On my way to the seaside yesterday I was reading something in Psychologies magazines about removing labels that you or other people might have about yourself and that have negative connotations for you. This is definitely something that affects me and that I think about a lot. In my previous blog: https://samanthathesanevegan.blogspot.co.uk/2018/05/what-is-sane-or-normal.html I've talked about whether those who are highly sensitive and therefore experience stronger highs and lows emotionally should be labelled as 'insane' because statistically we are in the minority. (If you don't get a chance to read it, my answer was, of course, no!) I proudly wear the highly sensitive person label and I'm not ashamed to say I have a mental illness. There's a few personality traits or characteristics that I or other people associate with me and that do nothing for my sense of self-worth. So I decided to do the exercise about removing negative labels whilst on the beach (whilst listening to Bob Marley!)
So what are the labels that I don't like being associated with myself?
'Too quiet, Introverted, Shy'
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| My unhelpful labels. I should've put 'too quiet'! |
I don't think any of these are necessarily negative qualities but I don't like it when people associate them with me. I think this is because it was always what people said about me in school growing up (it was definitely true at the time!). So when people still continue to say this about me I feel that they are disregarding all the great progress I have made since then with regard to confidence.
It depends on where I am mentally (whether I'm in a depressive episode or not) but I can be quite outgoing and sociable. I like going to meet-ups to meet more like-minded people and try new experiences and it doesn't really phase me if there won't be anyone I know there (the younger me wouldn't dream of doing this!). I have a hedonistic side and I like socialising and dancing. What is definitely true of me, however, is that I find endless conversation (especially small talk!) exhausting and I DEFINITELY need a lot of 'me' time and headspace otherwise I go crazy. None of the words 'quiet, shy or introvert' are insults but I think I have negative connotations with them ('social recluse' 'antisocial' 'hermit') because of what people said about me at school. Despite those things not being insults, if a label is unhelpful to me, I will disassociate it from myself!
'Fat, Overweight'
I put on quite a lot of weight last year, partly due to the binge eating that accompanies my depression and partly the medication I take and so now I'm the heaviest I've ever been and my BMI is almost in the obese category. I often find myself calling myself fat in a jokey/self-deprecating way, to distract myself from how upset I really am, which I really don't think is helpful. I do struggle a lot because I love indulgent food and alcohol but I do also like healthy food, I exercise as much as I can and I put a lot of consideration into what I eat.
I don't know why I am letting the fact that my weight in kg divided by my height squared is higher than 25 have so much power over me when really I know there are much more important things in life! This is definitely a label that serves no positive purpose and that I want to rid myself any association with.
'Boring', 'Geek'
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| From my proudly intellectual Psychologies magazine! |
These are also words that people associated with me in school because I wasn't loud and boisterous and got (mostly!) good grades (I was in a school where that wasn't considered a good thing at the time but something that got you bullied or made fun of!). I feel like people really got me all wrong. I don't think there is anything wrong with the kind of person that people would consider a 'geek', somebody intellectual who is a real bookworm and doesn't enjoy parties or sports. It just wasn't really me! In school there were a couple of subjects I had a bit of a head-start on because my mum was a teacher (Maths and French) but I was no genius and I wasn't particularly studious either! I can't remember what I used to do in my spare time as a teenager but I seem to remember spending a lot of time sleeping and resting and constantly leaving my homework until the last minute! In school I was used to not doing a lot of work and still getting relatively good grades so university came as a total shock to me! I wasn't brilliant at sport but not awful either and I have enjoyed dancing and enjoying upbeat music from as long as I can remember. I haven't been to school for about 16 years so I don't know why people's incorrect perception should still bother me.
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| I won a potato race aged 10, wasn't that bad at sports! |
When I have the mental energy, I now love to learn new things as an adult. I had to work extremely hard to do that nutrition diploma, with science never having been one of my strong points and it's one of my proudest achievements. It's so wrong that in certain academic institutions those who do well are ridiculed and people use derogatory words like 'geek' to describe them. It's also a word that serves no positive purpose.
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| my new labels! |
How to remove negative or unhelpful labels and create new ones!
I enjoyed doing this exercise from Psychologies magazine in the picture above. I established what the inaccurate and/or unhelpful labels were and wrote my new ones. Instead of 'quiet' I put 'selectively talkative!' I talk when I feel like it and I do truly believe not every gap has to be filled with crap! 'Geek' I replaced with 'Intellectual and sporty!', boring I replaced with 'Interesting and fun-loving' and 'Fat' I replaced with 'Voluptuous, muscular and healthy'. And the unhelpful labels? I stuck them onto stones and threw them into the sea, to symbolise ridding myself of my association with them. It felt good! (other than the slight guilt for polluting the sea with 4 mini post-it notes) It might take a while for me to fully stop linking myself with any of those labels but I am going to try and focus on my new more positive and accurate labels. Don't let anyone give you a label you don't like or that is not helpful to you!
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