This Podcast is about learning how to Identify who we are from the inside, and not letting outside circumstances define who we are as people. I open up about my own circumstances with the hope that this can make a difference in someone’s life. We are all in this journey called life together.
Here is a transcript of the above episode.
Hi everybody. Welcome to the Spin Cycle Podcast, part three. This is your DJ Sam, and today we’re gonna be talking about internal identity. You know, for the past nine months, I have been out of work for my career. I’ve been looking for a job, I’ve been applying to lots of places. I’ve had lots of interviews, and I, I’ve just been in a real funk. I’ve been really down on myself. Um, it’s been very emotional. It’s been very real. Uh, I’ve had to take a lot of odd jobs. I’ve done some consulting, I’ve been doing DoorDash, and I now work in a warehouse for FedEx loading boxes into gigantic 17 foot trucks with kids half my age. And the one thing that I keep getting reminded of is that it is a blessing that I’m able to physically. Do the job I’m doing, but it definitely weighs on my soul. It’s probably one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do. The FedEx job, my ego is pretty much out the window. I, I have a hard time looking my son in the eye and telling him that I’m really confident in what I’m doing because in all honesty, I’m not. It’s, the whole thing has just been an an exercise in humbleness. I don’t really always know where to begin. I know that I’m making enough to barely make it by. I’m up to my eyeballs in debt, and I just keep waiting for an interview to turn into an offer. And then I, when it doesn’t, I get mopey, I get upset, I cry a lot, and I start to wonder, what am I doing wrong? You know, I’m, I’m totally trained, certified, and experienced in all of these. Jobs that I’m applying for, I’m totally capable of doing all of them, and yet nothing seems to transpire. You know, I’ve, I’ve gone and listened to a lot of motivational speeches. I’ve gone to churches, temples, I’ve just been trying to get my own mindset. And then it hit me yesterday, a friend of mine said, Sam, what makes you happy? And I thought, I don’t know. What does make me happy? I always thought that music and technology always made me happy, and I felt that when I had enough money to pay for amplifiers and all of these devices, I was happy, but was I really, really happy or was I just masking something? I used to be a writer, used to write about hip hop when I lived in Japan and when I lived in New York City. I covered all sorts of types of music, went to concerts all the time, didn’t make nearly as much money as I’ve made before. I was recently unemployed, but I was happier. And then I said to myself, there are people in this world that have a lot less than me, but still seem to be happy. So what’s going on here? And then I thought deeper into it and I said, you know, the real problem here is that I identified with my job. That’s where the internal identity comes from. I thought that whatever company I worked at, whatever promotions I got, and whatever money I made from the jobs that I had were an indication of my worth, and therefore I associated my identity with them. But when that job went away, I started to flail and say, well, who? Who am I? I mean, I come from a family of entrepreneurs. My father had his own accounting firm. My brother has his own import export business. My uncle has his own broadcasting company. So when you have your own business, the business is the job and the job is you, but. I don’t really know if that’s the case for me. I’ve always worked for other companies. I mean, I do stuff on the side, but they never make enough money to make me have a really successful living situation. So I start to say to myself, what, what am I? And I have to face the fact that although I’m not making the money I used to make. In the product management program management position at entertainment companies that I come from, that doesn’t devalue who I am as a person, as a person. I am a creative entity who does love music. I love hearing about music. I’m really into audio technology. I love art, skateboarding, Japanese culture. I love my son. I love, you know, whatever is really important to me is something that I love. And somewhere along the way, while I had this job, I forgot about that. I forgot about what’s important to me. And what’s important to me is knowing who I am as a person. Someone who’s not built by external forces, someone who has enough understanding to know that as long as I tap into these. These talents or these cultural outlets or these artistic outlets that help shape who I am, I’ll be okay. And I think that has actually cheered me up. So when I was asked, what makes me happy, I, I have a better answer for it now. Being creative makes me happy, showing and sharing my struggles with the world. It’s, it’s not easy going through what I’m going through. I’m literally haven’t worked in my career job in nine months. I have moved out of my house and I only get to see my son a few days outta the week rather than living with him every night. And it has definitely shaken me to the core. It, it’s like everything that I valued was, was taken away, but I made these decisions. I made the decision to move out. I made the decision to, um, see my son when I can. I made a lot of decisions in my life that have taken me to this place, but just because I’ve made the decisions doesn’t devalue who I am as a person. I’m a caring person. I’m a. Extrovert in some ways. I really try to help people. I always have the mantra and it says, more blessings than burdens. I try to look at the upside of things. I mean, doing DoorDash has really shown me that I can be helpful in a lot of ways by bringing medicine to people, or I bring food to certain people that need it, that are unable to move. I, I’ve brought food to a woman in a nursing home that can’t move, and I open her milk for her and I talk to her for a minute. Um, I’ve, I’ve helped a lot of people doing this. I smile, they smile back. When I’m at the restaurants, sometimes I wish them more blessings than burdens, and sometimes they look at me and they go, wow, man, I really needed to hear that today. Thank you. Exchange a smile with someone. It keeps me talking to people and it keeps me interacting. And the FedEx job, it really has taken a lot out of me. It’s shown me that there are people in this world that are doing everything they can to make ends meet. They’re just living the life the best way they can. So I come back to it and I say. I have two jobs, and then I have a third job as a father, as a role model for my son to show him that everything I’m doing comes from a really good and honest place. That’s my third job, and my fourth job is tapping into myself and knowing that no matter what occupation I have, no matter how much money I make or don’t make, I will never lose who I am as a person. And the creative juices that I have will always flow as long as I give them a place to be. It’s, it’s a real nuance for me. It’s, it’s really different. It’s something that I’ve never grown up with. I wasn’t taught to value the creative side of myself. I was always taught that you work, work, work until there’s nothing left. That’s the way I lived for years. Well now there’s nothing left. It’s just me and I can’t give up. And if that, if I can’t give up, then you shouldn’t give up. This is, this is all a test for all of us, and I just want everyone to know that your internal identity is not made from what you do externally. It’s made from who you are internally. I. And as long as you can remember that, I’m sure you’ll find happiness. Thank you. This is the third podcast, and I hope you listen to other ones. Hopefully they will be a little bit lighter than this one. All right, more blessings than burdens. Everybody. Love you and have a wonderful afternoon.