Reduced to a Label

We think that the measurements and labels help us make sense of our world. Figure things out. Identify where you fit and where I fit on the scale of success and significance.

They feed my need to understand in general, broad strokes where you came from and where you are going based on a single footprint left on a sidewalk… without getting too involved, too personal, without risking disclosure.

So I assess you and you assess me based on… age.

Nationality. Gender. Education. Income. Address. Marital status. Children. Religion. Job. Personality profile. Facebook. Twitter. LinkedIn.

All these numbers and labels, even big and glamorous, impressive and praise-worthy, always seem to diminish. Because they shrink the amazing complexity of irreducible personhood – the messy, multifaceted story of a unique, unrepeatable, once-in-a-history-of-the-universe individual life down to what fits inside a 4x3. Zeroing in on two or three fragments of a complex mosaic and reducing it to the handful of broken (or shiny!) shapes we catch a glimpse of at the split-second intersection of our lives' paths.

Something intrinsically human gets forever lost in the process.  Left outside the margin of the label.

If treated callously or carelessly, labels we attach to others and others attach to us can transmit pain and crippling hurt years after they’ve been publicized.

A diagnosis becomes a definition.

Teasing becomes trajectory.

Somewhere along the way, we accept the condemning designation as our destiny.

Some sink deep into depression, others overcompensate by spawning frenetic activity – often religious activity - plastering more labels to cover up the inadequacies of what lies beneath.

All along, we don't realize that we have mistaken labels for our true identity.