What do you do when you don't want to create walls?

[StephenThomas]

Recently, it has come to my attention how destructive labels can be. I have always been a person who needed labels to define myself. I was Dad, Husband, worker, Minister, etc. I have heard numerous people say how they didn't like or need labels, but I could never quite understand.

Since leaving ministry, and basically most of Christianity, I found the label of Pagan. I started thinking of myself as no longer Christian, but Pagan. Then the epiphany came.

I was thinking in terms of how the Christian church puts up such walls and boundaries against any Pagan theology. Then, I was confronted with Pagans saying how Christians were the enemy. It reminded me of a time when I was taking a yoga class and someone in the class said, in a very snide sort of voice, "Christians can't understand yoga." I realize how labels, calling ourselves Pagan or Christian, or whatever, puts up walls. Is there a way to avoid this?

I don't think of myself as Christian, but that doesn't mean that I reject everything that Christ taught, just churchianity. I think more of myself as Pagan, but there are parts that I don't agree with. I want to talk with and learn from both sides, all sides. I want to have conversation that leads us all closer to Source. If we/I put up boundaries/labels. then how do we do that?

Anyone with advice?

[StephenThomas]

I just realized that there is a thread dealing with this same thing from a different perspective.

http://www.druidry.org/board/dhp/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=39968

[Bracken]

I was thinking in terms of how the Christian church puts up such walls and boundaries against any Pagan theology. Then, I was confronted with Pagans saying how Christians were the enemy.

Hi, Stephen. There are plenty of people here who call themselves druids without thinking anybody is the enemy. I have also known plenty of groovy Christians who don't think anybody is the enemy.

My answer to the title of your thread here is, "don't create walls". You can only sort yourself out, nobody else. x

[StephenThomas]

Great advice, Bracken!

[katie bridgewater]

By definition, all Christians have more pagan ancestors than they have Christian ones, and most US and European pagans have up to 2000 years worth of Christian ancestry. There is no conflict in my mind. I'm not sure how anyone could manage to create such a them and us mentality with this fact in mind. And I agree with Bracken - if you don't make divisions then any that do exist don't belong to you and you can steer clear of them. Why waste time on them, when you could be getting on with being yourself, whatever category you fall into (or not...). Life's too short.

[DJ Droood]

"Good fences make good neighbours." Robert Frost.

[StephenThomas]

I think my problem comes from two directions.

The first is getting away from the need to label or build that wall for myself. This is really something fairly new to me. The second is that I keep running into walls that are not of my making, but someone else. Yes, they can be avoided, but in the rural area where I live, that would mean avoiding a good part of the population. At least that's what I think. I read on the Marketplace thread someone asking about setting up a booth at the local farmer's market, selling Pagan supplies. I can't be sure, of course, but I think that might get me burned at the stake! Perhaps I am just gun shy as I was declared a heretic in one denomination and it was VERY uncomfortable.

[treegod]

It comes from adopting a group identity. I'm not Pagan, I'm not a druid, I'm not a Christian, though I recognise aspects of them within me.

The only "walls" I need are personal ones (semi-permeable, so I am still in relationship with the world without dissolving into it), and to cultivate a sense of "I, you" and not "we, they". I have a cultural background, but it's more about how I have been influenced as a person, how what I identify with.

[NovaStar]

I think my problem comes from two directions.

The first is getting away from the need to label or build that wall for myself. This is really something fairly new to me. The second is that I keep running into walls that are not of my making, but someone else. Yes, they can be avoided, but in the rural area where I live, that would mean avoiding a good part of the population. At least that's what I think. I read on the Marketplace thread someone asking about setting up a booth at the local farmer's market, selling Pagan supplies. I can't be sure, of course, but I think that might get me burned at the stake! Perhaps I am just gun shy as I was declared a heretic in one denomination and it was VERY uncomfortable.

This is a concept that's fairly new to me as well.
I have recently learnt to distinguish 'me (the Ego)', from Me (my true self).

Me (the Ego), is a daughter, girlfriend, friend, employee, citizen, pagan etc etc - and more significantly, everything that those should be. It is a construct based around perceptions - how I perceive I should be, how I believe others should perceive me, and also how society says I should be. It's the construct that makes us insecure if we don't live up to those ideals and happy if we do. Because it it based on ideals, it is also inherently fake.
Me (the Ego) needs to lose weight, needs to succeed financially and at work, needs to have a good, clean and tidy home, needs to call her mother regularly etc etc.

