The Costume Shop of Identity
Who Are You When No One Is Watching? | 1 | Thinking Out Loud | Kimberly
Hi, It’s me. Kimberly.
(aka: Welcome to Thinking Out Loud)
Podcast: Thinking out loud | Kimberly
Why do we need labels to tell us who we are?
Labels aren’t inherently bad.
Labels can be incredibly helpful.
They can help us find people who understand us. They can give us language for experiences we didn’t know how to describe. They can help us communicate our values, our interests, our beliefs, our experiences, and even parts of our personality.
Sometimes finding the right label can feel like finding a missing piece of yourself.
“Oh. Other people experience this too.”
“There’s a word for this.”
“I’m not the only one.”
There’s anything wrong with that.
The problem begins when the label stops being something that describes us and starts becoming something that defines us.
When the Label Becomes the Cage
You are more than your sexuality.
You are more than your gender.
You are more than your diagnosis.
You are more than your interests, your political beliefs, your religion, your appearance, your career, your hobbies, your relationship status, your motherhood or fatherhood, your trauma, your accomplishments, or your mistakes.
All of these things can be parts of you.
None of them, by themselves, can possibly contain the whole person.
You might be someone who loves cats.
You might also love dogs.
You might be someone who loves quiet nights at home — at the same time, someone who loves going to concerts.
You might be deeply religious and still have questions about your faith.
You might be politically conservative about one issue and hold a more liberal position on another.
You might believe that taxes should be used responsibly while also believing that providing school lunches to children during the summer is a beautiful service to a community.
These things aren’t contradictions.
They’re evidence that you’re a person.
Humans are complicated. That’s the beauty about us.
We contain contradictions, preferences, experiences, beliefs, fears, values, and opinions that don’t always fit neatly into one category.
You cannot cherry-pick pieces of yourself and call that your whole identity.
When Identity Becomes Ego
Something else can happen when we become too attached to our labels.
The label can become part of our ego.
Once our ego becomes invested in being a certain kind of person, changing our minds can feel threatening.
If I’m not a provider, how can I be a good man?
If I’m not a good mother, how can I be a woman of value?
If I’m not the responsible daughter, does that make me the problem in my family?
If I’m not successful, does that mean I’m a failure?
If I’m not the smart one, who am I?
If I’m not the strong one, am I weak?
If I’m not the “good” person, does that mean I’m a bad one?
This is where identity can become a cage.
Suddenly, we’re not asking:
“What do I value?”
We’re asking:
“What do I have to do to remain the person I believe I am?”
Those are two very different questions.
The first gives us room to grow.
The second can trap us.
The Need to Belong
I think humans have always used labels, at least in some form, to help us understand where we belong.
There is nothing inherently wrong with wanting to belong.
Belonging is important.
We want to know that there are people who understand us. We want community. We want to feel accepted. We want to know that we’re not alone.
Belonging can become complicated when fitting in requires us to participate in things that don’t align with who we are.
Maybe you don’t enjoy gossiping.
However, you’re sitting with a group of people who are making fun of someone’s appearance or talking about how someone smells.
Nobody is telling that person.
Instead, their humiliation becomes entertainment for the group.
You laugh along.
Maybe you don’t think it’s funny.
Maybe you’re uncomfortable.
Maybe you’re afraid that if you say something, they’ll turn their attention toward you.
Does that make you a bad person?
I don’t think it’s that simple.
Maybe you’re struggling with confidence.
Maybe you’re afraid of rejection.
Maybe you’ve learned that belonging sometimes means going along with things you don’t agree with.
That doesn’t mean your behavior doesn’t matter.
It does.
I think there’s a difference between saying:
“I participated in something I don’t feel good about.”
and:
“I am a bad person.”
One is an observation about behavior.
The other is a totalizing judgment about identity.
Those aren’t the same thing. It’s also unhealthy, to judge oneself based on a moment they were surviving.
The Most Dangerous Labels
Some of labels deserve the most scrutiny is:
Good.
Bad.
Evil.
Hero.
Righteous.
Sinful.
These words don’t simply describe behavior.
They can become judgments about the entire person.
Most labels are subjective to some degree.
Even the word “good” requires us to ask:
Good according to whom?
Good according to what values?
Good in what situation?
Good for whom?
Sometimes we need to spend less time arguing over labels and more time defining what those labels mean to us.
Two people can use the same word and mean something completely different.
I Am a Feminist
For me, I am a feminist.
I believe in women’s rights.
I believe in autonomy.
I believe in the importance of untangling sexism, classism, racism, ableism, ageism, and the other systems and assumptions that can shape how people are being treated.
Whether or not I have experienced it. To me, listening to people’s stories is important when shaping my opinions. Practicing good faith requires it when exploring nuance.
Nuance is a big part of my journey of feminism. To challenge my black and white thinking.
