“We must be willing to let go of the life we planned so as to have the life that is waiting for us.”
― Joseph Campbell
I started thinking about becoming a physician when I was 11 years old. I graduated from medical school at the age of 29. By the time I was 35, I realized that I was not going to be able to continue tying my entire identity to my role as a physician. But it took me until I had my son (I was 42) to complete the transition out of that identity.
Don’t get me wrong, I will always identify myself as a physician. It’s just not my primary identity anymore. There’s a part of me that knows that it never really was.
There are many reasons why it took me so long to let go of this identity, not least is how easy it is to answer the question: “What do you do for a living?” when you are a doctor.
Another reason, I can see with the clarity of hind-sight, is that I never allowed myself to grieve that loss. I spent twenty-five years of my life seeing myself as a doctor—letting go of that image of myself was not easy. If I had allowed myself to grieve a little bit, to wallow a little bit, I may have been able to let go a little easier.
If you are going through an identity change—say, from single person to married person, or from couch potato to marathon runner, or from student to entrepreneur, give yourself a little time and space to grieve.
Think of all the things you could have done if you had remained single (a couch potato, a student) and all the opportunities that you have now missed due to your transition to a new identity.
Realize that your change in identity, no matter how positive or sought-after, is a form of psychological “death” that needs to be grieved.
In Finding Your Own North Star, Martha Beck devotes 23 pages to this process of changing identities, which she calls Square 1: Death and Rebirth.
You can’t be reborn if you are unwilling to die.
Perhaps if I hadn’t spent so much time wondering what my colleagues would think of me when they found out I’d gone off and become a life coach I wouldn’t have been as stuck as I was for as long as I was.
Now I identify myself by many roles. I am excited to explore each one and I realize that while one is primary right now, another will move into that position as time passes. I will grieve the loss of the identities that no longer fit me, and embrace the identities that I grow into.
Today I am primarily a mother. I am also a stepmother, a wife, a daughter, a writer, a life coach, a doctor, and a runner.
Letting go of the life I planned has brought me to the life I’ve been waiting for.