How to give up your identity

In the last few months, I stopped drinking coffee every day — a habit I’ve had for my entire adult life.

After a couple weeks off of coffee while I was sick, I noticed the fabled "jitters" when I added it back in. So I tried a few more weeks off... and it stuck.

As I started telling people, I realized that the hardest part wasn’t actually cutting coffee itself.

The hardest part was giving up my IDENTITY as a hardcore NYC coffee junkie.

I knew I could always always rely on coffee to get me through anything, day or night.

I was picky about my beans, carefully grinding them to the right coarseness and keeping them frozen.

I could throw back a stale bodega coffee if it was mission critical to a deadline or a long night out, no problem.

When people told me they could only drink espresso or tea, I could no longer take them seriously, tbh.

But in a few weeks, that was me.

And I had to re-examine ALL of the judgements I’d harbored against non-coffee-drinkers.

The truth is that I was so attached to coffee because it once helped me survive.

It got me through art school. It got me through all the high-pressure, fast-paced bullshit I put myself through at that time in my life.

It’s a major part of working in an office, both socially and functionally.

It’s how I used to force my body to wake up early in the morning, every morning, as a natural night owl… and stay awake to get shit done.

It’s how I "hacked" my body to be productive in the way that I was asked to be at that time, when I didn’t think I had a choice around whether or not I lived that way — before I found another way.

The even more fucked up part: since I stopped drinking coffee daily, I am now on a regular sleep schedule for the first time in my life.

I just gave up on trying to fix my sleep hygiene at all in the last few years. I thought my wacky circadian rhythm was just how my body worked, and I had to accept it.

But once I stopped trying to control it with coffee, my body finally found its true, regular rhythm... and I had NO IDEA I had one, because I’d been masking it with coffee my entire life.

I had no idea HOW coffee had been harming me until I had to try something different.

Do you have any old habits that you’re ready to examine? Maybe processes in your business? Canva templates you’ve held onto? *wink wink wink*

Just because something has been part of your identity for a LONG time… doesn’t mean it IS you.

Let me know if you've been through a similar process — and what identities you're re-examining these days.