Who Are You?

It’s not a rhetorical question.  Who are you?  Take some time right now to answer that question.  In fact, take a piece of paper and make a list of all that comes to mind.  Don’t read any further until you answer this question:  Who are you?

I SAID, DON’T READ ANY FURTHER!!!!

Ok, now, with your list, I have something else for you to do.  Count anything that relates to a role, title, or position.  In Sheri Riley’s book, “Exponential Living: Stop Spending 100% of Your Time on 10% of Who You Are”, she states that most of us spend the majority of our time developing and focusing on our roles, titles, or positions.  It’s as if that is what defines who we are, when it’s only 10% of who we are.  Unfortunately, we then neglect the other 90%.  We spend most of our time improving what is on the outside, while neglecting who we are on the inside.  We spend time on skill development, rather than on personal development.  Let’s admit it.  Working on who we are, developing and maturing in the other 90% of our life does not seem profitable.  It doesn’t seem like it will help us achieve what we want in our professional life.

At the beginning of the Covid19 pandemic, many of us realized the need to slow down.  We began to realize that there was more to life than being professional successful.  However, that didn’t seem to last long.  We thought the pandemic would be only a few weeks, maybe a month.  It would allow us to regroup, rearrange, reprioritize, in hopes that when the pandemic was over we would do life differently.  Yet, if I have learned anything during this pandemic, it’s that nothing changed.  Not really.  We kept spending 100% of our time on 10% of who we are – we just had to adapt and get innovative.  If I’m honest, there were more expectations for us to excel, to show our productivity, to keep our nose to the grind.  We didn’t take our foot off the pedal – we just shifted gears.

So, rather than using the time to focus on the other 90% of our self, many expended 100% of their time scrambling to reconfigure the 10%, all the while neglecting personal health (some noticed they put on the Covid19).  We worked from home.  We literally lived at our office.  It was hard to shut off as we had to shut down.  Perhaps many poured themselves into their 10%, knowing that the pandemic won’t last forever, and soon things will get “back to normal”.

Don’t wait for things to get “back to normal” without spending time focusing on the 90% of who you are.  Maybe spend time discovering who you are apart from the 10%.  I have a challenge for you.  I want you to answer some more questions:

If so, I don’t often do this, but let’s talk.  Let’s begin a conversation.
In the meantime, consider making another list.  Answer the same question, “Who are you?”, but answer this time by making a list of who you are as a child of God.  Start to understand the difference between the role(s) you play and who you are in Christ.  My sense is that we can’t be our best parent, student, teacher, pastor, friend…unless we understand who we are in the eyes of God.