Worth Beyond Output
Louisa: Welcome to The Fifth Season, a podcast where we believe aging is a privilege and today, we’re asking a question that most of us have ignored for decades: Who are you when you stop producing?
For years, we’ve decorated our lives with titles, achievements, and “masks” like an overburdened Christmas tree. But as we enter this new season of life, it’s time to move beyond the “socialized self” and start writing our own scripts.
Today, hosts David Lowry and Don Drew explore the “Life-Changing Magic” of internal tidying. They’ll discuss how to declutter your identity, set down the heavy masks of perfection, and find the courage to be unapologetically yourself.
David Lowry: Welcome to the Fifth Season Podcast: Conversations on Successful Aging. Aging is a privilege and we want to have conversations on how to do it well. I’m David Lowry and I’m joined by Don Drew.
Declutter Your Identity
Don Drew: Recently I heard a question asked, when was the last time you felt fully unapologetically yourself? Over the years, I’ve added to my identity like an overburdened Christmas tree. But in today’s show, we’re going to be talking about how to declutter your identity.
David Lowry: I like that. And in fact, this is very apropos for me today because I’m in the process of doing a lot of that right now. I’ve been thinking about that.
Thoreau and Kondo Within
David Lowry: We could go back for those of you who love a little classical literature to Henry David Thoreau, writer and philosopher. He spent two years, two months and two days largely by himself next to Walden Pond in Massachusetts. In his words, He wished to live deliberately to front only the essential facts of life and see if he could not learn what it had to teach, and not when he came to die, discover that he had not lived. That’s one of the best observations that came from all of that. And he said, our life is frittered away by details. We need to simplify, simplify, simplify.
Don Drew: Right David, I think it was about six or seven years ago that a Japanese woman by the name of Marie Kondo first entered the world stage with her bestselling book, The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up. That was all about simplifying and decluttering our lives, and it was wildly popular. And today we’re going to turn Kondo’s principles inside ourselves.
David Lowry: That’s getting to who we are as people. We’ve gone to preaching now, Don.
Titles and the Socialized Self
David Lowry: As I reflect on the first half of life as a season of getting and acquiring and trying to be somebody, Ram Das said before you could be nobody, you’ve got to be somebody. And part of that being somebody for me was working my way up as a professor. So, you start off, you have to get all those degrees, have bachelor’s, master’s or doctorate. Then you climb up through the ranks where you’re this lowly instructor all the way up to a full professor, and then you get recognized for writing and publishing and creating. It never really ends. Some people go on and become administrators and college presidents and so forth.
But wow! All of those titles and possessions and status at some point in our life, as we get closer towards the second half and ready for retirement, we realize, hey that’s not who we are anymore. Those titles were great when we had them, but that’s not who we are now.
Don Drew: David, and you’re talking really about professional titles. There’s all kinds of other titles that we have before we ever were teachers, we were college students. We’ve been husbands. We’re dads. Just today I had lunch with my son and I’m a bit older, and so is he now. But I’m still his dad. But who told us to want all these things? Family? Did our family do it? I know in my case, I never really had this concept that I could not go to college. I just thought college is what you did after high school. It was never any question. My dad programmed that into me. And he very much wanted me to go to college. And so I grew up not even thinking there was another option.
Is it our culture? Is it social media? There’s a lot of stuff going on and this idea of the socialized self. We’ve talked about this in other podcasts. The socialized self is constructed of all of these things, of our schooling, of our family, of our churches, the people around us, our nation, our national culture, our Oklahoma culture, if you’re from here. It all makes up this socialized self, and you and I have talked about how important it is to move beyond that to what we call a self-authoring self or even a self-transforming self, in which case we are writing the script ourselves.
So, a lot of these things that we became, or these titles we wear, these masks we wear and so forth, a lot of them were given to us and we just accepted them.
Which Roles Fulfilled Us
Don Drew: So let me ask you a question, David. Did the things that you accumulated these titles and so on, did they actually fulfill you?
