Another Sunday morning and I feel empty, even a little sick to my stomach, thinking about going to church. Nonetheless, I shower, shave and put on my suit and head out. Sitting on a metal folding chair accentuates my feeling of discomfort being here. I feel all the more that I don’t have a place at the table in this place because I am gay. So, I stopped going to church because there was not a place for me at that table. I never stopped to think what it meant not to have a place at the table. It meant that how I felt about significant parts of my past changed or lost relevance. I didn’t realize that when I moved on, that if I didn’t claim my place at a new table, I might feel untethered. Fast forward several years and I am doing a movement meditation buck naked at the top of the one L HIltop Hotel in Dallas. John, the group leader invites us to ‘’walk like you belong on this earth’’. I keep moving and mentally stopped in my tracks. Where is it that I belong? Where is my seat at the table?

I look good! I am wearing my favorite Salvatore Ferragamo Loafers, Armani jacket and Ermenegildo Zegna tie and slacks. As I walk into the HRC Federal Club Luncheon at Dallas Petroleum Club in Dallas I feel confident and handsome. I am here, I hope, to land a date. I look for a vacant spot at a table with someone I know. No such luck and the only empty seats are at the very back of the room. As I get closer, it appears to group of close friends in their own world and not really interested in a newcomer. Somehow the confident guy with a very financially rewarding job got replaced in an instant by a 6-year-old self from Ogden, Utah, in a homemade Halloween costume when all of the other kids had the cool printed rayon costumes from Grand Central. I reverted back to a little boy who felt full of shame because he didn't fit in. As that old identity got activated, I no longer measured up and wanted to fade into the wallpaper. From where I am today, I was adorable as the identity that held the shame and sense of not belonging has been jettisoned. Should it return, albeit briefly, I easily say. ''no longer who I am''.

Over the course of a life, we develop many different identities; son, sibling, friend, husband/wife. Some are based on affiliation like church, schools political party. Others are activity or hobby based. Occupation and workplace add additional identities to our portfolio. We even have identities for our sexual preferences and attitudes - think leather daddy or pig. When you think about it initially, it is easy to think I really don't have that many identities and then you start writing and the list is long. Identities serve as place holders for significant amounts of information. They tell us and others how we belong. What we believe. How we might respond in certain situations, etc. Most of us update addresses, phone numbers, ''home'' in map apps and we rarely edit or update out list of identities. As we grow, transform, evolve, we have elements of identity no longer fit and we rarely stop to drop those that no longer fit. These identities often are dormant until our psyche trots them out to offer meaning to a situation - often not the meaning we wanted.

Andrew Yang changed his party affiliation today from Democrat to Independent. His choice to change his political identity is illustrative of how we can be constrained or limited by our identities His switched, he said because he believed that identifying as a Democrat no longer was going to be effective for him to bring the change to the national conversation that he thought is necessary. I am not writing about his change to have a conversation about politics rather because this is what seems to be ''in the field'‘.

One of my clients was recently lamenting that he no longer felt he ''belonged'' to the group of friends he had carefully built over the last several years. They still had shared interests and a feeling of connection to one another and he some time enjoyed spending time with them. But as he explained, there are some things - things important to him where they now have different interests because he has shifted his identify in some areas. And with many other clients, we have found lingering identity at the root of resistance to change. The old identity keeps them stuck or vacillating between old and new identity.

As we move into a ''new normal'' and in not all that many months - a new year, I am curious what lingering identity needs to be off loaded and updated.

‘’Will you PLEASE get a new job or let mom know what your plans are? She keeps asking me, ‘when is David going to get a new job.’ She is very concerned.’’ sputters my very exasperated brother. I’d ‘’escaped’’ from the corporate world early in 2000. I initially intended to find a new job. I had been doing personal growth work and erotic exploration since early 1996. The greater the distance between me and the corporate life, the more I knew I couldn’t go back. My heart ached when I thought of working at another cubicle farm. My mom only wanted me to be ‘’successful’’. I wanted success on my own terms, as I defined it. My success be congruent with who I am and what I am called to do – not just a fat paycheck.

When I see a Porsche on the 101 headed to Silicon Valley I wonder; do you own a Porsche because you love it or because Steve Jobs bought one after a great success.

Our families, our friends and the world we live in offer up many definitions of what it is to be successful;

None of these measures are inherently flawed, although more often than not they are measures based on the expectations of others - not our own design. They often create a life lived for others reflecting their aspirations instead of standing at the center of our own lives, creating that which makes us feel most alive.

Creating your own definition of success challenges others, it is the ultimate ‘’coloring outside the lines’’. Some of the men I have worked with find that as the follow their unique path to success, others, who follow more traditional approaches although less soul satisfying paths to success, begin to question If they, the questioner, are really successful.  That uncomfortable questioning, that dissonance, leads them to push back, judge and criticize.

My experience, of defining what success is for me, is that it isn’t always easy. There are set backs and unexpected achievements. It often requires going against the current. There are moments of uncomfortable comparison that resolve into the deep pleasure of my version of success. I found people who support me and aren’t scared of my path. And it’s worth it. It’s worth it because my heart is satisfied. I feel that I am responding to my calling. I don’t wake up in panic in the middle of the night in fear that my ‘’success’’ could vanish tomorrow. And I am grateful that I can support others who are creating their life from their heart out.

How do you define success?