Loosening The Grip on Who You Think You Are

Have you ever noticed how quickly we define ourselves?

I'm a parent. I am an expert. I am a failure. I'm the strong one. I'm not creative.

Without thinking, we define who we are by a single sentence, role, or a judgement.

But none of these are the truth. They're stories - temporary, fragile, shifting with time and circumstances. We mistake them for identity, and when we cling to them, we begin to live inside of a cage our own making.

How Identity Becomes Over-Identification

It feels very natural to define ourselves by our roles, thoughts, habits, and interests. It's how we hold responsibility and purpose.

But identity becomes over-identification when we stop seeing those definitions as descriptions and start treating them as the essence of who we are.

Think about it like this:

• You play roles. At work, you might be a manager. With friends, the funny one. At home, a parent or partner. These are roles you step into.

• You have experiences. Sometimes you succeed, sometimes you fail. Sometimes you show up kindly, other times you don't. These are things that happen.

• You have thoughts. "I'm good at this." "I'm not smart." "I'm a bad person." Those thoughts come and go all day long.

None of these are you. They are what you do, what you feel, or what you think.

Over-identification happens when you stop, even for a minute, seeing them as passing parts of you life and start believing they are your core identity.

• You make a mistake -> instead of "I made a mistake", it becomes "I am a mistake"

• You lose a job -> instead of "My role changed", it becomes "I am worthless."

• You struggle with school -> instead of "I struggle", it becomes "I am stupid."

When you stop fusing identity with the mood or the struggle, you create the space to move again. You see that even in depression or anxiety - in the storm; you are more than the weather.

Why is it a problem?

Because all of those things can change.

• Jobs change.

• Roles change.

• Habits change.

• Thoughts and emotions definitely change.

So if you’ve built your identity on them, your sense of self will feel shaky every time life moves.

It’s like building a house on sand. The ground shifts, and suddenly you don’t feel safe anymore.

• The expert feels lost when the industry evolves.

• The athlete feels permanently broken after an injury.

• The person who believes “I’m a bad person” struggles to imagine growth, because they’ve already accepted the label as permanent.

Over-identification makes identity fragile (easy to shatter), rigid (hard to grow beyond), and distorted (narrower than reality).

When We’re in It

This shows up most painfully when we’re struggling. In depression, anxiety, trauma, or even just a bad mood, it’s easy to believe the feelings are you.

• Depression says, “I am hopeless.”

• Anxiety says, “I am weak.”

• Trauma says, “I am broken.”

• A bad day says, “I’m just a bad person.”

But those are states, not identity. They’re weather systems moving through, not the climate of your being.

The point isn’t to deny them. You feel what you feel, and you're allowed to. The point is to come back down to earth and remember: this is not who I am and I can work to adjust how I feel, think, behave, or what I do.

And here’s the key: you can only ever change in the present moment. Not by rewriting the past, not by fearing the future, but by choosing right now.

• Right now, I can soften a thought.

• Right now, I can take a breath.

• Right now, I can act differently than I did before.

A bunch of right nows, stacked up, can become a new way you feel about yourself, a new way that people see you, most important, a new identity to hold lightly.

When you stop fusing identity with the mood or the struggle, you create the space to move again. You see that even in depression, even in anxiety, even in the storm, you’re still more than the weather.

A Wisdom Thread

This isn’t a new idea. Wisdom traditions have been pointing it out for centuries. In Buddhism, the teaching of non-self is the reminder that thoughts, feelings, and roles are more like clouds than the sky itself. Clinging to them, as Buddhism calls it, only creates suffering because clouds are meant to move.

Modern psychology echoes the same truth. Studies show that people who hold multiple roles, friend, learner, worker, community member, report more resilience and even live longer. It’s not just because they’re “busy.” It’s because they don’t fall into into a single fragile identity. When one role shifts, others remain, and they still feel whole.

The Freedom Beyond Over-Identification

The truth is simpler than we make it:

• You have thoughts, but you are not your thoughts.

• You do jobs, but you are not your job.

• You play roles, but you are not the role.

• You make mistakes, but you are not the mistake.

When you see this, you loosen your grip. You stop living as though your worth depends on holding one identity forever. You create room to evolve.

Practicing Looser Identity

• Shift your language. Say “I feel anger right now,” instead of “I am angry.” “I made a mistake” instead of “I am a mistake.”

• Hold roles as seasons. Work, expertise, even parenting are chapters of life—not your whole story.

• Practice diffusion of your thoughts. Notice a thought as just a thought: “I’m having the thought that I’m unworthy.” This creates space between you and the story.

• Welcome evolution. What mattered to you years ago may not define you now. That’s not failure—it’s unfolding.

So What's Left of Us Then?

If we are not our roles, judgments, and thoughts, what remains? That's where you find freedom because then you see everything as temporary as it is.

You are not your titles. You are not your mistakes. You are not even your successes. Sorry.

You are the awareness behind it all. You are the consciousness that can see these things. The soul that plays roles, learns through choices, and keeps becoming. That is of course if you choose to change the script.

When you live from that place, identity stops being a cage and becomes a path of discovery.