A Reminder That You Are So Much More Than Your Salary

A handful of years ago, I went on a business trip to Italy with my husband. It was an amazing opportunity, but in the days and weeks leading up to the trip, I became in terrified that people would ask me, “what do you do?” and I wouldn’t have an answer. I didn’t have a fancy job title or a big salary. I stayed home with my kids and did freelance writing jobs while they napped or went to kindergarten.

I had jumped off the Big Law career track years earlier, and even though I was genuinely happy with my decision, I was also very insecure about it. Honestly, I still am sometimes.

The world we live in thrives on bigger and better. Bigger salary. Better job title. Bigger house. Better car. Bigger salary. Better job title. And on and on until we burn out, break down, or get off the hamster wheel.

I got off the hamster wheel many years prior, yet I actually battle these sensations of insufficiency and absence of self-esteem. I presume I’m in good company in this.

A viral image tends to this effed up center around what we do instead of what our identity is, on how much cash we make as opposed to the amount we appreciate life.

Albeit physical and psychological wellness shouldn’t really be a proportion of progress, the image raises intriguing focuses regarding what we esteem and consider significant in our way of life.

I’ll be obtuse. We live in a culture that blossoms with poisonous free enterprise. Believe it or not, poisonous free enterprise. In the U.S., private enterprise is viewed as American as fruit dessert. Essentially I used to think so. All things considered, that is the message we’re taken care of since we’re small children. “Victory” signifies ascending the stepping stool – more cash, a superior work, more stuff. Isn’t that so?

In my mid 20s, I began to consider horse crap on this vertical direction that we are taken care of from all edges of our lives. I left a generously compensated occupation as a lawyer in Big Law for a task that paid in a real sense half the thing I was making. Throughout the following 15+ years, my vocation has taken many plunges and turns, and side courses, and I’ve been acceptable with that. Generally.

Since despite the fact that I know in my heart that greater better-more isn’t the way to satisfaction, something in my body and my internal mind at times asks, right? I deliberately shun the “industrialist” way of life. My significant other and I decide to go through our cash making a trip and giving to causes we have faith in as opposed to purchasing more “stuff.” We live in a little house and divide one vehicle among both of us since we need to limit the “things” in our lives. I feel alright with the decisions we’re making and the daily routine we’re experiencing.

But still, sometimes I find myself feeling a little… I don’t know, less than. Especially when I’m surrounded by people who focus on earning more, climbing the ladder, and playing “the game” – a game we all know is rigged anyway. I am sometimes consumed with wondering what might have been if I had continued with the trajectory of professional success we’re told to want, instead of jumping off that train for a lifestyle that I actually wanted. I wonder if I should just work harder or be more ambitious. Would I be more respected, more worthy, more important?

Eff that noise.

I’ll be straightforward, I battle with these sentiments. A ton. I compose this as much as a suggestion to myself as a message to the majority of others out there who battle with similar sensations of insufficiency in light of the fact that your way of life decisions don’t line up with the falsehood we’ve been told since we were conceived – in particular, that our prosperity is estimated by something besides our own joy.

Try not to misunderstand me, this doesn’t mean we shouldn’t invest heavily in our expert achievements. Be that as it may, they are only a piece of what our identity is and living a “effective” life. I’m additionally not proposing that we as a whole become pleasure seekers. In actuality, I solidly accept that we as a whole have an obligation to leave the world better than we discovered it. However, that doesn’t mean getting more cash and ascending the professional bureaucracy. That doesn’t mean having meeting rooms named after you or narratives made with regards to your domain. It implies taking care of your spirit, sharing your sparkle, and resting in your own happiness for some time.

This is more difficult than one might expect, obviously. I’ve gone through a really long time in treatment dealing with these issues. I’ve cried and spiraled into a pit of frailties in light of the fact that my compensation wasn’t however much another person’s or in light of the fact that my work title of consultant is definitely not a renowned as another person’s.

But deep down, I know the truth; I just forget it sometimes. And the truth is this: success isn’t defined solely by the nameplate outside your door or the numbers on your pay stub.

Perhaps success – to the extent it can even be defined or measured at all – is  best summed up by Maya Angelou: “Success is liking yourself, liking what you do, and liking how you do it.”

We’ve got to stop tying our self-worth to our salary or job title. I certainly do, and you might too. But how?

All things considered, I’ll be straightforward, I’m actually sorting that out myself. I wish there were an enchantment pill, yet there’s not. I think it takes deliberately encircle yourself with individuals who share your qualities, who cause you to have a decent outlook on yourself, who you share things practically speaking with that aren’t business related. I think it takes advising yourself that since ascending the stepping stool is the thing that others what, it doesn’t need to be what you need. As Amy Poehler said, “Useful for you, not intended for me.” And I think it takes recognizing that shunning the entrepreneur proportion of achievement that depends exclusively on compensation and occupation title is extremist and nonconformity, and that choosing to battle this worldview is, in itself, somewhat of a triumph.