Don’t call me a follower of Tao.
Following Tao is an intensely personal endeavor in which you spend each minute of your life with the universal pulse. You follow the fluid and infinitely shifting Tao and experience its myriad wonder. You will want nothing more than to be empty before it – a perfect mirror, open to every nuance.
If you put labels on who you are, there is separation from Tao. As soon as you accept the designations of race, gender, name, or fellowship, you define yourself in contrast to Tao.
That is why those who follow Tao never identify themselves with the name Tao. they do not care for labels, for status, or for rank. We all have an equal chance to be with Tao.
Reject labels.
Reject identities.
Reject conformity.
Reject conversation.
Reject definitions.
Reject names.
“Labels are for cans, not people.” — Anthony Rapp
“Once you label me, you negate me” — Soren Kierkegaard
“They stick you with those names, those labels — ‘rebel’ or whatever; whatever they like to use. Because they need a label; they need a name. They need something to put the price tag on the back of.” — Johnny Depp
“I don’t care what people call me,labels have the negative value of making smaller boundaries for people.” — Michael Graves
“Labels are devices for saving talkative persons the trouble of thinking”
–John Morley
“What I really resent most about people sticking labels on you is that it cuts off all the other elements of what you are because it can only deal with black and white; the cartoon.” — Siouxsie Sioux
The problem with labels is they are merely shells that contain assumptions. When we are taken in by a label, we are taken in by opinions and beliefs. That is, we willingly accept statements without evidence of their validity. The assumptions become stereotypes, which soon become put-downs. Before you know it, we are engaged in name-calling or verbal abuse.
People are complex, multifaceted, and multidimensional. When we apply labels to them, we put on blinders and see only a narrow view of an expansive and complicated human being. Did you ever buy a plastic container or bottle of food at the super market with a huge label on the lid and sides that prevented you from seeing the contents? That’s what the labels we use to ‘describe’ people do, they obscure the contents of the individual.
When speaking about others, there’s nothing wrong with using descriptions. Novelists do it all the time. But there is a big difference between descriptions and labels. For example, think about the difference between saying “Tom is tall.” and “Tom is a liberal.” ‘Tall’ is a description because it is based on a fact; it’s just another way of saying “Tom is six feet, four inches.” When we call Tom a ‘liberal,’ however, we empty the word of meaning. Here’s what I mean. What are you, a liberal, conservative, or other? The answer is on some issues you are liberal and on other issues you are conservative or other. Right? So, how can I describe you by a single term? If I were to do so, I would reduce you to a one-dimensional artifact of the profound person you really are. Wouldn’t that be grossly unfair? Isn’t that good enough reason to avoid the consumption of assumption? — Chuck Gallozzi
The Tao that can be told is not the eternal Tao.
The name that can be named is not the eternal name.
The nameless is the beginning of heaven and earth.
The named is the mother of the ten thousand things.
Ever dersireless, one can see the mystery.
Ever desiring, one can see the manifestations.
These two spring frm the same source but differ in name; this appears as darkness.
Darkness within darkness.
The gate to all mystery.— Tao Te Ching, 1
I’ve always dislked labeling people or being labeled. One thing I find totally annoying now is this tendency to dismiss things politically as coming from “the left” or even “the right”. To me, it’s a matter of is what the person saying making any sense at all, or are they spouting off meaningless phrases or even lying about their intent? To dismiss other viewpoints by labeling them without considering the view and the person is always limiting.
Any issue has a multiple number of viewpoints, not merely two or even three. Our biggest problem as a society is that our lives and our issues are complex, yet people insist on seeing them in the simplest terms. And simple issues, conversely, are made overly complex by adding labels. A woman’s right to her own body becomes “pro life” or “pro choice” instead of being the simple issue that a woman decides what happens to her body. She becomes a uterus instead of a human being with a right to decide her own fate. And the real issue isn’t even about a woman – it should simply be a person’s right to live their own life as they desire.
Labels are dangerous. They stop people from thinking and let them take the easy path of simply reacting to the label. I find myself not even thinking of names of objects these days, preferring to note the colors, textures and forms around me rather than thinking I need to label things.
In dealing with others, I mayneed to use the shorthand of labels at times, but try to be careful in doing so. In my own thoughts, I try to avoid them at all if I can.
One Response
i think that when you label someone, something they are not that is just making them like evryone else. Labels are just something to tell you what the product is, not what its like or anything.