Everything I’m reflecting on here is based on my own lived experience, not on any kind of rigorous social science study.

Lately, I’ve been thinking about whether, in my early adulthood—even when I saw myself as very free-thinking—I was mostly operating within mental frameworks I’d absorbed without really noticing. Family, friends, mentors, role models: those influences shaped how I saw the world far more than I probably wanted to admit in my early 20s. What’s “free” in “free-thinking” often isn’t freedom from a worldview, but freedom to think within one.

And even when change does happen, escaping a worldview usually unfolds slowly, over years.

In my early 20s, I noticed I had a lot of openness to experimenting with identity—but it often looked less like true self-authorship and more like trying things on. I experimented with beliefs, identities, and lifestyles, but much of it felt like sampling what was already out there rather than carving something out through reflection alone.

It wasn’t until my mid-to-late 20s that worldviews started to feel reinforced, chosen, or consciously changed. Not that they suddenly became original—of course they were still influenced by other people and ideas—but the difference was intention. I had more of an answer to why I believed or lived the way I did, instead of just “this sounds interesting” or “let’s see if this fits.” It felt less like trial and error and more like deliberate self-decision.

Looking back, it seems like I developed a kind of base personality—almost like an erasable canvas—by my late teens, shaped by upbringing and an early sense of direction. Then, through my late teens and early-to-mid 20s, parts of that canvas were repeatedly painted over, often in a somewhat contrived way, as part of the exploration that defines that stage of life.

By the late 20s, what emerges can feel like a very different painting from the one you started with as a teenager. For others my age, that painting may or may not be new—or may be new only in certain areas. It depends on how well the inherited canvas aligned with long-term goals and lived experience. But whatever form it takes, the late-20s version tends to feel more natural, stable, and owned—at least based on the rate of change I’ve observed in my own inner world. That transformation has slowed compared to the flux I felt around, say, 25. Some new layers permanently alter the canvas by blending with or replacing what lay underneath; others fall away cleanly, like old embarrassments, leaving the original paint intact.

Someone who grew up in a supportive, emotionally healthy household and followed a life path that continued to work for them might barely notice these phases at all—they were already aligned. Someone who grew up in a less supportive environment, or was pushed down a path that didn’t really fit, might need a much more dramatic reset.

I grew up in a household with a mother who struggled with delusional beliefs and periodic bouts of paranoia. Once an idea took hold, it stayed put, regardless of counterevidence. Facts were optional. She also accepted almost anything my father said without much resistance and had a sharp tongue, which she used efficiently—on her children, on her siblings, and on anyone my father felt threatened by, repelled by, or triggered by.

My father, for his part, was narcissistic and selfish, enjoyed gossip, rarely admitted mistakes, and blamed others whenever things went wrong. He had a bad temper and, when it suited him, behaved manipulatively to get what he wanted. Together, they made a remarkably durable mess.

Curiously, each of them is manageable in isolation. My mother alone tends to be caring, agreeable, humorous, and calm, though emotionally distant, as she has always been. My father alone becomes philosophical, reflective, and even sentimental—a person capable of sounding thoughtful when no one is around to set him off. When they are together, however, something goes wrong. The combination is volatile. It is mildly astonishing that everyone involved survived.

I love my parents, and I take seriously what a son is supposed to do for his parents. Still, I see nothing scandalous in noticing that my perspective and temperament do not line up neatly with theirs.

I understand their worldview and why they are the way they are. There’s no doubt that they were genuinely well-intentioned, despite the duality I observed in them: one public face and another at home. Still, their perspectives lacked breadth and empathy toward other points of view.

It isn’t surprising, then, that the canvas I inherited needed heavy reworking throughout my 20s. For that, I’m grateful—to friends, family friends, mentors, and even figures from the past whose ideas and examples helped reshape how I think.

But to be clear, my mother has always been deeply empathetic toward people in need and toward animals—she even likes talking to animals. She is persistent in her efforts, keeps herself busy, and rarely stays idle or wastes time. She is also sharp at sensing what people feel. (My father, on the other hand, is sometimes childlike in sensing others’ unspoken motives.)

My father, too, has many virtues. Valuing intellectual exploration and striving for ideals beyond basic needs come to mind—whereas my mother is largely indifferent to anything beyond simple living. All of these good virtues have shaped me over the years, and they are the fixed parts of my canvas.

At the same time, I want to be careful. I’m only 29, and I don’t know what the future holds—whether stability lasts indefinitely or whether many more phases of change lie ahead. These observations may hold through the late 20s, but beyond that, I’m intentionally leaving things open, since I don’t yet have lived experience there.

So the conclusion has to be a bit ironic if it’s going to stay honest. I don’t think I can say, “I fully grew into an adult with a fully formed identity in my late 20s,” even though that’s a tempting idea for anyone trying to fit life into neat categories.

More accurately, it seems that at any point in adulthood we’re still working with an evolving personality canvas. When certain parts need to change, we apply new paint—often awkwardly at first, without fully blending it into what’s already there. Over time, some of those layers integrate naturally, while others peel away. That process may continue throughout life. Maybe that’s how changes in behavior, thinking, and emotional patterns happen: intentional and clumsy at first, then fluent and natural.

And maybe the late 20s are simply the first time we clearly notice all of this—and catch our first real glimpse of a pattern that may stretch forward unpredictably, repeat in familiar arcs, or never appear again in quite the same way.