Sometimes life can feel a bit like, "you are what you do". Someone asks us who we are, and we reply with a list of titles: “I am a stay-at-home parent,” “I am a writer,” or “I am a homeschooler.” The problem with this identity conflation is that one day, these roles and titles may change and we find ourselves rudderless. For so long we have built our identity on the rock of what we do that when we are no longer doing it, we flounder. Men experience a mid-life crisis. Women experience empty-nest. As I approach this critical transition, I can't help but feel that we need some proactive identity reminders (or maybe some retrospective rebuilding).

Grab that coffee and let's go back to the truth: we are both so much MORE and blessedly so much LESS than our titles presume. And only when we see ourselves through God's eyes can we truly be free of the expectations of others (and more importantly, ourselves).