119. Rip up your death resume
I was having lunch with a friend who was talking about someone she’d known who had died recently. And he had lived a “BIG” life. His obituary listed an impressive string of accomplishments.
And it made her feel that familiar sense of inadequacy that we can all relate to.
“What have I done?”
“What have I accomplished of any importance?”
And of course, when it's someone else—not me—that’s feeling inadequate, it’s easy to see the total ridiculousness of it.
In that moment, it became crystal clear to me that she was assessing her worth based on criteria that weren't meant for her.
Comparing apples to oranges.
She did not have a high-powered job, a long list of awards, or a huge salary. And as her friend, I couldn’t have cared less.
What I care about—and what I suspect most people who know her care about—is who she is, not what she's accomplished.
She’s joyful, playful, funny, and has a great laugh. She’s deeply appreciative of nature and beauty, and is a maker of art. She’s generous with her time and spirit, a great listener and storyteller. She’s emotionally honest, courageous, and intelligent. She has a huge circle of friends and has nurtured these relationships well. In other words, she’s relationship rich.
But that’s not what she was evaluating herself on.
It struck me how incredibly unjust it was to measure her worth as a person through some arbitrary success metrics.
So I blurted out,
“Who cares what's on your death resume?!"
And we burst out laughing.
But the idea stuck with me.
We build—and carefully curate—our work resumes so that other people can evaluate us.
It’s up to us to look impressive—and up to them to deem whether we’re accomplished and worthy enough to hire. Let’s call them the Deemers.
Somewhere along the way we internalize the feeling of being assessed—and create a second, imaginary panel of Deemers. But rather than evaluating whether we’re worthy of a job, they’re evaluating whether WE’RE worthy. Period.
It’s up to us to look impressive, so we work to build—and carefully curate—our death resumes.
And if we’re successful—and build an exceptionally impressive death resume, it’ll get printed in the paper … and we won’t even be around to see how impressed everyone is with it!
Even so, we regularly ask ourselves:
Have I accomplished enough?
Made enough money?
Had a big enough impact?
Am I enough?
(Has anyone ever answered yes to these questions?)
It seems impossible to live up to the expectations of the Deemers … but who exactly are these people? Who is it that I’m trying to impress? It’s surprisingly hard to name anyone who sits on this powerful committee, waiting to judge me.
So let’s rip up our death resumes! Fire the Deemers!
…
Yet even as I write this, I can hear the niggling doubts:
How will people receive this?
Is it valuable—or trite?
Should I have left it in my journal?
Crap.
The Deemers are at it again. They’ve had this job for a long time. They’re not going quietly.
Maybe I can’t silence them overnight.
But maybe I can be more selective about who’s eyes I see myself through.
Instead of an imaginary, impossible-to-please committee, maybe I can try to see myself a little more through the eyes of the people who know and love me.
Not as a tally of accomplishments, but as a whole person.
Measuring can be dangerous!