Who are you? Who am I?

Who are you? Or turned inward, who am I? Identity is a complicated question and I find it very challenging to answer.

• Part of the challenge is because who I am is in relation to others (I am a father, a brother, a spouse).

• Part of the challenge is because identity is a multi-faceted thing (I am a teacher, a learner, a thinker, a golfer).

• Part of the challenge is because identity is contextual (when I am at the restaurant, I am a server, when I am at the university, I am a professor).

• Part of the challenge is because who I am is time-bound (who I was yesterday may not be who I am today and who I am tomorrow is still undecided).

• Part of the challenge is because who we are is influenced by social context (who do I think I am supposed to be with certain social groups, who do my parents want me to be, who do my friends think I should be).

• And part of the challenge is how all these parts interact with my own, very personal vision of who I am or should be.

The reality is that identity is the interaction of all these parts, and probably some I haven’t considered.

 From what I have read and researched, the key to satisfaction may lie with finding the path the best integrates all these parts in a way that aligns with your own personal vision.

As we grow up, most of the people around us speak into existence their view of who we should be. They do it with the best of intentions. They want to help us find our way. I am sure that I did it with my own children and students that I have interacted with over the years. The challenge is that until we are 25, so much of who we are is quite malleable and those suggestions can be cemented before we have time to truly decide if it’s what is truly in line with who we are.

As I moved through high school, many of the people around me told me I would be a good teacher. And they were right, I have certainly made a long career of it. The trouble is, much like a crime investigation, once you have a prime suspect, you can overlook very plausible other subjects, because you develop a bit of tunnel vision. You want to be right.

And then time intervenes.

I went to school to become a teacher, and despite some internal thoughts that it might not be the right path, I didn’t want to waste the time I had already spent in college, so I finished the degree.

And logic intervenes.

I finished the degree and didn’t want to waste the degree, so I got a job teaching. And I wanted to be good at my job, so I worked hard to be the most effective teacher I could be.

I got married and I wanted to be the best husband I could be, so I stayed in the teaching career to help provide for my family. And I had children, and I wanted to provide as stable a home life as I could, so I stayed in my teaching career.

I want to state unequivocally that I don’t regret any of these choices. They were the choices I wanted to make, and I would make almost all of them again for I love and adore my wife and children and thank God every day that I get to wake up to their presence in my life.

However, instead of going to college to pursue the degree that I thought I should do because most of the adults in my life thought I should do it, maybe I should have listened to the small voices in my head tugging in other directions. Maybe I should have taken the time to figure that out. But I didn’t.

So here I am today. I am taking that time now. And it is frustrating. I am pulled by three decades of already made decisions and now I am pulled to figure out if this is truly the path I am meant to be on.

Perhaps, it was the right path all along. Maybe, at 18 I wasn’t ready to have this conversation and I needed to experience everything I did so that I could be prepared to have this conversation now. After all, you could argue that it was always supposed to be this way, because this is how it happened. This is my story.

Regardless, I do know this much. I am no longer going to ignore the nudges and tugging. I am going to lean into these “what ifs” and see if they yield new paths for the question, who am I.

My advice to you is:

• Go down the roads less traveled.

• Give attention to the little voices that say “What if?”

• Take a moment to lean into the possibilities of who you could be, even if at the end you decide to continue being who you already are.

• Try every day to live so that what you are doing is aligned with who you are.

Be well!