When Life Changes, You're Still You
If you lose your job, you might feel like you've lost yourself. If your marriage ends, you might not know who you are anymore. If serious illness changes everything, you may feel completely lost.
This makes sense. We build our lives around our work, relationships, health, and living situations. When those things change, it feels like our identity disappears with them.
But here's something worth considering: your circumstances and your identity are two different things.
How We Mix Them Up
From childhood, we learn to describe ourselves through our situations: "I'm a student," "I'm from Texas," "I'm the middle child." As adults, this continues: "I'm a nurse," "I'm married," "I'm a runner."
These statements feel true because they describe our life right now. But they're actually describing temporary situations, not who we really are.
The problem starts when we build our whole sense of self around these situations. Your job becomes who you are. Your relationship status defines your worth. Your health problems become your identity.
When situations change—and they always do—you feel lost because you've been using outside circumstances to answer "Who am I?"
Why We Do This
Using circumstances to define ourselves serves some purposes:
It's easy to explain yourself to others through roles they understand. Complex identity questions get simplified into simple categories. Society treats people differently based on their circumstances—job titles, relationship status, achievements. Shared circumstances help you connect with others in similar situations.
But this creates problems. When your identity depends on circumstances you can't completely control, changes feel threatening to who you are.
All Circumstances Change
Every situation in your life is temporary, even the ones that feel permanent.
The “law of impermanence”: Jobs end through layoffs, retirement, or personal choice. Relationships change through marriage, divorce, death, or natural evolution. Health changes due to aging, accidents, illness, or recovery. Where you live changes through moves, finances, or family situations.
This isn't negative thinking—it's reality. Understanding that circumstances are temporary helps you enjoy them without depending on them for your sense of self.
What Stays the Same
If circumstances keep changing, what about you remains constant?
Your awareness: Something in you notices and experiences all these changes. This observing part has been present through every situation you've ever experienced.
Your ability to respond: While you can't control everything that happens, you can always choose how you respond.
Your core values: What matters most to you tends to stay relatively stable, even when your circumstances change.
Your capacity to learn: You can adapt, grow, and develop new skills regardless of your current situation.
Why This Matters
Understanding the difference between circumstances and identity helps in several ways:
Less anxiety about change: When you know that changing circumstances don't threaten who you really are, transitions become less scary.
Better at adapting: You can fully engage with current circumstances without needing them to be permanent to feel secure.
Clearer decisions: Choices become easier when you're not trying to protect an identity based on situations that may no longer work.
Stronger relationships: You can connect with others based on who they are, not just their current circumstances.
More resilience: Problems in one area don't feel like total collapse when you understand the difference.
What This Doesn't Mean
This perspective doesn't mean circumstances don't matter. Your job, relationships, and health significantly affect your daily life and deserve attention.
It doesn't mean you should be indifferent. You can deeply care about your circumstances while understanding they're not your identity.
It doesn't mean change is easy. Major transitions still involve grief and practical challenges.
When Big Changes Happen
When major circumstances change, these approaches help:
Notice what continues: Pay attention to what stays the same despite external changes—your ability to think, feel, observe, and respond.
Separate facts from identity: Instead of "I am unemployed," try "I'm currently looking for work."
Look at your values: Consider how what matters to you might show up differently in new circumstances.
Stay curious: Ask what new possibilities might emerge rather than only focusing on what you've lost.
Building Steadier Ground
A more stable sense of self comes from recognizing what persists across all circumstances:
The part of you that observes thoughts, emotions, and experiences. Your ability to engage thoughtfully with whatever life presents. Core principles that can guide decisions regardless of specific situations. A learning approach that serves you no matter what's happening.
The Bottom Line
Your circumstances will keep changing throughout your life. Jobs will end. Relationships will evolve. Health will change. Living situations will shift.
But the part of you that experiences these changes—your awareness, your ability to respond, your capacity to find meaning—remains available regardless of what's happening around you.
You are not your circumstances. You're the one experiencing your circumstances. Understanding this won't eliminate the challenges that come with life changes, but it can prevent those changes from feeling like the end of who you are.
That creates space for both grieving what you've lost and staying open to what might come next.
Ready to Go Deeper?
If the concepts in this post resonate with you—if you're curious about what remains stable when everything else is shifting—you might be ready for a more comprehensive approach to building resilience during major life changes.
My book "From Reactive to Resilient: Practical Awareness for Major Life Changes" provides the complete systematic framework for navigating identity confusion, career transitions, relationship endings, and other significant changes without losing yourself in the process.
This isn't about meditation practices, changing your beliefs, or mystical revelations. It's a research-backed approach that offers straightforward awareness techniques you can apply immediately to any major transition.
Available January 13, 2026
Click here for pre-order information
Plus: Get immediate access to my free guide "Who You Are When Everything Changes" when you join my email list. No spam—just practical insights for thoughtful people navigating life's major transitions.
