Labels

Have you ever wondered what it would be like if you could be exactly what you wanted to be? To fulfil your potential? To do things others have dared to do, but you have only dreamed of doing?

So… what’s stopping you?

I came across the answer quite unexpectedly after attending a course which discussed Buddhism and the art of detachment. I went home and thought about the things I am attached to – not material things but core beliefs and labels I have stuck on myself – about who I am, and what I can and can’t do. I wondered where, along the way, these labels had attached themselves to me. So, like a detective, I decided to look back in my past to discover who I really was. I wondered “Where do I start?” Firstly, I looked at the labels others have slapped on me throughout my life that I have just accepted as being ‘me’. They include: hypnotherapist, sociable, friendly, kind, a little bit zany, forgetful, sometimes inconsiderate, to name but a few. However, upon reflection, I realised that, although they were essentially labels I sometimes use, they were not what I would call permanent, fixed aspects of my personality.

So I peeled them off.

Next came the labels stuck on by my close family: hopeless cook, lenient, dreamer, intelligent, actress, optimistic, cranky… . I again realised that these descriptions were certainly not always the case – in fact I could just as easily be the opposite according to my mood (except for being an excellent cook!).

So, I peeled them off.

Lastly, I came to the labels/beliefs I had stuck on myself: mother, wife, daughter, friend, heroine/victim, lover/enemy… do you get the picture? I was able to remove these labels by just thinking, well, if I got divorced then I’d stop being a wife. When my parents die, I shall stop being a daughter. Now my children have grown, I’m no longer the same ‘mother’ who needed to be physically there for them. In fact, they are becoming parents themselves.

One by one, I peeled the labels off.

Until only two remained: I smiled with satisfaction, as I viewed them -FEMALE & HUMAN BEING.

At last, I thought, I’m can’t possibly take those off. They are who I really am. But, then the thought struck me – I need a body in order for these two labels to exist. And, like everyone else I am mortal. I can die. Slowly, hesitantly, I peeled off the remaining two labels. It was time to jump into the void and discover

I AM NOTHING.

It was at that point of realising I am NOTHING that something extraordinary happened. From that point of nothingness I could be anything I wanted. I filled the universe. All the labels of limitations had been taken from me. I realised as long as I related to the labels I stuck on myself – good and bad – and identified with them, that is all I could possibly be. I now believe we can all be more – much more…