Day 42: Your gift is not your identity. | The Walk Out

Yesterday we said the worst that was done to you isn’t your identity. Today the same is true about your gift.

TODAY’S TRUTH What you’re good at is a gift from God. It is not who you are.

THE READ “Now to each one the manifestation of the Spirit is given for the common good.” — 1 Corinthians 12:7

Paul is talking about gifts — the things people are uniquely good at — and says they’re given by the Spirit, for the good of other people. They’re not for showing off. They’re not for personal identity. They’re tools.

THE REAL Some of us are really good at something. Music. Words. Selling. Hustling. Reading people. Building things. Fighting. Cooking. Telling stories. Making people laugh. Getting attention.

That gift becomes our identity. We say “I’m a [whatever].” We base our self-worth on whether we’re using the gift well. We get scared when the gift isn’t working — when we have writer’s block, when nobody’s buying, when we lose our edge. Because if the gift is who we are, then losing the gift means losing ourselves.

The gift was a gift. From God. Given for the common good. It’s a thing about you, not the totality of you.

If you’ve made your gift your identity, here’s what’s been happening: every time you fail at the gift, you experience it as a failure of self. Every time someone better at the gift comes along, you feel diminished as a person. Every time the gift isn’t useful — or isn’t appreciated — you wonder why you exist.

That’s a lot to put on a gift. The gift was never supposed to do all that.

You are loved on the days you’re crushing your gift. You are loved on the days you’re not. Your worth isn’t tied to whether you’re producing.

PULL UP What’s your gift? Have you been making it your identity? What happens to you on the days the gift isn’t working?

THE MOVE Today, deliberately do something you’re not good at. Just for the experience of being not-good-at-something and still being a person.

TRACK IT How did it feel?