I was “just like my mom” at your age, and in many ways I still am. By weird coincidence, my mom and I both switched careers and ended up in the same exact field. We never really discussed it because at the time, I lived across the country and didn’t talk to my parents much. But we both decided around the same time to go into working for public libraries.
We have a lot of the same personality traits, and people think we are a lot alike, but there are some major differences that satisfy me to say that we are not the same. We have opposite opinions in politics and religion. We have different worldviews.
I think the major differences come because she never traveled growing up and had me at 19. I traveled around the world in my 20s and didn’t have kids until I was almost 40. I think having different experiences will give you a different perspective that is stronger than genetic tendencies. I think if you make an effort to experience things that your mom didn’t experience, you’ll develop in a different way. You don’t need to travel around India—maybe just do some volunteer work or join a club that has people different than the ones you are most comfortable with.
Or heck – just read tons and tons of books. They are a very cheap way to open up your imagination and can give you access to new ideas and ways of thinking. Don’t force acting different on yourself. That will be artificial. But if you keep exposing yourself to different kinds of people and different thoughts and ideas, you will naturally start to have more options for opinions that are going to be different from other people’s. Even if it’s just an obsession with Tom Waits or a craving for Thai food—it’s just that little something extra.