Identity, and what it means to me

Inspired by NicoleandMaggie who asked: “Who are you?  Are you what you do?  Are you what you think you are?  Is your identity important, and if so, how?”

I’m an engineer.  I don’t define myself by my job, but the engineering mentality is part of my identity and would be even if I no longer worked in engineering.  This is also code for things like practical and rational with an appreciation for math and problem solving.  I’m not a tinkering sort of engineer, but  I appreciate working on something that is going to be BUILT rather than a more science-y approach of knowledge for the sake of knowledge.  I hate inefficiency.  I get strange delight when I discover irrationalities in my favor, like the time when the travel size contact solution was cheaper per an ounce than the full size, or when the sampler of 4 small beers was cheaper per an ounce than a full size beer.  (These both happened on the same long weekend!  Am I the only one who thinks that is wild?!)

I’m a midwesterner, even though I may never live in the midwest again.  I have a bias in favor of all midwesterners, as they are good, friendly, sensible people.  In my circle of friends, all of the former midwesterners are punctual people.  This is IMPORTANT, it shows you respect other’s time.  They don’t lie, and they are just plain NICE.  When I go “home”, I note the culture shift and I feel so much more relaxed and… at home!  It speaks to my ties to my family, my roots, and my childhood.

That said, I’m a midwesterner who is deeply in love with  California, enough so to deprive my hypothetical children the privilege of being Midwesterners themselves.  Sorry!

I’m also a wife, daughter, sister, aunt, and friend.  It probably says something about me that I don’t mentally identify myself in relationship to those I love, but I’m not sure what.  Probably something bad / unflattering.

I’m an introvert, but this isn’t something I really identify as, it is more just a useful tool to explain my personality to others who are more extroverted.  Note:  introvert is not equivalent to shy, extroverted is not (always) equivalent to obnoxious.  In more detail, I’m (most often) an INTJ.

I’m a runner.  Sometimes this is a bigger part of my identity than others (i.e now).  Sometimes I blog, but I don’t think of myself as a blogger.  I am a lapsed PFer.  Although I’m most certainly a woman, I don’t really identify as a woman any more than I identify as… a person.  It is hard to describe.  Does anyone more eloquent understand what I mean by this?  I wonder if this is because popular culture so often presents the majority of stories (movies, books, TV) from the point of a view of a man.

Backpacking in the mountains is merely something I do, but it means so much to me that I wonder if I can somehow make it part of my identity, even when it only uses up small slivers of my life.  I have an adventurous spirit, but can I call myself an adventurer when most days I just go to work and then home?  I’m a feminist, but similar to an introvert, only as a tool to describe where I’m coming from.

My identity is important to me, and probably to those closest to me (but most important to me, clearly).  The rest of the world doesn’t care much and is satisfied by whatever labels are convenient to apply.  I’m OK with that.

What about you?  What do you consider to be key parts of your identity, and how do they differ from the things that you do, and the things that other people may label you with?