I recently stumbled across a new podcast called Millennial. It is a refreshingly youthful, creative, sweet, painfully familiar autobiography of a recently graduated millennial. We follow her as she navigates unemployment, self-worth, and identity. We join her as she figures out how to create a successful podcast from the ground up, while working a 9 to 5. I sunk deep into my chair as she discussed the expectations she had for herself post-graduation, a reminder of my own professional expectations I had the year after graduation.

Many of us are navigating a chapter in our life where we (kind of) know who we are, but are presented with a daily, ever-changing crisis of what we do. Some of us may be comfortable where we are at, but many of us are still struggling to find jobs we are qualified for, rent that is not exponentially increasing, or houses that aren't falling apart. We are flooding into cities after brief periods of living at home post-graduation, coming back from months of traveling, starting families, or balancing multiple jobs. I began to think about the way many of us millennials answer the familiar, daunting, often stress-inducing question "what do you do?" and how the way we answer is a symptom of a greater social pressure to be successful.

What do you do? They ask.
I am a farmer and work part time in an office, I reply.

Why does the answer to this question jeopardize our identity?

When asked, "What do you do?" more often than not we answer with "I am ______." How have we been conditioned so well that we answer this broad, open-ended question with our job title! Our job title! Over time, we may begin to define our self-worth by our financial stability. There is so much pressure on what you do that defines you, so you fall into the habit of letting it define you. This passivity begins to erode our ability to actively engage with who we are, based on our changing hobbies, interests, passions, and personality.

Why do we ask this loaded question in the first place? How has this become the first question we ask a stranger? Unfortunately, we live in a country where our rank, paycheck, socioeconomic status, job title and profession define what our level of success is. Can this be our subconscious attempting to measure up to this individual and define their worth and thus our own self-worth? Underneath this seemingly innocent question, lies a deeper rooted inquisition. How does this interaction allow you to connect with the person across from you? Instead, what if we started to ask, What are you passionate about?

I garden, I read, I keep chickens, I ferment, I ride bikes, I work hard, I am a community member. I am able to do all of these things on top of holding down multiple jobs and managing a plethora of projects because I try my hardest not to let my profession define and alter my identity. Next time you meet someone new or reconnect with an old acquaintance, don't answer with what you do professionally, but rather, what you are passionate about.