Who You Are is NOT Defined by What You Do

It’s amazing how perspective changes over time. When I first quit work, I felt I had to justify my existence as a Stay at Home Dad (SAHD) by using all the titles of my “past life”. I would meet people and when they would ask, “Oh, what do you do?” I’d go into my canned speech, of, “well, I used to be a geologist, but now I’m a stay at home dad, but I do all this other stuff to make up for it.” As if I’m apologizing for not working or something… When probed about how easy it should be to find work around OKC, I’d go on about, nope, not looking for work right now, just volunteering and doing family stuff. Then I’d even talk about all the volunteering I was doing like it would earn me a prize or something.

Later, much later, I realized I was looking for validation since I wasn’t getting that with many of my current volunteer roles. I mean sure, everyone loves a volunteer, but where’s my performance review?! Where’s a bonus showing how well I did?! Where’s a gold sticker for fucks sake?! Oh right, I don’t get those because it’s volunteering and um, well, that doesn’t happen. So, what happened to make me not even mention my past life anymore, much less my new job, and now I can be more than okay with it? A perspective shift, confidence in who I am, and accepting my current role for what it is.

I’m Not Important, and Never Was

The heading may seem harsh, but face it, none of us are that important when it comes to work. Ok, all of us are very replaceable, and if you’ve never dealt with an unexpected death at your office, well, just wait. When you find out Jim, your engineer, had a heart attack and passed away over the weekend (totally fictional scenario, but I’ve been to 4 of these impromptu meetings at Oxy alone…) you realize how replaceable you are. In a day or 2, except for figuring out where he stored some files, you’re back working like you never missed a beat and Jim never existed. It’s crazy if you’ve ever dealt with it. And it’s not just Jim, hell, if our CEO got hit by a bus, except for some grief days, and water cooler chatter about if our stock price will fall, I wouldn’t even notice any company disruption and she’s the top dog.

What does this have to do with being happy now? Well, I used to get validation about my life from work, titles, family, and other places, but a big part of “success” was tied up in what I did, not necessarily, who I was. It was all about, “what have you done for me lately?” and lord did I ever show up with numbers, charts, performance increases and more to show what I’d done for them lately. Every year, year in and year out. It was even 3x a year at Chevron… So efficient! Lol It’s easy to get wrapped up in that mindset and not realize that what you do isn’t who you are.

Who Am I?

Well, this has been an interesting question for me to answer. I went from career guy on the possible fast track to an upper management position, to an unemployed, heavy beard wearing, chainsaw wielding, SAHD. Yep, just like that. It’s taken a while, but I finally realize that nobody here gives a crap about what I do, or what I did. I could be a multi-millionaire or an unemployed guy with some hidden secret (there must be a reason he’s “healthy” and young and not working) and no one cares. It reminds me of a line from another one of my favorite movies, Raising Arizona:

 

With all of this focus on improving my mental health and the slowing down of life in general, I’ve had time to find me again. Like, the me that existed before my dad killed himself and I went into a major depression for the next 10 years. The me that doesn’t accept that being majorly depressed and having daily suicidal thoughts and ideations is “ok”. The me that used to be happy at nothing, or just used to be genuinely happy without putting on a mask and faking it thru the day. I’ve been more open to more strangers this past year of my life than ever before and holy hell is it liberating! Being able to own it and work with it, whatever “it” is for you, has been a huge step in getting confident with me being me again.

I Like Me, Again

I never “didn’t like me” (except this past 10 years of depressed angry me, that dude really sucks) but you wouldn’t know that if you’ve met me in the last decade. My brain was in a bad place and I tried all manner of ways to get it to not be like that, but I never tried things that would work, like actual meds. It was all superficial self-medicating stuff that somehow seemed more acceptable than seeing a shrink to get real meds. That’s all in a different post that’s coming, but what happened when I came out of the fog of depression was that I found me again. I had interests, hobbies, and things I liked doing that I didn’t even know I liked, ahem chain-sawing anything, lol.

I like having the free time to spend a day walking around the woods on our property gathering downed brush and trees and piling them up. I like being able to watch birds, squirrels, crows, snakes, deer, and whatever else wanders around while I’m out here. Even more so, I like being a SAHD. Making sure the kids are good with doctor, dentist, and extracurricular appointments. Making their lunches in the morning, getting them to shower regularly, teaching them about money, life, teaching them how not to be an asshole to people (you can never start too young imo) the universe, and just everything. Now when I get asked, “what do you do”, I reply, “I’m just a SAHD, what about you?” I put the ball back in their court and just listen. If it comes up again, I mention some volunteering, but unless it’s something exciting that I want to talk about or share, even that gets met with a shrug and “meh” from my brain. Again, no one I’m around now cares if I’m an oil company CEO or a SAHD, they just don’t care. What you do doesn’t have anything to do with who you are around here. It’s friggin’ awesome!

Even with titles… Just let it go…
People Know ME

This past Sunday morning my phone started notifying me that a PTA chat had woken up and seemed to be pretty active. When I opened it (begrudgingly, lol) I saw about 3 pins that had been shared, asking, “hey, can you make this for our Christmas market booth?” And guess what? I can! And then I suggested making Christmas ornaments from cut cedar and carve the OK state outline with a heart on it and they loved it! Same with baby’s 1st Christmas and any other cheesy stuff we can put on those. After going down a craft rabbit hole, and being worried that the cedar discs may split and I don’t want to sell something that will split later, I found pre-cut, pre-drilled ~3” diameter wooden discs with live edge for $0.50 each! Also, I found out you can dry smaller pieces of wood like those ornaments and other kinds in your oven, fairly easily, so I’ll work on that too.

So many ornament ideas! And regular craft ideas!
I can make all of thse, and even have offers for assembly and painting the snow-people!

I was stoked! I can now focus a hobby towards a volunteer thing AND make money for the school and ultimately the kids. I have a couple more chainsaw carving requests, and as soon as I can get any amount of money from anyone I can call myself a professional chainsaw artist! Right, that’s how colleges define pro, as “you made any money off your talent”. Either way I’m excited about it! People know I do woodworking and have free time, and now I can marry the two. What a great symbiosis!

It’s Just Jay

This past year has FLOWN by! I can’t believe we’re 2 months away from 2020, the school year is almost half over, and there’s so much planning left to do for so many things. By being so active with my volunteer stuff, it seems like time has sped up. It’s crazy! Even with all of that speeding up, it has been one of the better years of my life so far. I found me again, I found new hobbies and rediscovered old ones, I’ve spent way more quality time with the kids and wife, we enjoy spending time with each other again, and I’m slowly meeting new people around here.

Visiting people I’ve met out there too. They don’t care about titles either!

Through it all, it’s just Jay. Not “depressed pretending life is good Jay”, not “career focused Jay”, not even “apologetic about not being career Jay, so listen to what I’m doing now that’s so much better, aren’t I a great person Jay”? That last guy really sucked… Bwahahaha Yep, it’s just me and I like me regardless of my title. I’m proud to be able to have the opportunity to be a SAHD, even if I may not be the best in the cleaning department (sorry honey), and I’m proud to be as active in my community as I am.

It means a lot to me to be that involved and even more that it has started providing a fulfillment that I’ve been lacking lately. It has been really exciting to actually feel excited about volunteering, to be comfortable with my current station in life, comfortable in my own skin again, and just rediscovering me this year. That has been awesome!

Have you had anything shift in your life lately? Have you gotten comfortable with something you didn’t think you could be comfortable with? I’d love to hear about it!