Ghinwa Merei

Transcript

, by Jinva Murray. Eight years ago, I left a management meeting, crossed the street to a small cafe, opened my laptop, wrote my resignation letter, and hit send. From the outside, it might have looked like a big and bold decision. But that was not the case. It was the beginning of losing everything I thought made me who I am. By that time, I had spent over 20 years creating what many would call outward success. I have led teams at Fortune 500 companies.

I have an Executive MBA from an Ivy League university. I created a national team from scratch. I had a dream job. I had a dream team, and by all measures of success, I achieved my goal. A year before that, something had been gradually growing inside me. I tried to ignore it. After all, how can you abandon a career you 've built your entire life? What I didn't see then was that somewhere along the way, my achievements gradually became my identity. And when that personality collapsed, I collapsed too.

I started asking myself questions I had never asked before. Who am I? Without your position, without income and status? Some mornings, getting out of bed felt like a victory. Three voices were competing for control in my head. One was my inner critic. Look at yourself. You left your dream job. What were you thinking about? The other was filled with fear. Maybe I made the biggest mistake of my life. Maybe my best years are behind me. And between them was a pleasant, soothing voice.

Don't think about it today. Watch another show. Scroll the tape a little longer. Tomorrow you will feel like yourself again. So I did what many successful people do. I tried to correct myself. I read every book, took every course, worked with therapists, until one day, feeling like I had hit rock bottom, I heard a small voice inside that said: No one is going to come save you. You are the one you've been waiting for. At first it scared me. But then it freed me up, because my questions started to change.

Instead of asking, "How do I go back to who I was before?" I started asking, “Who am I? » Actually. And this question began a journey deep within myself. I stopped correcting myself. I stopped arguing with life. I realized that I was not broken and not defeated. I simply outgrew a personality that no longer suited me. Looking back, I now realize that the greatest courage was not quitting my job. It was necessary to remain with the pain, uncertainty, shame, and resist the desire to build another bright identity in order to feel worthy again.

And with that, something else slowly began to grow. I stopped looking for validation of my worth in achievements or the approval of others. I realized that what I had been chasing all these years had been within me all along. And gradually peace, freedom, and joy came. Today, I am still ambitious and have many big dreams. But I no longer build my identity on external recognition. I build it by staying true to myself. And if I could tell myself one thing when I was sitting in that cafe many years ago, it would be this.

If life asks you to give up the identity you've spent years building, don't confuse it with losing yourself. Maybe this life is inviting you to come home. Because the greatest courage and achievement is not the creation of a new identity. It is the courage to let go of everything we thought we were supposed to be until only what remains is who we have always been. And that is how we are reborn from within.

Transcript generated from the recording and lightly cleaned. Some names and wording may differ from the spoken speech.