Living Untitled
I’ve written in a previous post about my decision to resign from my tenured professor position. Recently, I’ve begun my “separation” from the university by bringing home countless boxes of books, files, and personal belongings from my campus office. This has been a process of dissolution (of my career), disintegration (of the boundaries between personal and professional), and integration (of my professional and personal selves). In bringing my professional office home, I’ve begun to realize how much I’ve built my identity upon academic and professional achievements. My Ph.D. earned me a position at the academic table, and my professional titles — Assistant Professor and then Associate Professor — have become easy explanations of who I am. Now that I’m leaving, I’m becoming untitled.
How does one live an untitled life in a world that relies on titles to categorize people? After all, we often ask new acquaintances some version of “What do you do?” For almost a decade, I’ve been able to answer that question with “I’m a professor.” Eight years before that, I answered with, “I’m a grad student.” While most people outside academia don’t really understand what grad students and professors actually do, knowing someone’s title convinces us that we know something intrinsic about a previously unknown person. Having a title to fall back on certainly convinced me that I knew something intrinsic about myself. I was a professor. That meant something. Without a title, I’m unsure how to proceed after the “What do you do?” question.
My existential pondering reveals a deeper question of how to integrate the creative, life-giving identity of my in-progress self with the striving, achievement-based self I have relied on for so long. I love that latter self. She helped me succeed in a challenging profession, and I don’t want to jettison her entirely. But how to weave her into a more holistic, intentional, and sustainable identity? While I can’t yet answer that question, I’m learning to ask and let it sit. I keep the question planted in the soil of my mind so that it can germinate and grow with regular watering and sunshine.
Last week, the seed showed a tiny sign of life as I sorted through the things I’d brought home from the office. Sitting on the floor, I’d begun to unpack a small white box, placing the contents in piles that I’d eventually distribute throughout my home office and the rest of my house. My hand rested on a picture frame protruding from the top of the box. I knew what it was. With this one object, my existential dilemma distilled itself into a concrete and unexpected question: What do I do with my doctoral diploma?
My diploma is encased in a black frame with a glass front. The cream-colored certificate has my name typed in black italics and centered under the gothic lettering of the “University of California.” An embossed gold seal shines from the bottom like a giant period ending the conversation with authority. My diploma is the official recognition of my academic title, and, as I’ve come to realize, my professional worth.
As I pulled the framed document from the box, I felt a pang of something I could not name. I placed the diploma on the carpet and sat with it. How could this innocuous piece of paper hold so much weight? How had it not dissolved the minute I brought it home? I left these questions on the floor with the diploma.
I’d experienced similar pangs of emotions as I’d unpacked other items from my office. When I pulled out old Sociology books that I hadn’t read since graduate school, I felt just as excited by their contents as the day I’d first read them. They earned a place on my bookshelf at home. When I pulled out textbooks that I’d kept because I might use them in preparing for a class, I laughed at the absurdity of even bringing them home. I never used these resources when I was teaching. Why would I want it now when I have no plans to teach another class? Those books went back to the office to sit on the donation shelf.
The next day, I returned to my diploma. I began by studying the words on the paper. “Having demonstrated ability by original research in Sociology,” it says. That’s the bar to meet for earning a Ph.D., and I’d done it. This piece of paper represents the peak of my career. And yet, as with much of academia, earning my Ph.D. was a false peak. From the top emerged the next peak of getting a job, which I also summited by securing a tenure-track job before graduation. But even that turned out to be a false peak because soon after enjoying the view, I had to start climbing to the peak of tenure.
As I examined the diploma, I realized that in the recesses of my mind, I’d expected the paper to dissolve when I packed it, or when I drove it home, or maybe when I unpacked it. But it hadn’t. That piece of paper, the official declaration of my academic worth, remained as physically solid as it had the day I’d received it. No one had shown up with an apologetic expression to pry it from my hands, apologizing with an explanation that they only give this to people who deserve it. I was leaving, so obviously, they’d made a mistake and would take back my degree.
It sounds absurd now, but that’s how strongly I identify with my professional self and all her accomplishments. Of course, the fact that I earned my doctoral degree won’t ever change, but the sense that I’ve betrayed my profession lies deep in my core. I’m leaving an exclusive club, and even though I’ve decided to leave, some part of me expects them to revoke my Ph.D. That’s how deeply I’ve internalized the norms and values of academia as part of my very identity.
Sitting with my diploma reminded me of when I’d displayed it for the first time in my office. I’d waited a while in part because it needed a frame. When I finally found one, I propped the framed diploma on a bookcase and felt…odd. I’d expected pride or some kind of satisfaction, but it wasn’t that. Instead, I felt empty. I’d simply followed the steps laid out, one foot in front of the other, until I’d finished my graduate program. The same happened when I got tenure. I followed the guidelines, added some extra padding to ensure success, and then wasn’t surprised when I received my tenure letter. There’d been no risk; I showed up, gone above and beyond expectations, and succeeded.
In the process, I lost myself. Each day, I stepped on the treadmill of to-do’s for the sprint of my life, inch toward the finish line, and then start again the next day. I felt exhausted and overwhelmed with the weight of everything I had to accomplish. Every semester, I’d reach a point where I’d wonder how I’d make it to the end. I’d force myself to celebrate achievements because I knew I should, but I didn’t feel the excitement and congratulations that others tried to bestow upon me. There was always a next peak, a next thing to strive for, and a next, and next, and next. Never a moment to relax and enjoy.
I’ve spent the past 17 (!) years climbing this deceptive mountain — learning to climb and then summiting the false peaks. Now I’m letting go and rappelling down to see who I am without the club. What do I do with the gear that’s kept me safe all this time? The gear that I’ve hidden behind for purpose and meaning in my life? It’s taken me some time to realize that dissolving my professional identity, doesn’t mean that I’ve lost my professional skills. But what do they mean outside academia? What do they mean to me?
I could very well turn myself into another list of achievements in some other established profession. I don’t want to do that. Instead, I want to recognize, feel, and be fully human. I want to connect to the rest of the world not because of some letters after my name or a coveted “professor” title, but because I am seen, and I see others, as a wondrous, creative human being. The world is an amazing place, and I want to live in it. I want to create it. I want to live a life of intentional being.
When I’m older, my Ph.D. will be an afterthought. Perhaps it’ll be something interesting about myself that I‘ll use in those get-to-know-you icebreaker games where you have to think of something interesting about yourself. “I have a Ph.D.,” I’ll say. The others will look skeptically in my direction because they can’t imagine me, living my new life, as an academic. Meanwhile, I’ll pack the framed diploma with my name on it in a box, a knick-knack reminding me of an adventure I once had.
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