Do You Like the Roles You Play?

For better or worse, we all have multiple roles we play throughout the week. These roles can be employee, partner, friend, parent, or sibling just to name a few. There will always be roles we enjoy playing more than others. Regularly checking in and asking ourselves if we enjoy the roles we play gives us time to reflect on the roles we have chosen and how we are choosing to enact them. When we own that there is a level of choosing the roles and how we act when in those roles, it shifts the power dynamic and restores our agency. While not every role is a choice, staying in that role or not is. It may be a complex choice, but it is a choice.

This matter of the roles we play being a choice is significant to our happiness and fulfillment in them. One of the most cherished roles I play is that of mother. There have been times when the way I enacted the role of mother that made it less than happy. By owning that I had the ability to change the way I mothered, I was able to restore my joy. Joy and happiness take tending. We must tend to ourselves and take responsibility for our joy and happiness. If we stay in roles or enactment patterns that destroy our happiness and prevent us from feeling joy, we can make changes. If the dynamic of the role does not allow you to change if you stay in that role, there are ways to get out of the situation that has you feeling trapped.

No matter what the obstacles or how complicated the dynamic is, with a good enough plan we can always change our circumstances. When we change our circumstances, we change our roles. Believing that you have the power to change your circumstances and are deserving of the pursuit of joy is central to having more good days than bad. I understand that you may have labored in this ill-fitting role and may not be able to see a way out, but I promise this is not your forever.  Take a moment to reflect on what you would need to be able to escape or change the roles that steals your happiness and peace of mind. Now make a plan. Reach out for help if you don’t know where to start. Don’t be afraid to ask for support and work to make the changes necessary for you to change your life. I promise that you are worthy of support. You deserve to have more good days than bad. You are deserving of joy.