Identity 101
If someone were to ask you to describe yourself, what would you say?
I would start off with a joke about how I am related to that fish from Finding Nemo, the one that says, ”I’m obnoxious!” I would probably say that I was born and raised in Vegas, which is my way of warning you that I am probably 70% weirder than you are expecting. Is being a Vegas native a personality trait? Scientifically speaking, probably not but I would still say it. I would say that I’m a nerd and a book lover. I would say I’m a writer because that is also more of a personality trait than it is a job. I would probably try and convince you that I am, in fact, funny and I would mention that I love sports and I wouldn’t have to tell you about my husband and kiddos because they would be popping up in the conversation before you could even ask about me.
As someone who has had multiple websites and blogs previously, I’m familiar with the requirements that come with writing an “about” page. In college, I had to take a few marketing classes as part of my creative writing degree, where I also got really familiar with writing bios. Bios even have a formula for what you should write and what qualities to highlight in them.
Even in conversation, we have an acceptable format of describing ourselves, a few adjectives, throw in hometown, and maybe something you love and you have yourself perfectly explained in a way that is digestible for the public.
We have narrowed down our identities to a few key words and some single adjective labels.
Even though I am a Christian, I didn’t once say that when I just had my imaginary conversation with you describing myself. If you’re a Christian, would you?
Now, if you read my Instagram bio or my “About” page on my website, there are some words thrown in there that would clue you into the fact that I am a Christian. Yet, in physical conversations (and made up ones in my head) I haven’t been saying it. I don’t say it. I get nervous just telling people that I write Bible studies and faith content. In our society of single adjective labels and catchy key words, Christian and Christianity has been deemed negative labels.
What is funny to me is that I come from the generation where we all dyed our hair black and put bright streaks of colors in it, we wore black jeans and weird jackets, called ourselves emo and scene all while begging people to stop labeling us. Even those who weren’t calling themselves or identifying as emo, would hate when labels like preppy or jock were assigned to them. My generation, while using labels to describe ourselves didn’t confine ourselves to that label as our whole identity. Now that I’m a fossil, I can look back and see that I was emo but the loudest, happiest emo at my school. Yet, I liked the black (ish, I didn’t understand black jeans or the baggy black pants with chains but I wore a lot of black shirts) and I loved dying my hair. Emo or scene kids weren’t all alike and we didn’t march out of a factory with the same music tastes and jargon. We still had our own personalities. We had individuality.
“We have narrowed down our identities to a few key words and adjectives.”
I went from being apart of the generation that hated labels and didn’t want to be put in a box to living in a world of a million boxes and if you get put into one of them you are automatically assigned every other label that goes along with that box.
Republican
Christian
Democrat
Right-Wing
Left-Wing
Progressive
All these words make us think of a type of person or other adjectives that we can also associate with the words above. I just pulled at some big ones. If I threw other things out like “pro-life” or “activist” you would think of more adjectives and have an idea of the type of person you are dealing with.
When we hear adjectives or descriptor words and assume things or make decisions based on those adjectives, we’re judging. Jesus talks about judging on the Sermon on the Mount, Matthew 7:1-2 says “Do not judge so that you will not be judged. For in the way you judge, you will be judged; and by your standard of measure, it will be measured to you.”
How many times have you held someone to a standard that you yourself have failed? If you are a parent, that number is pretty high. I catch myself frequently holding my kids to higher standards than I hold myself a lot of the time. Like picking up toys the second they’re done playing with them before moving onto the next toy, as if I haven’t set dishes in the sink and said I would do them later so I can move onto the next thing. As if I have never been distracted and forgotten to put away something, pick something up, or even lock the door.
The thing about judging based off some adjectives that are being used as descriptors is that those few adjectives do not completely speak to the person as a whole. It doesn’t tell us what is inside the heart. We’re so busy focused on labels and the things that are different that we’re not paying attention to a person’s soul, to a person’s individuality.
It’s something we have done as a society. We have slowly started to strip away individuality and ascribed to a community identity. To me, it seems as though not enough people read Anthem in high school and it’s starting to show.
The heartbreaking part is that these adjectives, these labels, these things that we cling to as our identity, our purpose, who we are, will all fade. The things we wrap up our identity in have the tendency of being taken away. That’s my experience, at least.
We use these labels, these words, these adjectives to find belonging, purpose, a sense of self. Yet, when the words don’t match up perfectly, we’re desperate, trying to find another word to give us a sense of purpose. The generation who begged for labeling boxes to be eliminated are around long enough to discover that people need the boxes to figure out who they are. Without those labels, do we even know who we are? Perhaps this is why humanity is struggling so much. Our identities are wrapped up in labels that can change at any given moment. Our identities are wrapped up in social media, jobs, and people. None of these things can save you. Wrapping up our identity in bios, adjectives, or the things we can claim about ourselves won’t fill the hole deep in our souls that is constantly searching for something.
So before I am a writer, or a Vegas native, a mom, a wife, a person who yells at referees on the TV, I am Ashleigh. I am a sinner saved by grace. I am created in the image of God and have been adopted into his family.
These are the things that I can safely wrap my idenity in because God is unchanging. He is always soverign. He is always there. I don’t need to set a measure to judge because that’s God’s job. My job is to point back to Him in all I do.
So I’m going to start with changing up how I describe myself.
Hi, I’m Ashleigh, I’m saved by grace and a child of God. Everything else is secondary, you can learn it as you get to know me better.
Photo by George Prentzas on Unsplash