I am not my job. In fact I bear a marginal and shoddy resemblance to my job, often to the great pain of my colleagues and superiors. I point this out because it appears that David, does.
Now, I always knew that. Which is not to say he is wholly defined by his job, just very majorly. I'm also not saying this is in fact a bad thing. He has a good job, when he is occasionally allowed to do it, and he avoids letting other people re-define him by their impressions of his work. This is a modern take on the job definition of self, and certainly I think a healthier one. Recognizing that in spite of the malignement of misguided direction, one's work has value, is very important in this gestalt.
I am not defined by my disease. I am constantly exposed to people who do this, and in fact exist in close proximity to a person who's entire definition of self is composed of a complicated (and occasionally wrong) impression of the aspects of several illnesses. Many of these are long term and incurable. As someone who has an incurable (if well controlled and relatively common, as well as treated) condition, it would be easy to allow this to happen.
I am defined by three major roles - Husband, Father, Gamer. An occasional dash of son, though my parents and I are not so close as some. I realise this only because of the effort I will spend to mix these things successfully, and because of the torment which an imbalance of these three aspects can/will bring.
5 comments:
What disease do you have? You never write about it.
I think David "thinks" he is defined by his job, but I would disagree.
If I were to tell another person about David, I might mention his job and the company he works for, but ti would be as part of the whole description - "My friend David works as a Transaction monitoring Coordinator with Convergys. David is a witty, verbose individual who will make you laugh at the drop of his intellectually humorous hat".
Etc....
So, David if you ever read this, I think you're wrong. I think you are someone who transcends your job title, into a better place in all our hearts and minds.
Laterz
AH
Oh, by disease I mean "gross overamplification of the problem". Technically I have a "condition", a common one, known by the very unmysterious term of hypertension. It is especially common in slightly over weight and under exercised males in western industrialized nations, where free time is available at historically unprecidentedly large levels and the desire to exercise is replaced with the desire to drink beer.
Oddly enough, work is very defining for me. How I work, and what I achieve in my work is very much part of who I am. I put a great deal into it. But that has been true of anything about which I'm passionate.
Look at my library. I'm as much defined by my love of the written word as I am by my work.
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