Depth and Paper Swans

It has recently occurred to me that we exist outside of our own understanding of ourselves. I am not me in all my depth to my neighbor, or to the person in the striped backpack sitting beside me in class. I am a stranger, with a strange story. Perhaps no story at all.

Far too often, this makes us view people as two-dimensional. Where is their depth?

Their depth is in a complex series of events

and people

and feelings

and desires

and dreams.

All those come together to shape a human, just like a series of many folds creates a paper swan. All people have this depth, just as I have this depth, but why don't I see it? Why don't we see it?

We don't see it because it is easier to write them a clean cut, understandable story, resulting in explainable actions. We set that story in their lap like a perfectly packaged present, never asking whether they wanted anything at all.

"Here, let me dictate who you are and why you are that way, even if I don't know you at all."

But what tends to happen as we get to know people is that they unfold. You start to see all the bends and the creases—the memories and the emotions—that created what they are. And you can't put it in a box, and you can't pretend it's two-dimensional.

That's what makes everyone an individual.

Their depth.

And that depth is why people are worth unfolding. All people. Let them tell their stories and have messy, broken moments that don't make sense.

Let them have depth.