By contrast, Me (my true self) just is. Me isn't worried about what others think because she is doing what is right for her, and only by being happy in and of herself, can she make others happy too.
ME (my true self) lives, loves, is content with herself so long as she is being true to herself.

There is no need to construct walls or labels, but it's something we are brought up to do and it's a horribly difficult habit to break! Try to step outside yourself if you can, to identify what your labels are, and whether they really, truly matter. Does it matter what other people think if you are just being yourself? - you can't please everyone, so why try, when that in itself will just make you unhappy as you can't succeed?

Just be.

[skydove]

I think I do try and dissolve into the world mentally. As you said when you posted you are many things to many people, but you are not only that. I dont think that when people know you well they would view you as just one dimensional they would see all your qualities, interests, likes and relationships and view you as a whole person not as a segmented part to be judged on that part only.
If we learn to view every person as a whole person, infinitely complex, the product of inheritance, upbringing, education, circumstance, race gender etc we can ourselves be more tolerant and understanding of them particularly if we judge them to be a person somewhat lacking in qualities that we hold dear, because of course we do judge them even though we may try not to.
To dissolve into the world for me means to try and see things from different points of view to my own so that I can begin to understand and see the things important to that person and to reach over their boundaries and find a greater commonality. I realise that they may not want to do the same with me as they may need that feeling of separateness and group identity to feel strong and as a statement of who they are and I have to respect that imposed boundary. Rather than try and fit into a perceived niche I have to learn flexibility in myself so that I can learn what to believe is right for me.

[Kima]

I have found a way out of this issue myself by deciding that labels are simply a way of finding community. When I first called myself a bisexual, it allowed me to find people who had been through experiences similar to mine. Sometimes it can also be a way of rallying around a political issue for specific action. But the tag does not define me anymore than it defines others. It is only a way of finding other people with whom I can partially relate to concerning a particular issue. Being a druid, for instance, enables me to come and share on the message board, to source pagan books to read and be exposed to new ideas. Whether or not I call myself a druid is irrelevant in such a frame because it will never define me as a person; it just affiliates me with the druid community.

So this is my answer: tags aren't about identity but community.

[treegod]

A cell needs a wall to be. If it didn't have a wall it would cease to be a cell. Same with skin, without skin the organism would just fall apart. But both skin and cell walls have an important function; they don't isolate the organism, they facilitate interaction with the environment and protect it too.

This biological individuation is important for the integrity of the organism and its relationship with the world. Each cell needs to be individuated to function well, each organism too, and each psyche. This psychological self-definition is important, stopping us from being swept up by the "flow" of the masses. Then the "I" that identifies is distinguished from the "I" (ego) that is identified with and finds its own way. You don't need to dissolve the central "I" to understand others because the central "I" is something that inuitively understands the other "I" without losing the distinction between self and other. Two "I's" can recognise each other, because they essentially come from the same source.

Kima, I like what you said about tags and community. I have said here before that I'm only a "druid" with other "druids". It's a way of connecting with people of like-mind, finding somehting in common to work on.

[StephenThomas]

I like all these responses. That's the glory of this type of communication.

It seems that we all need/are conditioned to have a certain amount of boundaries to both define who we are and how we relate to community. The problem with these boundaries is that they can be restrictive. Freud said that we have the id, the ego and the super ego. The id is that part of us that is wild and uninhibited, but can get itself in trouble. The ego and super ego are those parts of us that throw up wall to keep the id from plundering and pillaging.

In terms of calling myself Druid, Pagan, Christo-Pagan, or Twinkie eater has to do with trying to define myself in the world and relating to community. When those terms give me definition and a sense of that community, it is good. When it restricts and alienates me, it is bad. Perhaps the best way is to allow the walls to be there to some extent, but creep over them for the occasional pillage.

[skydove]

Hi Treegod thanks for helping me to understand the psychological terms you are using, perhaps I chose the wrong words to express myself. I have not studied psychology and I dont think I meant to say that I should dissolve my own personality in the search to understand another persons viewpoint, of course that would be stupid and dangerous and wasn't really what I intended to say -
I know I'm not a soluble aspirin in the great sea of life.

[StephenThomas]

I know I'm not a soluble aspirin in the great sea of life.

Now those are truly words of wisdom!

[treegod]

Hi Treegod thanks for helping me to understand the psychological terms you are using, perhaps I chose the wrong words to express myself. I have not studied psychology and I dont think I meant to say that I should dissolve my own personality in the search to understand another persons viewpoint, of course that would be stupid and dangerous and wasn't really what I intended to say -

Thanks for clarifying. I think we understood each other

I know I'm not a soluble aspirin in the great sea of life.

Love the quote!