You Are Not Your Work

For a long time, I thought I was.

Not in an obvious, career-obsessed way, not in the “hustle culture” sense of working 80-hour weeks to build an empire. It was more subtle

than that. More insidious.

Work was never just about the paycheck. It was proof of existence. A way to mark time. A way to justify my place in the world. A way to answer the question, Who am I? without having to think too hard about it.

Because when you strip that away, when you wake up without a title, without a role, without something to “contribute”, you come face-to-face with a much harder question:

Who am I, when I’m not doing anything?

I didn’t choose to confront that question. Major Depressive Disorder chose for me.

When you’re out of work for a long time, when your mind and body say “no” long before you’re ready to admit it, something happens. At first, there’s the shock. The void where structure used to be. No Monday meetings, no emails, no projects. Just… empty space. Days that stretch out, long and quiet, filled with nothing but your own thoughts.

And that’s where the real battle begins.

Because in a world that worships productivity, not working starts to feel like not existing. You see people moving, building, achieving, and you start to wonder, If I’m not contributing, what am I?

There’s this deeply embedded lie we’re all sold, whether we realise it or not: your worth is tied to your usefulness. Not just in the obvious economic sense, but in a

fundamental, existential way. We are conditioned to believe that who we are is what we do. That our value is in the work we produce, the roles we fill, the way we “show up” in the world.

But when you can’t show up? When your body won’t cooperate, when your mind is telling you stories, when simply getting through the day feels like an achievement, what then?

If I’m not “useful,” am I still worth something?

It’s one thing to say, intellectually, Of course, your worth isn’t tied to your job. It’s another to sit in that truth when the world moves on without you.

And I’ll be honest, it took me a long time to believe it. When you’ve spent your whole life measuring yourself by what you produce, stepping outside of that framework feels like stepping into nothingness.

At first, I resisted it. I searched for other ways to “justify” myself, maybe I wasn’t working, but I was still learning, still thinking, still useful in some way. I tried to negotiate my worth, even in stillness. But then came the deeper, harder realisation:

I am not my work.

I am not my productivity.

I am not a function, a role, a tool.

I exist, and that is enough.

And maybe that sounds simple, but if you’ve ever been in that place, if you’ve ever felt like a ghost while the world moves on without you, you know how much of a fight it is to believe it. To hold onto the truth that your existence is not something you have to earn.

This isn’t some neat, packaged revelation. I still catch myself slipping, still tying my value to what I can offer, still feeling that deep, nagging guilt that I need to justify my place in the world. But I see it now. I catch it. And I remind myself:

If I had nothing to offer, no job, no talent, no skill, I would still be worth something.

And so would you.

No matter what the world tells you. No matter what your mind tells you. No matter how long you’ve been carrying the weight of proving yourself.

You were never your work. You were never your productivity.

You were never something to be measured.

You are enough. Simply because you are.

Sit with that for a second.

Not because of what you’ve done.

Not because of what you’ve built, achieved, fixed, provided.

Not because of the role you play in someone else’s life.

Not because of your potential, your effort, or your usefulness.

Simply because you are.

If you’ve ever been through a long stretch of not working, not contributing, not “achieving” in the way the world expects, you’ll know how hard that sentence is to accept. You might read it and think, Yeah, sounds nice, but in reality… And then comes the inner voice, the one that’s been trained by years of expectation, by a world that often treats humans as resources, by the subtle and not-so-subtle ways society equates worth with output:

If I’m not doing anything, what’s the point?

What am I contributing? What am I giving back?

Who am I, if I’m just… here?

That last one hits the hardest.

Because without work, without structure, without something external to define you, you’re left with just you. And if you don’t know how to sit with that, if you’ve spent your whole life proving your right to exist through effort, what’s left?

For me, it felt like falling into a kind of nothingness. A blank space where identity should be. Days that stretched out with no clear reason to get up, no sense of direction. And underneath it all, a fear I didn’t want to say out loud: If I’m not doing something, will people still care about me?

That’s the real terror, isn’t it? Not just losing a job, or a role, or a purpose, but losing the connection that comes with it. Because so much of modern life is built around being useful to others, to workplaces, to families, to friends. If you step out of that cycle, what happens? Do you disappear?

I wish I could say there was a sudden, profound moment where I “got it”, where I realised my worth had nothing to do with my usefulness and

everything clicked into place. But that’s not how it works. This isn’t a revelation. It’s a daily reckoning.

Because here’s the truth:

Even knowing that I am not my work, that my worth is not conditional, I still struggle to believe it.

That’s the depth of the conditioning. That’s how deep the hooks go. Even now, if I’m not actively doing something, a small voice still whispers, Shouldn’t you be contributing?

And every time, I have to make the choice—again and again—to remind myself that I was never my work in the first place.

Existing is Enough

This is where it gets uncomfortable.

Because if your worth isn’t tied to work, or output, or usefulness, then what is it tied to?

Nothing. And everything.

It’s tied to the fact that you are here.

It’s tied to the fact that you are breathing, thinking, feeling, experiencing, being.

It’s tied to the fact that, even in your quietest moments,

even in your stillness, you matter.

This isn’t about rejecting effort, or ambition, or drive.

It’s not about pretending that work doesn’t shape us, give us purpose, help us grow. Work can be meaningful. Work can be a part of who we are. But it is not,

and never was, the measure of our worth.

So, if you ever find yourself in that place, the one where you feel invisible, where you question if you matter without something to show for it, know this:

You were enough before you ever worked a day in your life.

You will be enough long after you stop.

You are not something that needs to be justified.

You are enough.

Simply because you are.