution? Not being the same version, but always open to upleveling?

There was a time, high-school, college, my 20s, where I had fake nails. Standing appointments at the nail salon. So what changed? Maybe it started to feel high-maintenance, and I attached significance to that. Maybe ease overcame this and it was more important to not need to do this. Maybe it was financial prioritization. I honestly don’t remember. There is such beauty in not knowing something. And that is very different from not having an opinion. If you ask me if I like to eat sea urchin, I can adamantly say no, as I have had it and found it to be disgusting. Same with fish soup. If you ask if I like scuba diving, I don’t know. I’ve never done it. I don’t crave it, but I don’t know if I should.

This version of me likes to be able to make my nails pretty myself. But I am also totally game if a nail salon appointment comes into my life. And this version of me is vegan 85% of the time, except when I eat a burger or ice cream. Or pizza. So maybe like 80% of the time. Does that count? I guess it depends on who is counting. And my opinion is the one that matters for me. XO