The Aspiring Psychologist Podcast - Who Are You Without the Label? Inner Work

Episode Date: May 7, 2026

Who are you… without the roles you’ve built your life around? In this Inner Work episode, we reflect on identity, validation, and the tension between who we are and how we’re seen. We explore what it means to rely on external markers of success and how we begin to build something more internal, stable and self-defined. 📩 Business & Collaboration Enquiries ✉️ Email: [e-mail] ⚠️ Disclaimer This content is for informational and educational purposes only. It does not constitute medical, psychological, or professional advice. Any actions taken based on this content are at your own risk. © Dr Marianne Trent

Welcome along to Inner Work. I am Dr. Marianne Trent and thank you so much for being here. I hope by now you may have caught the episode with one of my childhood crushes. Childhood, teenage. Let's go with teenage, teenage crush. Anthony Kavanaugh, also known as Kavanaugh. I did an in-person recording for episode 230 of Psychology Actually, which is the first ever, official episode that's been recorded for psychology actually because we have moved across from the aspiring psychologist podcast. Have you watched it? I would love to know what you think. But it's really got me thinking about who we are when we are maybe not that identity. And I think

that's resonant for me as a psychologist as well, because I always do say that I'm a person first and a psychologist second. But if it got to a state, stage where I was, you know, retired or not working in this field for some other reason, I think I would find it hard to think or who am I? And I guess even with some of the aspiring psychologists I support as well, like, you know, at the moment as I record, people are finding out whether they've got interviews. And it can be really like, if I haven't got those external metrics of success, you know, so I am getting interviews, then what does that say about me? Does it say anything about me, am I good enough if I don't have that? And that I think is something really powerful psychologically.

And I guess something I didn't really have time to explore with Kavanaugh is that we need to be able to internally validate ourselves. And I do hope I've got a little bit better at that over time. But I think it does take some element of feeling that things have gone well or that you've achieved certain things to have that kind of confidence that you can stick under your own belt. So I know the first time I really had that was when I got my GCSE results, it felt like finally I had something that I could use as a solid foundation. Does that make sense to be able to know actually I'm doing okay? But I guess also there was a bit of external validation there because it's like, yeah, actually, you know, so I got 1A star, 3A's, 5 B's and a C, and it's that whole, yeah,

other people will know that actually I'm reasonably intelligent, which is silly because, you know, when I was younger, people used to call me a bod and a boff, which is a very, very Milton Keynes term, I think. When I say those terms, my husband was like, we never used bod or boff. So, yeah, like, I already knew that I was perhaps had a different approach to learning than other people. My kids were winding me up the other day saying, you know, oh, you know, you swat, you swat. And I said, well, you know, if I was in lessons than I liked to learn. And actually, I won't have you say that learning is not cool. Because actually me learning and me having that love of learning has allowed me to go on to become

a qualified clinical psychologist, which means that I am the mother that I am, it means that I met daddy, it means that you guys are here, and it means that I am able to earn money to be able to support, you know, not all the family, my husband does earn as well, but, you know, to hold up my end of, of the deal. And so I won't, I won't hear anything of, you know, being called a swat. I am really proud to have had that identity. I'd love to know what you think, what's your relationship like with learning or with the identity of where you're at in your job or how you spend your free time at the moment. Something else that was evoked for me when I was chatting with Anthony is kind of the public facing nature of things maybe not going so well. And he seems to have

dealt really well with that, at least, at least, you know, on the surface, that's how it seems. but, you know, shame and, you know, other people's judgment can be so powerful and so, so debilitating. You know, when you feel like something's gone really badly, I remember when I had my Viva for my thesis, for my doctoral qualification, and it didn't feel like it'd gone very well at all, and I was very, very sick from anxiety that day. I've never had anything quite like that, but that kind of power of of shame and responsibility for not being good enough, but also the idea that I wasn't going to maybe graduate with the rest of my cohort, that felt like a lot.

And it felt like people would be, I don't know, like it marks you out as someone that people might be able to say, oh yeah, I always knew that she was maybe not quite good enough or, yeah, I'm not surprised about that. You know, I could imagine that. And I think we forget to look at the other side that people would be shocked and people would be surprised

and people would be moved by, the distress, you know, for me and want to support me. But we can always imagine that you will be, you know, the talk of the town. And we will often forget to look at the other side of the penny because it all feels so swirly, so catastrophizing. But of course, you know, people don't usually, I think hopefully the people in our lives want to be on our side and care about us and aren't just ready to throw us under the bus, you know, metaphorically.

So yeah, that's, I think it's very difficult. And especially where, you know, your main source of income is by being a creator. It's ironic that I'm wearing my shorts hoodie today as a creator. I was taking some photos today because I've had my hair done and I put on my shorts hoodie. And I had, I haven't got them on now, but I had some shorts YouTube socks on as well. And yeah, I've been kind of moving towards a slightly little. one-to-one work with clients and kind of thinking more about my membership and about kind of brand partnership working and it is just a bit different trying to juggle all of those income

streams and that responsibility to make sure that the book's balance at the end of the month I realized I was covering my mic up sorry about that everybody it is different and you know I can't quite imagine what it would feel like to be musicians or a creator where every day you wake up and maybe your diary is just about creating opportunities or going along to, you know, to gigs or concerts or rehearsals, things that, you know, but then sometimes your day might just be nothing. You know, watching your Spotify revenue or, you know,

thinking about what's going to come next and what opportunities you can pitch for. And it's very much a different identity. It's a different mindset. And I think even being self-employed is just different as an identity to being employed. And that's my experience and my reflection upon having been employed for most of my life and then being self-employed. It's all about you have to be okay with kind of raising your head above the parapet and talking about yourself and what you do.

otherwise people will maybe not see you or they won't have had enough exposure about you for them to be able to make a decision or for you to have come up in their algorithm to cross paths. So yeah, it's really tricky and it is very different as an identity. I would love your thoughts on this. Thank you so much for being a subscriber in my members-only content and you get to be in this inner circle. I love having you here. grateful to have you here. I love any feedback. Thank you so much again and I'll see you for our next inner work episode coming very soon. Take care.