Why Did I Change My Name?

If you knew me from a while before, you would know me under a different name (Johannes Larsson). Starting from July 2024, I changed my name.

Because everyone has been asking me about it, I decided to write this post and explain my reasoning. Not because I feel I owe anyone an explanation, but because I want to inspire you to think about it for yourself.

No, I haven’t become a complete hippie (not more than I was already anyway), and no, I didn’t move to India to become a yoga teacher or anything like that.

Still the same old me. Just with a new name.

And it’s actually a decision that I’ve pondered for more than a year.

Let me share why I decided to do this big change.

The Main Reason For My Name Change

First of all, there is not one reason, but multiple, which I will share later in this post.

However, there is one main premiss from where the decision was made. And it’s basically this..

We have choice in life.

Such as our political party, our religious, our occupation, our friends, our food, our location and so on. We can change them at any time.

Then there’s also things we don’t have choice over. Our parents, genetic predispositions, the weather, where we were born and so on. We can’t do anything about that.

Then we have our name.

Yes, our name was not our choice, initially. But we have choice over it. We can change it.

So why don’t we?

I’m not saying everyone should. But if you don’t like your name, for whatever reason, (which isn’t that surprising, given that your parents probably had a different idea of what a good name is..), why should you be doomed to carry that name for all eternity?

Just as we can change our religion or the place we want to live, to inspire us to live better – we should be able to change our name too, if that’s something that inspires us.

It may seem weird at first, but that’s only because we’re operating from a set of man made constructs that were invented by some random dude long time ago. Doesn’t mean it’s right, or the only way to live.

So if there is something we desire to do, we can and should do it. There’s really no reason to limit yourself. The only law I acknowledge is the law of nature.

After thinking about this for more than a year, the question became more tilted towards.. why NOT change my name?

Why not create a name that you actually like hearing, inspires you, and has a deeper meaning for you? Whether it be first name or last name (or both, as in my case).

So with all that philosophy talk out of the way, let me share the more practical reasons.

1. The Idea of Having A Unique Name

I always liked the idea about having a name that is unique to me. None else in the world would be named that, at least as far as the internet is concerned.

Not only because I the idea itself speaks to me, but because it’s also quite functional to have a unique name.

There’s already a bunch of famous people named after my original name. So when people would Google me, they would find a list of different people.

Not a major concern, and sure, I dominated the search engine results pretty well, but still..

Should be straight forward to find me now.

2. A Name With A Deeper Meaning

To be honest, John doesn’t really mean anything special. It’s just the English version of Johannes, which is easier to pronounce. And some people were already calling me John, due to the difficulty of pronouncing my original name.

My new last name, Talasi, is based on something that has a deeper meaning for me.

It comes from the word Thalassa, which means “ocean” in Greek.

Since birth, I’ve been addicted to the ocean. As a kid, I could swim for hours, and stay in the sea until my skin was all wrinkly. As an adult, nothing has changed.

I spent countless hours chasing waves every week.

I can’t say why, but I always found the ocean to be very exciting for me. A place of grounding and reseting.

Ocean also means freedom. Which is my main value in life.

So I decided to abuse the original word a tad bit, and make up my own version, which is why I came up with Talasi.

3. Create Myself A New Family Name

Sounds strange perhaps, but the idea of creating a new family name thrills me.

My previous surname means squat. The name Larsson comes from Lars Son, which is an old tradition in Scandinavian countries. But my father is not named Lars. This has just become the most common surname in Sweden because there was once a dad named Lars who made some kids (what a great guy).

To someone who’s all about a deeper meaning (and slight dose of OCD), this is too random.

If things were different, and we had a family name we took pride in, I’d think twice before changing it. But in this case, it means absolutely nothing. Most of my family doesn’t even have the same last name.

So the idea of disrupting the pattern of transferring a random meaningless name and instead create my own unique name (that also has a deeper meaning) for my myself and future family, excites me to the tee.

4. Get Better Branding Internationally

Having a Swedish name comes with a bit of difficult. Various nationalities struggle to pronounce my name, so everyone would call me different things. And some of those things, were just so bad.

I’ve heard everything from “Johannessen” to “Muhammas”.

Because I moved from Sweden when I was 19, I have no ties with the country at all. So I’m not looking to build a brand for Swedish audience, but rather an international audience – so I wanted a name that works better in that regard.

After all, we wouldn’t use a Swedish name if the plan was to setup a company targeting the international market. A personal brand is no different than a company.

5. Start Fresh With A New Personal Brand

At the very same time that I changed my name, I also wanted to change a few other major things about my brand.

So a fresh start felt like a good idea. Just forget the old, and focus on the new.

There’s a power in having a clean slate that I can’t describe in words. It’s just that I wanted to build from scratch. Rethink who I am, what I’m doing here, how I can serve people better.

And in the process of creating new accounts, it was a big bonus get rid of some old people, old feed, old old content and so on.

I don’t necessarily think that everyone gets to a place where a fresh start is needed. Maybe you just need a small change. But if you do feel like a fresh start, then don’t be afraid to get a sledge hammer and take down your old house, so that you can build the castle you always wanted.

6. Subconsciously Rewiring Myself

I don’t think there’s any other word or phrase that you see or hear as often as your name. You might hear and see it a million times throughout your life.

Think about it. Everywhere you go and whatever you do, you will encounter your name. You login to your computer, you see your profile on social media, your name on Whatsapp, people call you by your name, your bank account. Whatever.

Changing your name to something new is a way to trigger yourself subconsciously and consciously. Depending on your association with then name, you will trigger different emotions and thoughts.

So we would of course choose name that gives some kind of positive reinforcement. Maybe reminds you of being the best version of yourself, or just sounds sweeter to your ears, for whatever reason.

Therefore, you can get a vastly different outcome by changing the repeating variables in your life to something that makes you feel good.

Small Bonus: Getting Social Media Handles

Sounds silly, but a small bonus was to get my clean social media handles. It just doesn’t look good to be “johanneslarsson5403”, or to be forced to made up an alias I don’t really want, and not even available across all platforms.

This will simplify things and people can find my personal brand easily across all social media platforms.

Now I’m just John Talasi everywhere. Because that’s my name and none else’s.

So that’s it. My thoughts are shared. Hope I didn’t stir up too much confusion about your own name LOL.

Over and out,
John