I met with a young client last week who had recently been on a tough interview. During the meeting, the interviewer directed his attention to this young man’s GPA and admonished, “You really need to work at bringing up that GPA.” Unbeknownst to the interviewer, he had delivered a crushing blow but not for the reasons you might think.

My client was completely deflated because he WAS working really hard to raise his GPA. He was in the library all the time. That GPA was evidence of one tough semester, but certainly not indicative of this young man as a whole. With complete exasperation, he said, “I’m not my GPA!” Isn’t that true for all of us. We are not one-dimensional. We are not a snapshot in time. There is so much more to us.

My client, at his young age, knew not to allow a GPA to define him—he will become so much more than that in his lifetime. What are we allowing to define us? Is it our job, salary, or education? Is it our physical appearance, how smart we are, or our marital status? Snapshots of ourselves or others are flawed from the start. We are not one dimensional and we are not what one piece of paper says we are. Our definition of ourselves should begin with, “I’m amazing! Not perfect, but amazing. Come sit awhile. You’ll see. There’s so much good in me.” And a GPA or any other singular data point is laughable. We are more than that, but it must start with us!

With Gratitude,
Beth