Show Notes:
Today we are continuing our series on detangling identity and we’re focusing this episode on crafting control.
The challenge with the kind of work you do, is that while it draws people who enjoy feeling in control – it is an unending stream of out-of-control mess. Whether it’s the calls or the work-related risks or the organizational dynamics, there is SO much that happens that is not in our control.
So, what do you think that means when we’ve enmeshed our sense of identity, our sense of self, with our work? US Marine Corps veteran and behavioural scientist, Dr. Kevin Gilmartin wrote the book “Emotional Survival for Law Enforcement” and summarizes this so well. He says, “If the job becomes your life, and you don’t control your job, then you don’t control your life.”
Nailed it.
I said during last week’s episode that your work is a really important part of who you are. But the KEY is remembering and being intentional about keeping it a PART. A portion. Just a piece. Think of it like a pie chart. Work is a valuable piece of who you are – it says something about you that you do what you do. But if the piece of the pie chart your work occupies is the biggest slice of the pie, or outweighs the amalgamation of several other slices of the pie, then your balance is out of whack and you need to go back to last week’s episode to take a look at how you rebalance. If your work piece of the pie is dictating too much about who you are, how you feel, and how you value yourself in your world or experience value in the world, then you are running some serious risks and Dr. Gilmartin is hitting it on the head. Our work is so often outside of our control. The job is literally responding to crisis. The defining nature of crisis is NOT in control. And while we’re trained to enter into the chaos and intervene to help, the truth is that we can only ever do so much, and it is almost always REACTIVE which feels much less in control than preventative or responsive. On top of that, even within the organizational framework, we can often feel at risk of an adversarial or blatantly aggressive or hostile workplace dynamic that further undermines our sense of stability or control. Decisions that affect us are made without consultation and we are left to hold the repercussions.
If this is what we are using to define us, no wonder so many are burning out, experiencing mental health concerns and struggling to continue. When I make my identity tied to something that is so unstable, it is internally de-stabilizing. As we internalize an identity that defines us based on an environment and experience that can be so tumultuous, we internalize the chaos and the helplessness and the lack of control. And these features start to increasingly take hold inside of us and dictate how we feel, how we think and how we engage in our lives.
THIS is why it is so deeply risky to make work our life.
Now, I’m going to say, AGAIN, that work is of course an important part of your life. Yes, you have to work to pay the bills. And yes, you are allowed to love your work, feel passionately about the work you do, and invest deeply into the work you care about. Just not exclusively, or mindlessly.
I’m not asking you to not do your job. Really, what I want it the opposite of that – I want you, with all of the amazing skill, training and experience you’ve acquired, to be a kickass contributor to the work for a long, long time to come. Our communities need you. They need skilled, experienced people who ARE passionate about the work and committed to being in the thick of it. But we are losing really great people – veteran skilled staff – because the job got too big and swallowed them whole. What I want for you is to be mindful and intentional about keeping the job in its place – as a piece of the pie. And in so doing, I want you to craft something that is far more sustainable. Something that keeps you able to remain in the work for as long as you choose to be in it.
Last week we talked about balance and distributing our interests and sense of self across multiple “pillars”. An important piece of this process is anchoring to building aspects of my life that I have control over.
When we spend a significant proportion of our time in a workplace that really lacks control, we need to build a life outside of that that really enhances our connection to control, even in seemingly small ways. It is also really valuable to work at implementing pieces within your work day that give some amount of control back wherever you can find it. There are two specific aspects to crafting control that I want to encourage you to focus on.
The first is refining your values and the second is drawing your boundaries.
When it comes to refining your values, it’s really a matter of taking the time to step back from the auto-pilot nature of life to really dig in and be intentional in thinking about what matters to you most. Life has a tendency to get us caught up in the moment-to-moment of the daily grind. We can get hung up in some of the survival mode that life calls us into. We’re busy. Work life, home life, fixing the leak in my house or taking my car in for the weird noise it’s been making, visiting that ailing family member, getting that call out of the blue that says my pet needs surgery or someone I care about is leaving their spouse… Life doesn’t stop life-ing. The pace is high and we get caught in the current of it. It’s not that we intentionally fall out of living into our values, it’s that we lose track of time. But then, before you know it we have lived a life of reaction to whatever has come at us any given minute – feeling out of control and left with that funeral question but without the time left to cast a different kind of vote for how people will talk about and remember us. When we can make the time, prioritize the space, to get clear about our values – and to re-clarify them on a semi-regular basis – we are more likely to shape choices that allow us to live into our values even when life keeps life-ing.
When you are working to refine your values, I want you to think about where in your life you have experienced a sense of control. Think back – as a child or teen, as a young adult all the way to this time in your life – when have you felt like your best self? What kinds of activities or interests brought this out in you? Where did you feel like you were owning life? What are your greatest skills? Where do you shine? Who are the people who bring out the best in you?
Inventory the answers to these questions, along with that most central question – what would you hope that people would remember about you or say about you at your funeral? What characteristics about who you are and how you are in your life do you hope make the greatest impact on the world and those in your life?
These are your values. These are the spheres of control for you.
Identifying these, and taking time on a semi-regular basis to re-evaluate your values and how you are going about living into them, is the single most important thing you can do to help build a sense of control in your life. And in crafting an increased sense of control, we help protect ourselves from the impact of the areas in our lives where we experience reduced control.
As you identify your values, try to get creative in thinking about how you can connect to these. It may not be the same and it may not be perfect, but aim for close approximations. For example, one of the areas in my life where I have experienced a high degree of control and feeling in my ...