More Than What You Do: Escaping the Identity Trap

Written By: Brad Pedersen

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I was born into a tall family. 

Helped by viking genetics, my father was tall, as were his brothers and nearly all of my cousins. 

This picture from a trip to China, where he is stooping over to get closer to me, helps give you a sense of the height difference. I was one of the few in the family who didn’t inherit the tall person trait. No one made a point of it, but from an early age, I noticed the difference—not necessarily in how others treated me, but in how I viewed myself. 

It was a subtle contrast that lit a fire inside of me; a desire and need to prove myself.  I began to try and compensate for my self perceived limitation. I ran faster, climbed higher, took bigger leaps—always trying to demonstrate that I could measure up in other ways. 

There was also another important influence from my father. He believed in the value of doing hard work.  In everything he applied himself too, the expectation was he would give it his all and it would be done with excellence.   

Driven by a quiet inferiority around my height and shaped by modeling my dad’s work ethic, I set out to prove myself through effort. In an unspoken attempt to earn his affection—though he likely never saw it that way—I became the hardest working person I knew.

Deep down, I came to believe that love was earned through doing hard things with excellence—and over time, I internalized a rule: if it wasn’t difficult, it didn’t really count. 

This drive to exceed, to prove my potential, became a defining feature of how I would approach both life and business. 

When Work Becomes Who You Are

When I launched my first company, I chose one of the most difficult paths imaginable: a toy company, bootstrapped from my basement, in a region known more for oil and agriculture.  In many ways, that choice made perfect sense for someone who needed to prove himself through doing difficult things.

It was hard, unproven and would require relentless effort; and it was because of that—it felt like it mattered.  While initially the idea was mocked and ridiculed with many believing that I was just ‘going through a phase’ and eventually I would ‘come to my senses,’ the fledgling upstart started to get traction. 

As the business grew, so did the validation I had quietly craved—especially from my father. I was building something challenging, and I was doing it quickly, which in my mind signaled excellence. That combination aligned perfectly with what I believed would earn respect. And so the cycle began: the more success I experienced, the more of myself I poured into the business—fueling a flywheel driven by my needs for approval.

Without even realizing it, the business began to take up more than just my time—it began to take over my identity. It became my introduction in every room I stepped into, as I wanted people to know that I was a founder of a fast growing start up. 

However beneath the surface, something had shifted.  The business was no longer just what I did, it had become who I was and how I measured my worth.

When Strength Becomes a Liability

When we allow our work to define us—when identity becomes attached to performance—we start playing an unwinnable game. Not only because we let the other important factors of our identity atrophy but because if our worth is performance-based, then we’re only as valuable as our last success.  The truth is that physically and mentally we peak in our late 20’s. From that point on we are in a state of decline and trying to live as if they are a constant is delusional.  As the saying goes, “all race horses eventually go lame.”

This was the trap I found myself slipping into.

What began as a healthy drive to build something meaningful quietly morphed into an identity tethered entirely to my work. In the early days, that drive was the fuel behind launching my first startup—it propelled me down the path of entrepreneurship with energy and ambition. However our greatest strengths can also become our greatest liabilities.

For me, hard work was more than a virtue—it was a proving ground. I used it to compensate for what I perceived as my shortcomings, to prove my worth, to feel like I measured up. While that work ethic helped generate the momentum needed to grow the business, it also became the lens through which I measured my value to the world.

Yes, I had a wife I loved, a growing family, a life of faith, and other personal values, however if I’m honest—my investment of time and attention suggested that my identity and purpose in life revolved around my work. 

Unconsciously, I had adopted a belief system that looked like this:

Do hard things (DO) → Gain respect and success (HAVE) → Feel worthy of love and belonging (BE)

I had built my identity on performance and the more I achieved, the more fragile I became—terrified of what it would mean to stop, slow down, or as I would soon discover fail in business. 

My value felt tied to output and my sense of self was held together by results.

Bringing the Unconscious Into the Light

Carl Jung once said, “Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate.”

For me, the unconscious belief was that: my identity was tied to what I did, not who I was and as such my sense of purpose was built on output.

However, like most meaningful shifts, awareness didn’t come all at once. It began with a wake-up call in the form of a significant business challenge that led to bankruptcy. It was humbling, disorienting, and also a necessary part of my growth journey.

But that was only part of my awakening; there was still another layer to uncover—another important lesson that would become crucial in understanding my identity and how it tied to my purpose.

And that’s where we’ll pick up next week.

A Gentle Pause

So as you think about what is your purpose in life and how your identity informs what you believe it is, ask yourself the following questions? 

• Where have I allowed performance or success to define my sense of worth—and what might be the cost of that belief?
  
  
• Am I living from a clear sense of who I am, or am I still trying to prove something—perhaps to someone I haven’t thought about in years?
  
  
• What parts of my identity—family, faith, creativity, contribution—have I unintentionally let atrophy, and how might I begin to reinvest in them?

These questions aren’t meant to produce quick answers, but to open up space for your deeper awareness. Our purpose isn’t something we stumble into; it’s something we uncover through reflection, intention, and often, a bit of unlearning. 

Maya Angelou once said, “You alone are enough. You have nothing to prove to anybody.” When we begin to live from who we are—not just what we do—we tap into a richer, fuller and more complete state of being. 

It’s about arriving at a place where our sense of worth isn’t tied to performance, but grounded in the belief that we are already enough. From that foundation of abundance, we can begin to design a life with purpose—intentionally developing all our assets to live our true potential–to live life to the full!

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