Time to Let Go

I had an interesting thing happen to me last week. One of the employees at my factory, one I hardly know, walked up to me, and we had the following exchange:

"Hey Jay. I have something I've been wanting to tell you."

"Okay. What's up?"

"I've been walking around this place for the last year and a half thinking you're an a$$hole. It turns out you're not, so I'm sorry about that."

"Just to be clear: You're apologizing for secretly hating me for the last year and a half?"

"Yeah. That's right. We had that misunderstanding right when you started. It turns out it wasn't you I should have been mad at. So (he sticks out his hand) will you forgive me?"

I laughed, shook his hand and said, "Sure. Thanks for letting me know."

I'm not going to go into detail about what caused his misdirected hatred (shocking I know--a lack of detail from me), but this conversation, and the subsequent relief this employee felt after apologizing, got me thinking: What old thoughts about people should I let go of?

Even though most of the people I know are in their late twenties or early thirties, I have opinions about people I knew in high school and college based on who those people were ten to fifteen years ago. This isn't right. If the people who knew me in high school and college assumed I was the same, assumed I hadn't evolved, what would they think about me? When I came up in casual conversation would they say, "I bet all he does is watch professional wrestling in his basement, drive around a Saturn, and feel unjustifiably superior to everyone because he doesn't drink."

Part of the issue stems from our generation's inability to admit they don't know something. We fear looking or sounding stupid, so we contribute what little we know about a topic into any conversation. Unfortunately I can't say, "Oh I know Ted. He really likes playing Kung-Fu on the NES and playing with Legos," without looking like a fool. Ted was my friend in third grade...damn could he Kung-Fu.

Because people see the occasional (or way too frequent) Facebook, Twitter, or blog update from someone they once knew, they think they've kept in deep touch with that person. I might see a picture of a college friend drinking on Facebook and think, "Good ol' John, he's never changed." But John has changed. He has an MBA. He has a good job. He has a wife and a baby and a house and the list goes on. I know this because I still talk to John.

But I've lost track of many friends, and I should probably let my preconceived notions about those people fade away. If I run into them several years from now, I should learn who they will have become, not think about who they were when we were sixteen.

This week is as good as any for us to let go of what we think we know about people. Who did you once know? Who do you wonder about? Who should you reconnect with? What ideas about people should you let go of?