"Although the search for change can be stimulating, it also can be limiting. Over time this pattern can create a feeling of being lost in a maze of constant change, uncertain identity, elusive community and the inability to find a place to stand. If you step back and look at the pattern over a long period of time, you see a circle of repetition: seek change, celebrate the new, new becomes old, seek change, celebrate the new, the new becomes old, seek change. Often the pattern of embracing differences in youth gives way to a search for solide identity, a return to one's roots, and a redefinition of values. The desire to try everything shifts to a desire to know who you are. Living for years in this pattern can turn you into a neotraditional, a person who goes back in time to a more reliable way of life, someone who returns to a religion abandoned in youth, who takes lessons in a language spoken in a parent's native community, and who moves family relics from the basement to the mantel. (...) Embracing differences is an important and powerful pattern of communication. At the same time, however, embracing differenc can lead to confusion, loss of identity, erosion of values and standards, and, in a paradoxical way, the demise of community. Embracing differences can cause the loss of important distinctions that give meaning to our lives."

/Littlejohn - Domenici: Communication, Conflict, and the Management of Differences/