IT IS A NATURAL FOR US TO USE LABELS As a species… it's what we do. We label and sort. We ask ourselves, how does this person or item fit into our preconceived notion of the world? Believe it or not we like labeling. We like knowing how to deal with this person or that based upon the label we formally or informally place on them. It's a way we make sense of the world around us. Labels aren't always negative.
In the medical field, labels are often placed on people who are being treated for a mental illness. OCD, ADD, ADHD, Bipolar, schizophrenic -- to name a few. These diagnosis help treat the patients. But even these labels get stigmatized -- marked as socially unacceptable.
Jane Pauley talked about it recently in her message at the Oaklawn Spring address. She was diagnosed with bipolar disease and she did not want to tell anyone for fear of the stigma. She feared this because she knew that there was a stigma placed on mental illness.
Today this woman's label gives her a stigma too
LABELS NEGATE US Søren Kierkegaard said, "Once you label me you negate me."
Kierkegaard is stating that labels deny who we truly are -- our real existence -- our true God self.
WE WON'T LIVE FULLY IN GOD POTENTIAL
We begin to lose our value.
WE BECOME PIGEONED- HOLED A teacher tells a story about an incident he had in his class. He says, "during class today, I was spending the last couple of minutes sorting through some index cards that I had helped a student make for a vocabulary test. I arranged them out on the table and in jest began making a playing card castle out of them. One of the students said "are you OCD?" To those of you who may not know, which it's hard not to have heard this one, it means Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. He said this because he noticed that each of the cards was facing the same side with the lines facing one way and the red line on the top facing in a certain way as well. In those couple of minutes the student had in his mind put a label on me with this task alone."
We get pigeon-holed into these labels and we place see others in only these labels and we begin to see ourselves one way. The more we are told things the more we begin to live into the label.
BEGIN TO LIVE INTO THE LABELS -- SINNING WOMAN Maybe for the "woman in the city" she began to devalue who she was. The people would whisper as she moved about the city. Maybe she believed that there were no way out for her. Maybe she began to wear shame as her identity and all her choices were made from the identity that "sinner" gave her. Maybe she lived in that place and did not understand her way out.
ILLUSTRATION: John is a 57 year old man, whose family was a typical family. His father worked in a coal mine and his mother worked at home caring for the needs of the family and household. For his father, life was hard. John's father was demanding and critical. The hardships that his dad experienced had led him to expect perfection from his children. John's sisters were obedient and compliant and were rewarded by being ignored.
From his earliest days in elementary school, John struggled. He was small for his age and suffered allergies. He had a difficult time paying attention and had learning disabilities that went undiagnosed. He was always sent to the principal's office, which incurred his father's embarrassment and rage. John was frequently suspended from school. He was label stupid never to amount to anything
The child John could never measure up. He feels there is something wrong with him because he can't make the mark. John sees his sisters as good an he in his place bad and it is confirmed each time his behavior is called out for his behavior and experiences failure to live up to expectations.
He was labeled "stupid", a failure and never to amount to anything."
He is now carrying a burden of shame not about what he has done but about who he is. John went on to live a life of chaos being giving himself a new identity and being caught in a bunch of lies.
John and the woman and maybe some of us who are sitting here today have had negative labels placed on us. Labels that might be affirmed over and over.
