Labels. Aspects of a functional society. A sometimes necessary evil in regards to how we see the world, experience life and communicate with one another. When these labels are used for their intended purposes, such as the external naming of places and things, it enables us to communicate effectively with one another. We rely on these labels to help us make sense of the world around us.
However, labels have a darker side that all too often goes unnoticed. The destructive nature of labels against one another is readily and quite dangerously apparent. We have undoubtedly seen the repercussions from premature and long-term labeling. Social catastrophes such as racism, sexism, misogyny, homo/transphobia, bigotry and many others, are intrinsically woven into the fabric of our existence so systematically that we often don’t even recognize when they’re at play. But, what happens when the labels turn from the outside world and burrow holes into us and begin living from the inside world?
There are at least three aspects at hand in regards to our tendency toward labels and the act of labeling with respect to healthy spiritual growth.
Ego.
Ah sweet, delicious ego. The devil we know. The spiritually fictitious construct that tries desperately and quite convincingly to tell us who we are, who we are not and exactly how and why all of it is so important. The me, my and mine way of life. Service to self is the name of the game here, except that the ego doesn’t actually have a self to serve, not a real self anyway. It’s just a construct that was made up, created, enforced and re-enforced. So, what is this ‘self’ that the ego seems insistent on serving?
Identity.
Another concept not entirely real, but useful nonetheless…until it is not. And by ‘is not’ I mean, one comes to the world crashing realization that everything they thought they knew and everyone they thought they were, is not true. A personal and social construct that we incorrectly believe is of our own making and design. We are far from aware of all of the importance we place on fictitiously constructed identities that we feel give us meaning, purpose and a sense of self or being. I AM…a lawyer, a teacher, a garbage collector, a mother, a son, a friend, a republican, a liberal, black, white, gay, trans, a hard worker, royalty, a loser, a screw-up, a drunk, a cripple….a nobody…that wants to be somebody. An everybody that wants to be nobody. The list is endless.
Ego Identity Attachment
That imagined ‘somebody’ is whatever identity the ego strives to construct. Once it does, or even in the process of creating, the ego begins forming attachments to the identities it creates. It does this in attempt to draw meaning, purpose and value from personal, interpersonal and social constructs. The obvious problem here is…what happens when you try to draw meaning, value and purpose from constructed fabrications that don’t actually exist?
These ‘false identities’ are not your True Identity, spiritually speaking. They are just roles that you play. Like an actor stepping onto the stage, your True Identity (Self) is One, the Actor who steps in to play the different parts they have chosen to play. All throughout a day, we knowingly and willingly step into these different roles: parent, spouse, child, sibling, friend, student, lover, POTUS, etc.
The ego, having no actual sense of identity because it isn’t authentically real, desperately tries to attach meaning to these constructs in order to have its ‘needs met’. Its needs being validation, acceptance, promotion, success, value, worth, etc. This would be like an actor in a play or a film mistaking their real Self for the character they are portraying in that play or film. What happens when the curtain closes or the filming comes to an end?
In life, if we attach our identity to the roles we play, what happens when those roles end? If your entire identity is wrapped up in being a parent, what happens when that child moves out and begins their own life away from home or (God forbid) something happens to that child and they pass? If you are a doctor, accountant, teacher or any other number of occupations, what happens when you retire? Or if you were to get fired?
When we hang our egoic hats on the attachment to the identity of being that egoic structure, we build the very structure of who we are in temporal castles made of sand. It is only temporary and all that is temporary shall pass away. Not just in physical death, but in life.
When ego attaches itself to an identity, it is an attachment rooted in fear. Spirit is not of the realm of fear. Spirit operates in the realm of Love. Therefore, authentic development of spiritual growth needs to, at least in great part, happen within the realm of Love.
Spirit
The spiritual path is the walk through life where we realize that we are not are egoic structures, we are not the roles that we create and play. We are something much much more. Stronger, complete, more alive, eternal and everlasting. There is a difference between Real Us and the roles that we play. There is a difference between Ultimate Reality and the current play or movie that we are in. The Spirit grows when we abide in, nourish and develop our True Essence: our Soul and the expression of our Soul through Spirit.
Spirituality is often about the contrast between two different worlds: the egoic world and the spirit world. This dualistic framework is often referred to in a number of ways: love/fear, light/dark, heaven/hell, good/evil, Jesus/satan and on and on.
Many aspects of spirituality boil down to this issue of duality. This OR that. This AND that…instead of just ‘this’. Perhaps better stated as ‘just being-ness or just is-ness. Have you ever noticed that the root of ‘business’ is technically ‘busy’? As in the state of being ‘busy’, instead of just the state of ‘being’. Busy doing what exactly, instead of Being? As the great Buddhist teacher Jack Kornfield has stated: “When we get too caught up in the busyness of the world, we lose connection with one another - and ourselves.”
When did we graduate from our nature of Human Beings to Human Doings? When we allow our business to become only the is-ness of our being, we allow the potential for all of the preconceived notions outside of the is-ness to reveal themselves for what they truly are: a fabrication of our own egoic making.
Of course, I am not slighting productivity, action and progression. These are wonderful (in most cases) and necessary aspects of our collective human experience. I am merely pointing to the nature with which we engage these aspects. From what mental/emotional/spiritual plane are we creating these life experiences? A place of doing or a place of being?
So, how do all of these ideas effect spiritual growth with regard to labeling? As previously stated, when we come from the egoic plane, we are building fictitious identities and attaching false meaning to those identities. When we build our life castles on the sands of lies and untruth, we are not able to withstand the waves of life when the storms are overbearing. We can’t allow Spirit to grow and thrive when we clutch the egoic framework for dear life.
Attaching our identities to labels closes us off and shuts us down, living from a place of fear, when what we need to be open and thriving, living from a place of Love. For example, if you place your identity in being strictly liberal or conservative, you potentially cut yourself off from discovering and growing in other ways of approaching public and social policy. If you identify as strictly this religion or that religion, you potentially cut yourself off from reveling in other ways of hearing, seeing and believing.
If you place your existence squarely in the realm of the egoic worldview, you run the risk of denying all the ways that Spirit wants to flow to you and through you. Stretching you, showing you, challenging you, growing you.
Instead, simply let go. Let Spirit cultivate in you a deep desire for the peace that surpasses all understanding. To abide in the place of Oneness and Unconditional Love that some refer to as Heaven. Commit to a daily practice of mindfulness seeing yourself as the Source behind the label and not the label itself. Know yourself as the BEing behind the DOing. How do we do these things? Well, that’s an article for another time, dear friends.
Until then….let go.
When you let go, Spirit can flow. Where Spirit can flow, Spirit can grow.
Peace and Love to you always.