Why Changing Your Mind Isn’t Easy-And Why That’s Okay

So this week I’m writing a wee blog on and essay - the essay in question is Julian Barnes’s Changing My Mind .

Its a slim, thoughtful collection that asks whether we ever truly change our minds-or if, more often, we simply confirm what we already believe.

As I read it, I kept asking myself: when was the last time you really changed your mind about something important? And what actually made you do it?

The Great man himself :Julian Barnes

Barnes opens with the famous line, “When the facts change, I change my mind,”

Often attributed to Keynes. But he quickly admits that, in practice, facts rarely shift our beliefs. Instead, he finds that facts and events tend to reinforce what he already thinks. That’s honest. How often do you listen to someone with a different view and actually reconsider your own? Or do you, like most of us, just dig in deeper?

The book is short-just five essays, more like diary entries than full chapters. Barnes covers memories, words, politics, books, and time. He’s at his best when he talks about rereading writers he once dismissed, like E.M. Forster or Georges Simenon. With age, he finds new depth in their work, admitting he “hadn’t known enough about life to appreciate him” when he was younger.

That’s a lesson for all of us: sometimes, it’s not the book that changes, but the reader. Have you ever gone back to something you once disliked and found it transformed?

A Diverse Reading List to date in 2025

Barnes’s style is elegant, wry, and full of self-deprecation. He shares quirky details-like voting for six different political parties in his life-yet insists his principles haven’t really shifted. “It’s the political parties which have changed, swerving this way and that, dodging for votes; I, the voter, have remained a man of principle.”

That line made me smile. How many of us blame the world for changing, while insisting we’re the steady ones?

The essays are brief-some readers might find them too slight, wishing for more depth or new material. A few pieces were first aired on BBC Radio 3 in 2016, so they’re not all brand new.

Still, there’s wisdom in the brevity. Barnes suggests that real change comes not from outside facts, but when “areas of fact and feeling hitherto unknown to us have suddenly become clear, that the emotional landscape has altered”.

That rings true for me. Have you ever changed your mind not because of an argument, but because something inside you shifted ?

Have you changed your mind lately?

Barnes doesn’t offer easy answers.

He’s sceptical that rational debate will persuade anyone-least of all himself. Yet he does leave space for rare moments when new knowledge breaks through.

He admits, “Such moments are rare.” That’s honest, if a bit sobering

Is it worth reading?

If you enjoy Barnes’s voice-witty, self-aware, gently melancholic-you’ll find plenty to savour. He doesn’t pretend to have all the answers, but he invites you to reflect on your own certainties.

The book is short, but it lingers in the mind.

Have you changed your mind lately? And if not, what would it take?

Here's to a Bright Future, Rooted in Our Rich Past 🧔🏻

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