More than the degrees.

Who we are when we step away from the résumé.

With a few master’s degrees under my belt, people have started joking with me: “What’s next?” Another degree? A PhD? A Nobel Prize?

I know they mean well. But every time I hear it, I feel a little more invisible.

What they see are the accomplishments. The bullet points. The LinkedIn-worthy milestones. What they don’t see is the thoughtfulness behind each decision. The late-night conversations with friends and loved ones. The internal debates. The known impending sacrifices that came with each decision to pursue what felt important at the time.

Really, the quiet courage it took to say yes, again, to something that would demand so much of me.

So while they laugh, I don’t feel insulted, I just don’t feel seen. And to feel connected, we need to feel seen.

I was chatting with a new-ish friend recently, and I realized I didn’t even know what she did for work. Not because I didn’t care, but because that’s not the first question I like to ask when I meet someone. This time, I needed to know for context purposes... she’s going through a career transition, and context helps. We laughed about it and both appreciated that we’d gotten to know each other without leading with our résumés.

I’m not saying we should never ask. But there’s something beautiful about building a relationship before work enters the room. Yes, work takes up so much of our lives, but I’ve come to strongly believe that I’m meant to work to live, not the other way around. There’s a kind of magic in connecting first as people, not professions. Maybe that feels different for you.

The truth is, I used to lead with my accomplishments. I’ve always loved learning, still do, but somewhere along the way, something shifted. Maybe it was after I earned my first master’s degree. Maybe it was the way people started to see me, or rather, the way they stopped seeing me and only saw the accolades. Maybe it was the quiet reckoning of the pandemic, when the noise fell away and I had time to sit with myself. I began to understand that I no longer wanted to be defined by what I had done. I wanted to be known for who I was and becoming as a person.

And that’s a moving target. What I want my life to look like changes daily. But I’m learning and trying to be intentional about it.

I know I want to be a good person. That resonates. I’ve been finding that I regularly ask myself, “how do I want to show up in the world?”

I know it’s not as a résumé or list of degrees. Not as a title. But as someone who listens more than they speak. Someone who sees, and longs to be seen. Someone who loves deeply, and lingers in the small, sacred moments with the people who matter most to me.

And if you’re also figuring out who you are beyond your accomplishments, welcome. You’re not alone.