David Lowry: Well, yes, some of them actually did. I actually did find very fulfilling. For instance, in my area, which was communication, I always loved the study of communication. I loved reading about it. I loved writing about it. I loved teaching it. I loved doing things in it. So yeah, all of that fit with my nature very well.
But some of the other roles that I had, for instance, which was to be a deacon in my church and later on, an elder in my church. And I did those things, but I didn’t enjoy it at all. And I’m not blaming the church. If there were anything to blame, it would be my expectations of what I was supposed to be and do which had been handed to me by the culture, the socialized self that you’re talking about. Where I’m going with all that, Don is yes, these things were real gasoline to a 30, 40, 50-year-old guy, and it moved me along. It allowed me to feed my family, raise my kids, have a decent amount possession and do a lot of fun things. But when I get to this age of life that I am now, I realize that those were just things that were important at the time. They don’t last; they don’t stay with you.
And I’m a lot more concerned these days about who I am on the inside and what I have to offer other people as a friend, a compassionate companion to my wife and on and on and on we could go.
So, the pursuits weren’t wrong, they were necessary, Don. But I’m just wondering, as you think about all the hats that you wore over the year and you wore quite a few, how have you sorted through all of that?
Don Drew: A lot of the things that I have done the titles and so forth, they have been fulfilling. But they also sometimes just kept me busy. So, my answer would be some of both, right? Education, for instance, was always important to me. The titles that came with my increased education were very validating of my love for being an educated person. But the longer I wore those titles, the more I realized all that I didn’t know. I don’t get the kick out of it that I once did because I know what it is. I know what I had to go through to do it and what it really meant.
But what I catch myself doing is I catch myself still introducing myself primarily as a former professor because I want people to know that I’ve accomplished these things. But that has done that doesn’t necessarily, it doesn’t have anything to do with who I am or what I’m now. So, it really does both, but part of it is awareness of how those things affect you and what they really mean and then being true to yourself about what they mean now.
David Lowry: When you talk about being true to yourself, Don, and being authentic, this is something that my wife and I were discussing the other day. We’re trying to make a choice when we meet new people or visit with our friends or get together with people, to talk a lot less about the things we used to do and used to be and change the topic to who we are today and what’s important to us that brings meaning to our life as opposed to prestige to our life. Don.
Don Drew: At some point, I guess what you’re saying is the accumulation of all this stuff, all these things we’ve gathered over time, it just becomes clutter in our lives. And I think this started in full bloom, this realization when I was in my fifties and I was at the pinnacle of my academic career. I started realizing that I needed to unload some of these things.
Masks and Fragmented Selves
Don Drew: A very common term that we use for these kinds of identities are masks. So, let’s transition to that way of thinking, David. Can you help us define what masking is, in useful terms?
David Lowry: It started way with the old Greek theater where they would actually make a mask to represent one character. And they would hold the mask on a stick in front of their face. And that would be like the villain. And then there might be the innocent person and they would wear another mask and everything. And we’ve all been wearing these masks all of our lives. Sometimes it was the dutiful son or daughter, or maybe it was the faithful husband or the hardworking employee. Just think of all the masks you’ve worn. You’ve worn the mask of a father and a lover and all these things that you wear.
So clinically speaking, we have a very fractured personality. When I say fractured, what I mean is sometimes we don’t know who we are. Are we the teacher? Are we the professional? Are we the religious leader? We get so caught up in all those things that we’re doing that we forget that there’s a greater thread within us, the authentic person that we should want to be, that doesn’t place a value on being greater or less than anybody else, but just wants to be a loving expression of kindness and compassion and helpfulness to other people.
When you think about all that, is that really what we want to wear in front of our children, in front of our family and friends? Or is it about time to say, Hey I’m going to let that go. Maybe it’s time to, say, hey let’s take this to Goodwill and move on.
Don Drew: Well, they have served a purpose. Okay, so let’s just, let’s talk about a couple up here. Okay?
