I hate labels, with a passion. Funny thing is I have never been able to escape them. They may change and evolve but a label isstill a label. You want my opinion? The fastest way to alienate someone is to give them a 1 dimensional label. That or you not liking Batman, it is very close though. I would know because that’s exactly why I don’t talk to some people anymore, the labels not the Batman thing. I just could not put up with the version of me they created. I am not saying these people were wrong. I just could not believe that’s all they saw. It was like they put me in a box. Everytime they used that box to try understand me when I spoke it only made the gap between us bigger and bigger.
Funny enough though, lately I have been looking around and I see so many people around me struggling or I always hear things about them from someone else. I am like why? Why can’t you tell me? Clearly there is something! Then someone told me I was doing the same thing to them that the world did to me.
I really wonder how I created this environment around me where some people feel judged, inadequate and boxed in. I do not know how I became the exact same thing I was running from. At which moment I crossed over from defendant to prosecutor I haven’t the foggiest idea.
We all have preconceptions and misplaced thoughts about the people around us. But like I said earlier those only deepen the wedge between us.
“Labels rarely give you the full picture about a person, the whole picture makes a difference. The whole picture is the only way to the truth. The whole picture is the only way to real accountability. The whole picture is the only way to really start the healing. ”
The real danger in labels is that we can never relate with people outside the box we assign them and we miss out on so much rich personality because we have closed our eyes to it. More importantly though, I am asking myself have I really met them if I don’t see the whole them? And I realize now the first beauty of meeting Jesus is that He accepts us even though He knows the whole story.
We need the whole picture. Not the whole picture turned into our perspective. Not a situational purview, not a glamorous HD version but the real thing with all the grit and dirt.
Dear friend, if you want them to speak, ask AND LISTEN. Don’t judge, don’t rationalize, this is not a movie, you don’t have to give them the answers. Just remove your shoes and ask them for theirs….maybe then they will speak.
And if you decide to give someone a label this month, let it be “the whole picture of you is loved.” Otherwise, every day will just be another wedge as they continue to bottle it up.
#LetThemSpeak.
Truly Yours
A person ready to take off his shoes…
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Word!