Identifying Times

I had an interview with a really lovely alumnus of my high school today about sexual orientation and gender identity today and it really got me thinking. Our society is so obsessed with identities, and it's incredibly difficult not to get wrapped up in this obsession, I know that I do. Here's an experiment: Go to a coffee shop and observe the people there. Notice how you classify them. When I've done this, I've been intrigued by what information I think classifying, and what information I don't. Right off the bat, I notice that, if someone's white, I'll describe their hair color or clothes, maybe their weight, but if they aren't, their race becomes an immediate classifier. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, just interesting. It really opens my eyes to how I see the world, and how I suspect others do as well. We create a little box that is "me" and we put it inside of a larger box filled with the people who are like us and we label it "us", and everyone else is in a box labeled, "them". Sometimes people use these boxes to choose friends, or spouses, sometimes they use them to justify war. Let me clarify, it is bad when we allow the boxes to rule our lives past first impressions. I understand the need our brains have to classify and identify with things, but when we begin to fill our social circles with "us" people, and no "them", we lose a very valuable thing, the people who can teach us the most. Not only that, but we limit our own ability to grow. We've put ourselves into labels that are constricting and unforgiving that tell us we are this or that, and that we will always be this or that, and if we try to be otherwise or to expand what "this" and "that" means we will be classified as a "them", and some people are so afraid to lose their "us" that they are willing to contort and shrink into their "us" box.
I know that, personally, I have a tendency to take identities that have classified me as a "them" and make them such a huge part of my facade that I fool myself and many of the people around me into thinking that it's the most important part of me, and that just isn't the case. I've realized in the past week or so that it doesn't MATTER, that no one should have to say that they are this or that or the other simply because it's more comfortable for society, and no one should take a single part of their identity and make it who they are, because as humans, we are MANY things. Think about it, what if, as a blue-eyed man, I went around talking about how "blue-eyed" I was, and people started to think of me as "that blue-eyed guy"! Wouldn't everyone think that that was absolutely ridiculous? How can anyone expect to say that because they are gay/straight/lesbian/bisexual/male/female/transgender/gender-queer/black/white/Muslim/Christian/Taoist/Buddhist/Unitarian-Universalis/whatever that that is all they are? Everyone is so many things! And why should you have to say or think you are any of those things? Certainly not because people are more comfortable if you fit into their boxes! That's absurd!
So, I say, take who you believe you are, whatever that may be, and not what anyone says you are, and fearlessly be "I".

Tomorrow, I think I'll talk about some knitting.
Thing to be grateful for today: Interviews