In my opinion, the most important bit from this article “I quit my job at the start of the pandemic to launch a company. Here’s what I’ve learned in the first 90 days.‘
You are most powerful when your identity is tied to your own name.
You know when you’re at a party, and someone asks you, “So, what do you do?” And then you respond with your most impressive identity. Like most people, my identity was always wrapped around something external. I was a “student,” a “college newspaper editor,” and later, a “journalist.”
And for the last five years, “Polina Marinova, writer and editor at Fortune magazine” sounded pretty damn good. But I wasn’t in control of that identity. If I ever got fired, there goes my entire self-worth — and losing that is a recipe for psychological disaster. The best thing I did for myself is start The Profile in 2017 because it gave me another identity — one that allowed me to be 100% myself.
Start a newsletter, a passion project, or a new venture that lets you tie your identity to something that actually matters — your own name. Nothing is more liberating.
While we have talked before about owning your identity, this goes hand in hand – an identity that is one’s own.