How we identify ourselves affects our outcome

I often see folks who are heavily identified with the “I am not a good enough person, worker, wife, husband, partner etc.”, which manifest in many unhelpful ways. Their lives can be full of doubt and insecurities.

This then can be extremely debilitating for them despite their strong desire and motivation to change. They may try very hard to change their thinking, feeling and doing, but are unable to defuse or distance from their “not good enough identity”. So things may not change at a deeper level.

So it makes me think about how we as a group identify ourselves as a Profession.

So how do we identify ourselves as GPs?

The answer will often explain why we feel the way we feel, think the way we think, do what we do, and achieve a certain recurring outcome.

To change our outcome, we may need to do more than just change our thinking, feeling and doing. We may need to change at our “Identity level”.

Are we the “Health Architect” of our patient’s health journey due to our general bigger picture knowledge?

Do we value “Generalism” because generalism allows us to take a bigger picture approach to our patient’s health journey?

Do we identify ourselves as “Just a GP” or a “Gatekeeper”?

How we define “our identity” matters isn’t it?

I wonder if you know what I mean.