Know Your Identity

What we called identity?

• There was a one cricket player played really well. One of the most famous ones in the world. He meets with an accident. He has an injury on his nose because of which he loses his sense of smell. He can’t detect the scent of anything properly and all the newspapers in the world start discussing this accident. But nowhere we get to see that they have met with a tragedy.
• Nowhere we get to see that he has been through such a bad event. Because although an accident has happened, yet not with those things with which his identity is attached. The identity of that cricket player is through their legs, their hands, their eyes and to a huge extent through their brain. Had these things been affected, due to which he felt something like his legs or hands stop functioning, his eyes can’t see or his brain stops functioning, then it is a huge tragedy. That is when he has met with a terrible fate.
• Similarly, all of us are connected with some capability or personality. Our personality, is associated with it. A chef has a strong a strong relationship with taste. An artist has a strong relationship with their hands. A coder or an engineer has a strong relationship with their typing. So many things…if you would just pick any profession or if you try to understand a human being, then you would understand that there is something with which their identity is attached. There is something where they find their existence and what if something happens to this one thing? 
• That always scares us I remember there’s an interview of Bill Gates where he’s asked What are you most scared of in this world? And he replies that if someday I lose my capacity to think then I don’t know what would remain for me in my life! Because for Bill Gates his capacity to think defines his existence, his identity.
• Then the question arises, that one thing that defines our identity, our personality, our life; if that one thing is taken away from us, who would we be? And for this I am reminded of only one thing in the olden times, 200-300 years back, all those people who had shaped our world, who made all the inventions in science, who created history, who devised all the laws, who made huge advancements in their fields of work they all never stuck to just one thing in their lives.
• We have been almost accustomed to it that we think only one thing about ourselves and are in constant fear that if that one thing is taken away from us then we won’t have an existence, we won’t have a personality, we won’t have a life, we won’t have an identity. However, if you go back 200-300 years and ask those people what they had thought of themselves, they probably might’ve responded that even if this one thing is taken away from me, I am having 5 more things because of which I identify myself in the mirror.

Do a Multiple things

• If these 2-3 things are taken away from me, I am having 2-3 things more because of which I see myself in the mirror. No one else defines my identity, I do it for myself. And I am constantly changing my identity, and I have carried forward a number of identities along with myself.
• If you genuinely see someone who is successful today, you’d be able to see that they never do just one thing. They never stick to just one art. It is ironic that they will start such companies or do such acts because of which people working with them tend to believe that they will continue doing the same thing however they never do just one thing ever themselves.
• The example of Bill Gates – at one point of time he used to run Microsoft which is the world’s biggest software company. Today he is working to eradicate malaria and polio from the world, and is trying to build more toilets in the world. Someone who used to write software, what is he doing in malaria and polio? That is supposed to be done by doctors, NGOs and healthcare professionals. And Bill Gates does not have a degree that labels him as a healthcare professional.
• If you see someone like Einstein, or say Newton so he was an astronomer, a writer, a scientist, a historian, a poet, and used to do a lot many other things. If you try to know Leonardo da Vinci who has created the famous painting Mona Lisa so he was a painter, he was a sculptor, he was an astronomer, an artist, a historian, was a writer as well – and a ton more things. Einstein who was a famous scientist used to play violin, and he had a huge interest in history and God.

You only think around your degree and education

• This is the main thing. Our degree, our education stops us.  Our education and training tell us that we should be doing just one thing in life. Consequently, our job and our profession further validate it. That you are an HR Professional then that is what you are doomed to do for your entire life. If you have studied Finance, then that is what you’ll do for the rest of your life. If you’ve done coding, then that’s what you’re going to do for the rest of your life. And if you’re a marketer then you’ll do that for the rest of your life. Our training, our job, our school, our job all these have limited ourselves under just one role, just one thought process.
• Ask yourself this question today, “What all capabilities do you have today?” What are all identities you can create within yourself? Through yourself, what are the different roles you see yourself playing? If you stand in front of a mirror, then whom do you see? Do you see just a marketer, just an HR professional, or are you able to see a lot many different roles?

This is not limited just to our jobs if you genuinely look for your identity in your relationships, in your connections – then it is totally possible that you will look into the mirror and see yourself as a mother, a father, a brother, a sister, a friend, or even as a professional. However, these are not just relationships with the tag they hold, rather they define your identity.

These are those relationships being into which you feel proud. These are those relationships, those identities, those connections, expressing which you feel proud to an extent that you would be ready to write in your resume that “I am a father / brother / son / HR Professional.” And I am proud of all these things because I perform all these roles straight from my heart and filled with pride.

Ask yourself: “Are you limited to just one person for the rest of your life? Or are you ready to live multiple lives in just one life?”