Shonda Rhimes, with four television shows simultaneously in production, is an entertainment industry titan. In a recent TED talk, she described her deep passion for her work: “When I’m hard at work, when I’m deep in it, there is no other feeling…It is hitting every high note. It is running a marathon. It is being Beyoncé. And it is all of those things at the same time. I love working… A hum begins in my brain, and it grows and it grows and that hum sounds like the open road, and I could drive it forever.”
How to Make Room in Your Work Life for the Rest of Your Self
If the hum of your career has become so deafening that you struggle to hear other parts of your life, you’re not alone. Managing many different roles and identities is challenging for todays’ workers and their organizations. The greedy nature of our work (asking us to wear more hats, to do more, to be always on), combined with the demands of our personal lives and social pressure to be and focus on just one thing, means we need to learn how to manage our portfolio of different identities and the expectations that come with them. Through interviews with hundreds of workers, researchers have found that the right strategies can help us harness our complex identities to benefit ourselves, our relationships, and our organizations. Their research suggests some simple changes to how you think about yourself, how you act out your identities, and how you make space for others’ identities can help you successfully manage your multiple identities, and thrive as a complex and whole person.