Common Masks We Wear
Don Drew: So, think about the idea of the competent professional. I know that you and I both in our careers have wanted to come across as being competent professionals. Why do we do that? Why do we put that a mask on? We have a hope that we’ll be respected when we wear that mask. Or the always strong parent, the hope that our children and friends won’t see the inadequacies that we have. Quite often we feel like we have to be perfect parents, so we put on the perfect parent mask. But that is another kind of mask.
Then a couple of favorites of mine. The person who has it all together. The hope that they won’t be found out to be fake. There’s this thing called imposter syndrome, and anybody in the workplace that has been promoted or moved into a new position they put on this mask of total competence and so on, but inside we feel like an imposter. The person who has it all together really is a myth. It really is. And we may have our moments where we have it all together, but we don’t keep it together very long.
Another favorite of mine is the people pleaser. And when somebody is people pleasing. They’re hoping to be liked. So, we wear these masks and there’s so many more. Some of them are titles, some of them are types of ways of being and so forth, but they’re all designed to send a message that is not necessarily true about us or who we are.
Vulnerability Over Perfection
David Lowry: Absolutely, I have some friends of the family who I know are going through a rough patch. Kids are kids, right? Why can’t we say? And they can sometimes really, put you through it. But when they talk about their kids, it’s always with the best possible face and their family is doing great. And we know for a fact that is not the truth. We both miss when we can’t be vulnerable enough just to say what’s really happening in our life. We feel like we have to be that person, that puts it all together or is loyal and never shows a chink in the armor or anything like that. And more and more, as I get older, I want to be real with other people without them feeling like they need to fix me. And I also want to be able to listen to other people’s woes and problems and have them know, you can talk to me about that. And there’s not much I can do about it, but we could walk through it together and be friends and just be real with each other and at the same time look for things that are happy and joyful and other things. But I’m not looking for perfect friends, and I’m certainly not perfect, and I hope they aren’t looking for perfection in me. I just want to be an authentic human being.
Do you find yourself a little exhausted by all of these masks that people wear?
Don Drew: The answer at one time was yes. I think where I have gotten myself into trouble in the past when I was younger is that I was trying to wear. All of these masks and continue to wear them all at the same time. And it was exhausting.
Today, just speaking about this very day, I’ve been a husband, a dad, a gardener as I was pulling out a lot of plants this morning, because of the bad weather, and a podcaster. And whichever I need to be in the moment is where I’m at now.
The Hidden Cost of Masking
Don Drew: There’s a hidden cost to all of this chronic masking that we do. Can you talk a little bit about that?
David Lowry: The hidden cost is when you are wearing a mask that’s not really who you truly are. If your life is a bit of a struggle, but you feel like you must wear the mask of having it all together and never letting anybody see that you’re sweating or having any kind of difficulty, that can be a bit exhausting. The idea that you must wear this mask of competence, this idea that you’re only as good as the last thing that you produced, or this idea that you must be effective and efficient in all things, and that on your job, if you made a mistake, God forbid, that you ever have to own up to it because that’s not allowed in your job. All of those kinds of masks are unrealistic, exhausting and really anti-human in my opinion. It doesn’t celebrate life. It causes more pain and suffering. It makes us think that we should be better than we are when maybe we’re just being the best that we know how to be.
Don Drew: Burnout in the workplace is epidemic now. And when we put on masks all the time, the relationships that we have are built on the performance of that mask, whatever it is that we’re masking. Rather than true, real connection, I think one of the things we’re calling for in the second half of life is to be able to recognize the importance of connection over performance.
And there’s this interesting concept called emotional labor that I’ve always been fascinated by. It’s defined as severe emotional exhaustion, burnout, anxiety, depression, or decreased job satisfaction.
That comes from essentially acting one way when you feel another way. So, think about the next time you’re in a store and you walk by the return area where you can return goods and so forth. And just take a look at that person there behind the counter. And imagine people are coming to them with all manner of problem and issue and so forth. And their role is to be friendly and to be helpful and so on. And they have to put on a positive face, even though they may be constantly bombarded by ridiculous requests or complaints that people were unhappy. To keep that level of a positive emotion up is draining and it results in things like high anxiety and depression. And we know, scientifically we know that leads to decreased job performance and satisfaction.
