What defines you? Advice for the modern-day workaholic
Living is a full-time occupation, and it pays to live it well
OK listen, when I’m all stuffed up, head aching with a cold the night before I have to start up volunteer work for the rest of the week, I’m hit by exhaustion and get philosophical. Tonight, I’m delving into an issue I know I struggle with, and I’m sure I’m not alone in that.
This would be the great impediment that is: What defines me.
Until lately, my resume has. It is extensive only because of how I have reacted to having cancer, which has led me to the philanthropy work I have tirelessly dedicated myself to over the last six years. Foundations, ambassadorships, and committees, oh my; I am coming to terms with the fact that this is only allowed to take up what defines me as a professional worker, not a human being, breathing air, just trying to make the most of life like most other people.
It’s been very difficult for me to accept that I am more than my work, but I am. What I’ve been experiencing can quite simply be summed up by the recent meme that quotes “you’re killing yourself for a job that would replace you in a week if you dropped dead; take care of yourself.”
No matter how hard you may try to make excuses about this: You can’t live to work. I’ll be honest, this is mostly me typing away to myself, but I want to shed light for those workaholics that are struggling with deciphering their personal and professional identity.
Revisit the you that you are when no one else is around, or the you that you believe you are in your head; the you that knows all those little, but significant things, about how you like to live and think. Practise the things you put on the backburner in favour of taking work home when it really isn’t necessary.
But please don’t misunderstad this message: I’m not recommending that you don’t work hard. Work hard, hustle, give it your all, but only until you can stop and look back on the day in pride that you feel as though you did enough, and gave enough. Everybody has a different idea of what “enough” is, so it’s important here, to focus in on your own ideology of it. Just as everyone has different perceptions of what “good” and “bad” and everything in between is, you can’t live your live to please others.
At this point, in my own mind, I’m revisiting what I believe defines me. Hobbies, people, thoughts I have, actions I commit; I hold myself accountable to my mood and my path of life by my work ethic as a person.
Being human is a job all on its own, and I believe this is often so easily overlooked. Living is a full-time occupation, and it pays to live it well.
The purpose of living your life well, I think, can be summed up by some very insightful writing advice I once read a few years back. It went something like “if a sentence you write isn’t propelling the story forward, it’s a useless sentence. Don’t be afraid to get rid of it.”
This isn’t too say you should regret any “sentences” you’ve made, but rather to just be aware that your time is indeed a currency, and you need to spend it the way you might on a good book. In other words, your life is a novel that you get to create and make your own, but you get only one, so make sure you’re writing and living it for the right dreams you want to achieve, and have in your storybook.
It’s been very difficult for me to accept that I am more than my work, but I am.