the pieces of this damn puzzle won’t fit together

...Every time you think you’ve got it figured out, a new piece arrives. With every new piece, you are forced take apart a world you thought you had just figured out.

Some of the greatest moments of my life have been lived during this process of deconstructing and reconstructing worlds. The energy it requires is immense, however, the reward—paid in the currency of self-knowledge—is even bigger. And that’s the irony too—you spend all this time and energy trying to figure out another culture, and you wind up learning so much more about yourself in the process.