David Lowry: What we’re saying here is that the mask that we’ve worn in the past, could be the very thing that’s very imprisoning of us today. Don, as you think about these masks and things like this. I think you and I both say it’s about time that we simplify a bit. That might be the turning point for finding a better way forward in our aging years.
Simplicity and Less Overhead
Don Drew: In the opening line we quoted Thoreau was talking about material simplicity. But he was also referring to psychological simplicity. Okay. There’s not that much difference in the way he uses it. He recognized how much material clutter, in this case, just life was blocking him from being able to effectively use his mind. So, he had to remove himself from all the noise in order to find time to think. And to think clearly. And so that was his goal. He was out there for a little over two years, pretty much by himself.
He went into town a couple of times, but he had almost no visitors and he did not go into town any more than he had to. He was trying to live by the pond, by himself to write, to think, and to become effective in his thinking.
David Lowry: Well, I love Thoreau and I love reading the Thoreau. But I have too many affiliative needs to live out on a pond by myself and only go into town. I need I’m one of those; I’m more like the stereotypical person that needs the pub, to be around my buddies. But the thing that he’s talking about, regardless of whether you’re an introvert or an extrovert, or regardless of whether you’ve got your life all figured out or you’re still trying to sort it, would be this, fewer roles is less mental overhead.
If you have less to worry about or less overhead, then you’ll have more energy for what matters. And of course, the key is learning to balance between what you truly need and what you don’t need. Several years ago, Cary and I decided we’re going to downsize. We had a home that was about 3000 square feet, and we took it down a thousand, right? And it’s easier to manage this home. We don’t have to walk upstairs and vacuum it or anything like that. We don’t have two air conditioners to take care of. So, simplifying it made it a lot nicer. And we’ve given a lot of things away.
I have found that by doing that, that my life is easier to manage and there’s less overhead in my mind. Before I would go on a trip and I’d buy all these things, if I was in Europe, I’d buy some dishes or something like that and figure out how to get them home. I don’t need to keep buying new things. I just need to simplify.
I’ve simplified by getting rid of a lot of the things that I once bought and thought were really important. Probably you have too.
Don Drew: You’ve come about this hard earned. And you’ve come about it in later life. But many of our listeners may be at that point now where they’re coming into the second half of their life and they probably have already questioned the ladder that they’ve been climbing all these years.
One way of looking at this is that our roles come in stages in our lives. And in midlife, we’re questioning the ladder we’ve been climbing because we’ve had to do things to get a right to be on that ladder. We’ve had to earn degrees or promotions in order to be to advance up that ladder. But now they’re questioning whether or not the ladder’s all that important to begin with.
And, you know that’s a tough thing to realize is this ladder you were climbing that meant so much and that you were willing to advance and put on all manner of masks and faces to be successful at it and then realize, Well, gee, maybe that ladder wasn’t all that great after all.
Courage to Be Authentic
Don Drew: This effort you’re talking about, which is to simplify, requires a bit of courage. It’s a bit of a paradox with simplicity. We think about simplicity as being easy, but the paradox of simplicity is it actually takes courage to do less and be less.
It’s easy to go to Vienna like you did a year or so ago, and buy stuff and bring it home, right? That’s what’s almost expected of you. But it’s more difficult to say, Hey, I really. Don’t need this. We’ve been rewarded all our lives for doing and being more. Now we’re saying, you know what, that doesn’t work for me anymore.
David Lowry: Don. One of the realities of aging is that fewer people are watching us. And I would and am doing more of what makes me happy these days in my job and personal life out of my job. And I’m doing less of what doesn’t make me happy. And I’ve noticed that I’m generally a much happier person. Is that happening to you as well?
