![[Stories reveal how people change - Porco Rosso (1992), directed by Hayao Miyazaki, Studio Ghibli.jpg]] <p class="caption"><em>Porco Rosso</em> (1992), directed by Hayao Miyazaki, Studio Ghibli</p> Change is one of the great mysteries of life. One day things are one way, and the next they’re fundamentally different. How can this happen? People change, constantly, but we rarely glimpse the impacts and revelations that drive this change. A caterpillar reconceives itself under the sheath of a chrysalis. A snake hides away to shed its skin. Often it’s impossible to tell that change is occurring until after the fact, even with ourselves. We emerge as if from a fog and discover that somehow, we are not the same. An image materializes — an experience, a conversation from weeks, months ago, that set us on this path. But we have already arrived at this new self. We never got to say goodbye to the person we thought we were while that person was still here. Our friends notice something unfamiliar in us. They may be delighted — change is often wonderful — but a certain discomfort tends to arise from not knowing *how* this change has occurred. Stories are vital because they reveal how people change. Like alchemical handbooks, they chart the stages through which a character’s constitution is dissolved, distilled, and reformed into a new elixir. And in doing so, they transform discomfort into clarity. > Nothing retains its own form; but Nature, the greater renewer, ever makes up forms from forms. — [Ovid](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metamorphoses) I didn’t understand at first why the fighter pilot lead of Miyazaki’s *Porco Rosso* has turned into a pig. It seems arbitrary and absurd — until he talks about his past and brings us to this moment of change. The last man standing after fleeing from a dogfight, he’s become so plagued by survivor’s guilt that it has transformed him. He no longer thinks of himself as a good person. Now, he moves through the world solitary and withdrawn. He rejects the compassion of the love of his life. He sees himself as no better than a pig, and so he has become one. Which begs the great thematic question of *Porco Rosso*: when shame has made you see yourself as no more than an animal, how do you find your way to being human again? Porco ultimately does this not by returning to who he once was but by growing into [[Use what you have|yet another version of himself]] — someone who still survived but is no longer dominated by survivor’s guilt. Tracking the stages of his internal alchemy to the end of the film, we reveal the inner workings of this change. --- Believing himself a bad person unworthy of connection, Porco holds every relationship in his life at arm’s length. Until he’s forced to spend months getting to know a young engineer when she’s his only option to repair his trashed plane. He’s already changing — opening up more. She directly challenges his survivor’s guilt by telling him he’s a good person, not a pig. She could be getting through to him. But when he must accept a duel to protect her future and the safety of those closest to him, whether or not he’s really changed is put to the test. Tests are arenas in which we demonstrate that we truly are the person we’re becoming, and they can also be the means for us to [[Completion is a sacred spot|become that person]]. Internal change is meaningless if not proven externally. We’ve followed the stages of this character arc. Now we have to see what our character can do that they weren’t able to, before. This duel is Porco’s chance to prove he’s changed, the film’s climactic battle. We’ve already seen him contradict his survivor’s guilt by standing up for others and staying in a fight. But for him to have truly changed, this time he must act on the belief that *he is good*. He never betrays this goodness through the duel, refusing to fire on his opponent when given the chance. But he’s beaten to a pulp and brought to the edge of death. In this vital moment, the love of his life urges, “Get up! I don’t want to see you breaking any more hearts, you hear me?” Translation: “You’re only a bad person if you give up.” The bad person he thought he was would have stayed down — “all I’m good for is breaking hearts.” But he finds the strength to rise to his feet because he doesn’t believe this anymore; he now believes he’s good. And so Porco passes the test. He wins the duel. Afterward, he doesn’t hesitate to set off to save his friends from approaching enemies. He’s *being* the good person he hasn’t thought he was since the dogfight. And in this moment, he becomes human again. He’s changed. Change really is a series of alchemical reactions, events that reconfigure our neurons in unexpected ways. When a story shows us the logic behind these reconfigurations — and the patterns that free us from them — it’s like seeing beyond time. The mystery of how we change is laid bare, and tangible. We grasp a little more how experiences have impacted us. We know a little more how to become who we want to be. As *Porco* goes to show, connecting with someone who sees that person in us is a great place to start. *written listening to [“For every man saved a victim will be found” by Tarun Balani](https://open.spotify.com/track/23GeR1VGo3QHeS5UWQ5riO)*