We label. Far too easy.
We attach tags to people’s foreheads. We glue classification stamps on the standard images we have predefined. We put people, just like us, in boxes. And we go even further, we classify and catalogue not only human beings, but situations as well.
And please, do not get offended! We ALL do it! Consciously and/or unconsciously.
I started to have a problem with it. The more I notice this trend in the conversations with my peers, the more uneasy I feel. I know when talking about someone or something the first instinct is to draw conclusions. Lately, more and more of us are becoming some sort of knowing – it – all superior entities. And I wonder why?!
Is it a distraction from ourselves? From the questioning that might touch us and we do not want that? Distraction from the questions that are legitimate, but we do not like the answers we are supposed to give? And with a sharp reaction, we instantly divert the conversation, the flow of the discussion towards what seems like an easy escape. The classification. The facile conclusion. The finger pointing towards someone else or something else.
Is it the real us or is a bruised ego, the skilful director of this conversations? The ego – that spoiled, sulky child, who knows everything and who uses any kind of tricks to get away?!
If someone asks questions to have a better picture of a person or of a situation doesn’t necessarily make it an over the top or a too curious human being. Sometimes questions are tools we use to understand.
But questions trigger the ego’s alarm. So, actions to defend and prevent, are employed. And hence the classifications and the labelling. People instantly become in our conversations too fussy, too noisy, too boring, too reckless, too lunatic, too selfish, too annoying, and so on. It seems like we are having a well-established checklist and is our duty to cross the pre-designated boxes.
And everything becomes black and white. Right and wrong. They and us. And nothing in between. A linear vision for an uneven existence. Already an oxymoron.
And by doing so, we limit ourselves. We build, without knowing and without willing, invisible walls around us. We do not give ourselves a chance to discover more. To understand a different type of person. To see diverse types of situations. To explore a unique way of being.
I know the familiar and the well-known gives comfort, but by keeping ourselves between certain limits, within the borders we design, we sabotage our lives and our existence. We deplete ourselves from what might be an enriching adventure.
And that is why labelling comes handy. To play it safe. By the rules. The Ego always knows how to play. And always knows how to mask the fact that deep down it feels some sort of jealousy for those who dared to break the pattern. The ones who do not use the checklists. The ones that refused to play by the rules.
For less labelling and less classifications, we must begin by silencing the ego. And we ought to continue with using more our common sense and the universal understanding.
Labelling is good. For products. Not for human beings.
Classification is useful. For files. Not for human souls.
Conclusions are mandatory. For research papers. Not for human lives.
We are the same in a unique way. Let us treasure and celebrate the diversity, the courage, the similarities, the uniformity, all there is. As it is. With no judgement. And let us embrace each other. As we are.
Lots of love,
Sharing Simple Words
Sharing Simple Words 