Don Drew: Yeah, David what you’re really talking about is authenticity and how important that is at this stage of our lives to be authentic to ourselves. But the switch to authenticity isn’t like a light switch. You can’t just turn it on and off, or we can’t just suddenly become authentic when we’ve spent a lifetime wearing masks and being things for other people and I want to challenge you for a second to think about maybe some ways in which life gets in the way of our being authentic.
David Lowry: When you said that authenticity isn’t a light switch, one of the things that occurred to me is. If you’ve been wearing all these masks all these many years, sometimes when your children grow up, for instance, in their way, you have to discover who you are. Or if your marriage didn’t work out, suddenly you have to discover who am I without this partner? What do I really want to do with my life if I retire? It’s time for us to realize that those things aren’t going to help us anymore. We’re going to have to grow towards something more important.
If you care what other people think to the point that you won’t be yourself or say what you truly think and believe or you feared the rejection or judgment from other people so that you allow that to keep you from being who you want to be. It’s sad if you’re still living under the still living as though you must please other people in order to be okay. At some point you have to be good with yourself, good with your ideas, comfortable in your own skin. And if other people like it, that’s wonderful. But if they don’t maybe those people aren’t for you. Maybe it’s time for you to be there for yourself in a kind, loving, and compassionate way, I want to add. But when we can be who we authentically are in a loving, compassionate way, other people find that they’re attracted to it.
Practical Steps to Unmask
Don Drew: David, as we’re moving towards the end of our podcast today, I want to talk about a couple of practical starting points because I would imagine may of our listeners are going, okay, so this is interesting and good stuff, what do I do?
Well, the truth is that awareness is the first act of freedom. Notice when you’re masking, when you’re putting up these false faces. Sometimes when I meet people, I catch myself putting on the mask of being an intellectual or academic, however you want to say it, because it’s safe. I qualify, and it generally earns respect. So, I tend to bring it up. I put that mask on because I want people to think of me in a certain way. But it really doesn’t represent a lot of who I am now. So, I am becoming increasingly aware of when I’m doing that and catching myself doing it. That’s number one.
Number two, it’s important to start small, just like most things, you really need to start with the first step. Be honest in one conversation you’d normally perform in like the example I just gave. The next time I’m introduced, I think I will simply say that I’m an artist and a podcaster, and if someone has more questions, I’ll answer them. That’s a pretty easy thing to say. I could describe myself in a lot of ways. But being honest with others and in the process, being honest with ourselves.
And then the third step is probably to ask yourself regularly, is this what I want or what I think I should want in terms of who I am how I, my identity has been constructed in the present? This idea of what I think I “should” want. There’s that dreaded word “should.” To me that’s a word that needs to be stricken from the English language. Should is useless because we determine if we’re self-authoring, self-transforming people, if we are simplifying our identity, taking off our mask, however you want to say that, we are in a sense driving away the “should” from our life.
David Lowry: A good friend of mine said, we need to stop “shoulding” on ourselves, and I think they’re right.
Don Drew: Well, oh, that works. So, the reward is that the relationships and experiences we have, then if we do those kinds of things, they will reflect our real self.
Choose Who You Are Today
Don Drew: And so, with that, let me revisit Henry David Thoreau, he went into the woods, not to escape life, but to live more deliberately. Living more deliberately means living in the moment and being pleased with who we are now.
David Lowry: You’re absolutely right Don. And as we get ready to close, we might ask ourselves this week, what’s a role or expectation or mask that we’re ready to set down? Don, you were talking about how you might introduce yourself later on, like a writer, or a podcaster, or an artist. We get to choose. We get to decide who we are and how we want to introduce ourselves. We don’t need to be apologetic about it. We should just say, that’s who I am today. I encourage us to go about that this week and do that.
Closing and Next Steps
Louisa: Thank you for listening to The Fifth Season Podcast with David Lowry and Don Drew. Please visit our website at fifthseasonpodcast.com and like or share our podcast with your friends. Also, please email us with your questions or suggestions for future podcasts. We really do want to hear from you. Join us again next week. And finally, thanks again for joining us on this journey of successful aging. We’ll see you next week on The Fifth Season.