While searching for a video or description of the drunk surrounded by a lamppost that I mentioned in my previous post, I failed to find the story for which I was searching. Instead, I found several references to a joke about a drunk looking for his keys.
In essence the joke goes like this.
A drunk loses the keys to his house and is looking for them under a lamppost. A policeman comes over and asks what he’s doing.
“I’m looking for my keys” he says. “I lost them over there”.
The policeman looks puzzled. “Then why are you looking for them all the way over here?”
“Because the light is so much better”.
I am struck that, while comically illustrated above, I actually do spend a lot of time looking under that lamppost; in both my personal and professional lives. I look for identity in how others see me sometimes. I look for comfort in what I have, not what I need. I look for answers in the data I have, not necessarily the data that would really clarify the solution.
How about you?
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October 17, 2011 at 4:50 PM
rokalily
Identity is an odd thing. We own it; it is ours, yet we often let other people or our jobs define us. I know I am as guilty of that as the next person. But the danger in that is what if I lose a job or the perception an important person has of me is skewed or not realistic. What then? Who am I then?
October 17, 2011 at 5:15 PM
Ellen
There is a job/career self-help book called “Do What You Are”, based on Myers-Briggs personality profiles. It focuses broadly, too broadly, I think, on selecting a career path that capitalizes on your natural strengths. I think it is great to do what you are, but the reverse, being what you do; rooting your identity in your work; has inherent hazards… especially in today’s job market.
October 17, 2011 at 8:56 PM
j
Way too funny.. sorry but blonde jokes are just that.. good to laugh at. I’d laugh if it were a red head joke too.
October 21, 2011 at 10:19 PM
Curt S
Everything is defined relative to a constant, benchmark, perception or belief. Nothing just is…others identity for you is too influenced by their ideas and not what you really are.
You want to know how you are identified? I saw an episode of “I used to be fat” last weekend. The young boy Josh (after losing 115 lbs) said, “When people see me now they don’t say there goes a fat kid. They just there there … is a kid”. Made me love him for the self-pain he was able to shed with the weight.
The easy way out is to steer for the light the of the lamppost. I can’t say I haven’t looked for an easy solution in the past – only to be disappointed or sent back the starting line as often or more than I cut the corner.
I don’t need the lampost to find what I need to see with my rose colored glasses. I am more focused on what I see ego is replaced by age (I wanted to say ‘wisdom’ instead of age but that would be a stretch).