But what am I?

As I was designing my blog, brainstorming for topics, I tried to categorize the kind of posts I would make--stuff about me, conclusions from readings, reactions to reiki, etc. As I thought of a new idea to write about, my very second thought would be, "Okay! Now what do I label that?"

I am also a Facebook junkie and took the Myers Briggs test. I am INFJ, same as I was a year ago, same as I was five years ago. We all know what that's like, taking those quizzes. Whether it's "What color is your aura?" or "Which Disney character are you?" we just want to know. How fun is it for me when I take that test and it proclaims that I have an "idealist temperament" which inclines me towards "healing, counseling, teaching, and championing"? Yay! I think. That is what I'm all about! And this test just told me so! So it must be true! Now why did I need a test to tell me what I already felt. . .

We want to have something to identify with. We want to know what we are and we want to have a name for it. I am a Capricorn. I am a patient person. I am a dentist. These labels help us make sense of who we are and what we are all about. When life is full of so much gray area, these labels make us feel as though we have personality traits, careers, and constancies that we can not only count on, but we can tell the world about.

And we wear our labels so proudly! I am a mom. I am an author. I am an honors student. These labels give us a pick-me-up. They validate us. They help us tell the world what we care about, what is important to us.

But labels can be dangerous. When we've attached to a label in an inflexible way, we might be getting in our own way of progress. By the Spring of 2008, I had a deep-rooted uneasy feeling that this high school teaching thing is just not going to work. But if I'm not a teacher, what am I? I panicked. This was my life purpose. I am supposed to be helping people, teaching them in a classroom. If I let go of this job, then I'm letting go of who I am.

I held on for too long and I made my body and my mind sick, and all quite stupidly! Here I am, teaching and helping others. Do I have a classroom? No, not a physical one. Am I teaching people? You betcha. Am I helping others? God I hope so. Did my concerned and panicked identity ever imagine that there was another way I could help and teach others? Nope.

When we worry too much about how to label what we are, we won't allow ourselves to grow into what we must become. So I am going to try to lay off the Facebook quizzes. A little. Okay, more than a little. One a week. No more. Promise.