The question Spanish people don't ask that helped me to find myself
If you meet an Australian, the first question they’ll probably ask you after you tell them your name is, “What do you do?” It’s an easy question to ask and the expected response is simple: tell them what your job is.
Sometimes this question is asked out of interest, but mostly it’s small talk that helps the other person work out what box to put you in. Are you important or interesting enough to spend time getting to know? Where do you fit in the social hierarchy? It’s also a symptom of a society in which work has a disproportionate influence over who we are and how we spend our time.
For most of the decade I worked as a lawyer, I had a hard time answering this question. The reason why changed over time, but towards the end I felt uncomfortable telling people about my job because the work I was doing felt inconsistent with my values.
(Although once when I was visiting Dallas, I told a taxi driver that I “worked in a law firm” so he would assume I worked there in some other capacity. Immediately prior to the question, we’d driven past a sign for a personal injury law firm and he’d made clear his disdain for the entire profession; I did not feel like having it directed at me for the rest of the trip.)
Constructing my identity around being a lawyer wasn’t a conscious choice. But it’s difficult to have an identity outside of your job if the majority of your time and, more importantly, energy is spent doing a single activity; if you’re continually pushing your body and mind beyond their limits.
Here’s where the problem comes in: if your entire identity is tied up in one thing, like your job, it makes it very difficult to do something else. It’s excruciating to explore other options or even dream about what’s possible. Because if you don’t do that job anymore, who are you?
When I moved to Granada on Valentine’s Day in 2023, I didn’t have a plan except to take time off and try to recover from burn out. I had no idea who I wanted to be or what I wanted to do next. I didn’t know it at the time, but moving to Spain is one of the best decisions I could have made to help me draft answers to those questions.
Here’s why: my experience living in Granada has been that people here don’t care what you do for work. And therefore they don’t ask you what you do, especially not when you’re first being introduced. (It doesn’t mean that people here don’t work hard; but it’s true that people work to live rather than live to work). Locals here don’t tend to wrap their whole identity around what they do to pay their rent or mortgage. Spending all your time at work is more likely to be seen as a problem to be fixed, rather than a success to celebrate.
During my first year in Granada, the only time someone asked me what I did immediately after introducing myself was at the end of a yoga class. And the questioner was an American tourist. It was wonderful to not be constantly asked what I do, so that I could take risks when the stakes were low and enjoy the process of discovery. I started to collect different identities based on whether I regularly spent time enjoying an activity. I became an artist long before I earned any money doing it, because I was regularly creating art.
Being able to try on identities like new outfits without having to show everyone I met what I was wearing was a game changer. It’s helped me amass a sense of self comprised of lots of different identities. To name a few, I’m currently an artist, writer, language learner, English teacher, wife, dog mum, friend and aerial yogi. Now, if something stops working or I want to let it go, it’s not going to cause an identity crisis because I have a solid foundation. My sense of self is so much more resilient and fluid.
I’m so grateful to have had that time when I first moved to Granada to just be. Being able to make connections here without being asked what I did changed everything for me. It opened up doors to living my values day-to-day that I hadn’t even realised existed.
So, the next time I meet a stranger I know what question I won’t be asking them, at least not until we’ve gotten to know each other a little better.
Is it common in your home town to ask people what they do straight away? How does that question make you feel? Is there an aspect of your identity that it makes you want to shed?
Or is there an identity you’re curious about but don’t feel comfortable claiming yet? What’s one step you could take to get you closer to incorporating it into your sense of self? Focus on practical definitions here, i.e. I’m an artist because I regularly practise art.
These sketches celebrate every-day moments of connection with strangers, friends and ourselves. I know how easy it is not to be present in your life, and I hope they inspire you to seek out the small moments worth savouring in your own life.
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