Rethinking What Defines YOU?
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When you first meet someone, the typical topics covered in the first few minutes include your name, where you’re from, and what you do. The conversation might go on from there, but generally speaking, in a matter of these three standard questions, a person gains enough information to feel that they “know” you.
Are we really ok with being defined by a couple of questions that explain what we do, but not really who we are?
Here is a list of things that are used to identify who we are as we explain or define ourselves to other people:
- Our occupation
- Our family relationships
- Our friends
- Our habits/hobbies/vices
- Our political views
- Our views on social issues
- Our race
- Our marital status
- Our age
- Our religion
- Our abilities/disabilities
- Our geographical location
- Our intellect and education
- Our gender
- Our sexuality
- Our physical appearance
- Our health
- Our emotions
- Our potential
- Our economic status
We use the above categories to define our worth so that we can communicate it to those around us. But do the sum of these things make up the total of who we are? Can our identity really be dumbed down to a list of hobbies, attributes, characteristics and accomplishments?
Examine the questions and answers that come to mind when you think of trying to communicate your identity. Who do you say that you are? Who do you think that you are? Who does the world perceive you to be?
Perhaps the challenge is not so much in answering a standard set of questions that spits out a supposed mold of who we are. Perhaps the real goal is to continually redefine ourselves as we grow, as we mature both personally and professionally, and as we allow ourselves the freedom to not be confined to an identity based on a checklist of standard questions that show what we do.
And maybe then, we’ll be able to explain to people who we really are.
