A short motivational monologue by Rick Torrison arguing that high achievers often conflate identity and worth with titles and accomplishments. He warns this is a lie—if accomplishments are lost, identity is undermined—and urges listeners to locate value beyond roles, awards, and job titles.
I am my accomplishments. I am what I achieve. A lot of times people ask you, hey, hi, I'm Rick. Who are you? Or what do you do? Or they want to know about us, right? The first thing we identify with is our title, our job, what we do. Sometimes we put those out there first. I was the captain of, president of. I serve on all these committees. And all of a sudden we start identifying with this lie that somehow our accomplishments identify who we are, what we believe, what's important to us, our value, our worth. And the truth is our value, our ident. Our worth is not found in our accomplishments, but when we find our value and worth, our identity, we believe the lie that we are who our accomplishments say we are. What happens when those accomplishments get taken away? Who are we then? That title, Rick Torreson, with the doctorate by his name, are all those things actually the things that define me and who I am, they let people know my accomplishment, but I am not my accomplish. I'm so much more than that.