While holding a non-negotiable that harm is not middle ground. I believe that sometimes the middle ground gives us the room to ask better questions. To humanize others.
Being a feminist doesn’t mean I have to agree with every person who identifies as a feminist.
I can share a larger value system with someone and still disagree with them.
I can belong to a group without surrendering my ability to think, critical. To challenge ideas, I think are misguided.
That’s important to me.
I think we’ve gotten ourselves into trouble when an identity becomes a test of loyalty.
You aren’t allowed to question the group.
You aren’t allowed to disagree with the person who represents the group.
You aren’t allowed to have a different interpretation.
Eventually, the label stops being a description of what you believe.
It becomes a rule for what you’re allowed to believe.
What Is Wrong with Anger?
This is something I’ve been thinking about when I hear statements like:
“Feminist women are angry.”
I have to ask:
What’s wrong with being angry?
When you’re struggling to learn a new skill and you get frustrated, that anger can be a completely normal part of development.
When you feel suppressed, ignored, or treated unfairly, anger makes sense.
A toddler who wants macaroni and cheese and gets chicken nuggets instead might become furious.
The emotion itself isn’t necessarily the problem.
The question is what we do with it.
Anger can tell us something.
Fear can tell us something.
Sadness can tell us something.
Discomfort can tell us something.
An emotion doesn’t automatically tell us the truth.
This is where I think we sometimes get ourselves into trouble.
We experience an emotion, and then we create a story to explain it.
“This person makes me uncomfortable, so they must be a bad person.”
Rather, there may be another explanation:
“I’m not used to their personality.”
Or:
“Something about this situation reminds me of something I’ve experienced before.”
Or:
“I don’t understand them yet.”
Or maybe:
“They did something that violated one of my values or violated my autonomy.”
Those possibilities require us to pause.
They require curiosity.
Curiosity is much harder than certainty.
Discomfort Doesn’t Need a Villain
I think this is one of the hardest parts of being human.
We want our feelings to mean something.
They do. Full stop.
Meaning doesn’t always equal certainty.
Someone making you uncomfortable doesn’t automatically make them a bad person.
Someone disagreeing with you doesn’t automatically make them your enemy.
Someone challenging your beliefs doesn’t automatically mean they’re attacking you.
Someone belonging to a group you identify with doesn’t automatically mean they represent everything you believe.
We can experience discomfort without creating a villain.
We can experience anger without turning someone into an enemy.
We can disagree without deciding that someone is morally corrupt.
We can belong without surrendering ourselves to the group.
Perhaps most importantly, we can identify with something without becoming trapped inside it.
Labels Are Tools, Not Cages
Maybe that’s what I want to take away from all of this.
I don’t want to get rid of labels.
I don’t think we should.
Labels can give people language.
They can create community.
They can help us find each other.
They can help us understand ourselves.
Instead, I think we have to remember what they are.
They’re tools.
Tools need to be used responsibly — any tool can become dangerous.
They’re ways of describing pieces of ourselves.
They aren’t the entire person.
You can be a feminist and still disagree with other feminists.
You can be religious and still have questions.
You can be conservative about one issue and progressive about another.
You can be neurodivergent and still not behave exactly like someone else’s idea of neurodivergence.
You can be a mother and still be more than motherhood.
You can be a husband, wife, daughter, son, friend, employee, artist, teacher, creator, introvert, extrovert, Democrat, Republican, Christian, atheist, feminist, musician, nerd, athlete, or any number of other things.
None of those words gets to become the entire definition of you.
You are not a category.
You’re a person — and people change.
Final Thoughts
Maybe the question isn’t:
“What label am I?”
Maybe it’s:
“What does this label help me understand about myself?”
Then:
“What does it fail to explain?”
There’s a certain freedom in realizing that you don’t have to make every part of yourself fit together perfectly.
You can contradict yourself.
You can change your mind.
You can discover that something you once believed no longer makes sense to you.
You can belong to a community and disagree with it.
You can experience an emotion without turning that emotion into a moral judgment.
You can be uncomfortable around someone without needing to make them a villain.
You can be a good person who sometimes does something you regret.
You can be a person who makes mistakes without becoming your mistakes.
Maybe that’s the beginning of finding yourself.
Not choosing the perfect label.
Learning to hold your labels loosely enough that they can describe you without imprisoning you.
Because if nobody could categorize you, would you still know who you are?
Question(s) for the readers:
What labels do you use to explain who you are, and what parts do those labels leave out?
Have you ever turned a behavior, emotion, belief, or mistake into a judgment about who you are—or who someone else is?
What would you be willing to question about yourself if you knew that changing your mind wouldn’t make you lose sense of belonging?
Thanks for reading my rambles.
I’m Kimberly.
And this is Thinking Out Loud.
Subscribe | Follow
Comments