Finding Your Identity as a Working Mom

You’ve been feeling a bit lost lately, unsure of who you are. Your identity has been tied up in one space of your life, and shifting between motherhood and your career has you feeling stuck.

When your identity is defined by one role in your life, it’s easy to fall into feeling trapped, worried, and unsure of yourself when you try to embrace the other parts of you.

I’ve worked with many women who value their careers, but find that it’s consuming their energy and their thoughts, leaving little room for the rest of the roles they hold. You want to show your children that they, too, can have it all. Yet you’re finding it hard to not be wrapped up in work and all the stress that it brings.

You get through a long work day and find that you can’t mentally leave it. You’re with your kids, but your mind is on work.

You’re realizing so much of your value has been found in who you are in your career. You’re a high achiever, and it feels good to succeed, to be confident in the work you do. But it’s also limiting you from feeling present with your family, and with yourself.

If your focus has been stuck in the work realm of your life, it’s going to to take some shifting in your mindset to find your identity outside of work. But it’s possible, and beyond that, it’s incredibly rewarding to begin to notice the other parts of your identity and show up for those parts with love too.

How do you work through an identity crisis as a working mom?

Let’s start with defining your identity. Think about all the parts of you. Are you a hard worker in your career? A mom? A wife? What else is there? Maybe you’re an athlete, an artist, a creative. Write it all down, all the different parts of what makes you you.

Then sit with each one. This doesn’t have to take a long time to be meaningful for you. Notice each part of your identity, and think about how you nurture it. Recognize what you do when you’re in each role.

Give attention to your goals, what you want to be different about each part of your identity. Do you want to be more present as a mom? Do you have goals in your hobbies that you want to pursue? What about your career goals?

I like to imagine it as a Venn Diagram. Each circle is a different part of your identity, but these parts also overlap in different ways. If it helps, draw it out for yourself.

Think about how each part of you supports another part. Maybe you want to model to your children how to work hard, or how to care for yourself. The things you do in your career or in your self-care are also part of your motherhood identity, as you intentionally show your children the values you hope to instill in them.

When we become more thoughtful about the parts of ourselves and how they work together, we find that our identity is more complete, more understood, and more nurtured.

As you notice all the parts of you, and begin to nurture your goals in different areas of your life, you’ll find that it comes more naturally to feel more assured in who you are, instead of being caught up in an identity crisis trying to balance it all.

Make it a daily (or weekly) practice of briefly checking in with yourself when you start to notice the stressful fixated thinking patterns. Shift your thinking to other parts of you. Notice how it feels as you tune into other aspects of your identity.

If you find that you want more help working through an identity crisis and showing up differently in your daily life, reach out today to get started in coaching. I help overwhelmed working moms find balance, boundaries, and calm.