It’s everywhere. Adorning doors, desks, business cards. Doctor. Lawyer. Journalist. General Manager. Chef.

It has become a social requirement in many a circle to introduce yourself by your first name, followed by corporate title. Even if you omit it, your new acquaintance is bound to ask: “Well, what do you do?” Without hesitation, you shoot like a batsman trying to invent a new score, hitting two sixes in one motion. “I’m a doctor for a renowned hospital.”

Who can blame you? You spent years, which felt more like centuries, in medical school fighting your way through the battlefield of lectures, lecturers, two-tonne textbooks, finals, and frequent midnight oil sessions. Who would dare tell you not to use your hard-fought designation in an introduction?

You have made a huge step in the right direction towards making something of yourself. You are gaining financial strength and social mobility. You have made your family proud.

Of course it’s worth celebrating, but does your title define you?

It’s a world-wide phenomenon that takes control of our society and sets the tone for how much weight you should pile on to the already overburdened scale of your role in life. We push our children to vie for the already saturated professions and grab their accompanying titles so much so that they forget (or never learned in the first place) how to think outside of the box. But that’s a discussion for another day.

Think about it though. When you come home, take off your white coat and put down your stethoscope, who are you? When you take off the power suit and put away the brief case, who are you? No one in your house calls you ‘Doctor’. No one calls you ‘Lawyer’. So who are you, really?

Very often, people take on these titles and forget who they really are at their core. It’s as though their existence is housed in and depends on the titles. They forget the person they were before they got dressed and left the house. They forget the things that make them happy; the things that make them better human beings.

But the professional title you wear between 9:00am and 5:00pm ends at 5:01pm. That’s when who you really are emerges.

There are people in your life who see through that white coat. You could never have a conversation with them while wearing your ‘doctor’s hat’ and not get a side eye. So why do it with a new acquaintance?

Don’t allow society’s expectations to make you feel trapped in your title, so much so that it saps your happiness and make you regret the ‘centuries’ you spent studying to get where you are today.

If you’ve already gone over the rails, it’s not too late to regain your compass and really search deep within for that person who is a true representation of who you are proud to be. Separating your professional life from your personal life is an important way of maintaining balance in your life.

So the next time that someone asks you “Well, what do you do?” tell them: “I hike the Blue Mountain every chance I get, I ride dirt bikes in the rain, and I lay out on the beach until I get crispy.”

Be balanced.

Christina is a writer and photographer who holds a Bachelor of Applied Science in Psychology. She believes the simple truths and nuances of life stare us right in the face but we just need someone to help us see them. Her intent is to bring that insight in your life and create balance. Tell her what you think in the comments below.