People have this habit of labeling other people. When you meet someone, you get an impression of them. You decide what you think. If it’s someone outside of your immediate circle, you might hear how others describe them, and often, that’s all we need to think the same. Collective labels in action.
Some labels are pretty generic, but some are not. Some are meant to demean, to keep that person in a labeled box of sorts. Accepting them means giving our power away. Nowadays, there’s no real need to keep them, especially when they don’t fit. You might argue that there was never a need to accept the labels you’ve been given. But technically, reputations could be considered to have had a stronger hold in the past.
Change happens all the time though. If you’ve outgrown your box, or if it was never your size, then you might want to consider leaving it behind. The box is a metaphor of course, but I like to imagine kicking an actual small box into the air. A celebration of sorts.
The thing is, abandoning a label can have other consequences. If your change is (hopefully) an improvement, it might threaten some of the people who were keeping you in a smaller box.
In an ideal world, we’d be happy for those who move forward somehow. Far too often, people aren’t happy or content themselves, for many reasons. Someone else’s joy can be a source of resentment. A reminder that our own life isn’t where we’d like it to be.
As hard as that can be, especially when it involves people we care about, it’s not about us. It speaks quite a bit about a person when they’d rather see someone fail or remain where they are, lest it make them uncomfortable. But since it’s about them, it’s not something that should hold us back.
Each of us would do well to think about our own journey. If something needs to improve in our life, then it’s our responsibility to work on it. Taking out our frustration on other people can and probably will, backfire. If you’re able to see someone’s struggle, you can always show support and empathy, even if it’s silent. After all, someone who resents you might not want your support.
You could quietly put your old box away. When you do away with collective labels, you realize you don’t need collective recognition. People can think what they like, while you create your own labels, and put the power you’ve always had to good use.