Labeled Podcast Episode

The question, however, is not about whether that label goes away, it’s where that label fits in my overall identity, and what my primary identity is. Welcome friends to Breaking Bread, the podcast brought to you by Apostolic Christian Counseling and Family Services. It is very good to have you along. 

I’ve got Ted with me today. Ted, hello. Hi, Matt. Good to be with you. Ted, we’re going to talk about labels. Yes. When I say labels, there are lots of labels that we have for people. And in a place like this, we have labels where we would say. You are depressed, for example. Or you have anxiety, right? These are labels. 

You are addicted. And it’s a label. Right? And labels are good, and labels can be difficult. People react to labels. They sure do. So that’s what I mean by labels. And I would love to hash this concept out so that we have a proper understanding of the labels that we use and that we carry. 

Yes. Okay. So that’s our goal. I like it. I might further say that our society right now is very quick to throw out and assign labels. And those labels have consequences. There are certain labels that if they get pinned to you, death to career. Yes, you’re done. And so, let’s just start at the very highest level, vocabulary. 

Really what we’re talking about is vocabulary. And words matter. Vocabulary matters. Yeah. I think not only do words matter, vocabulary matters, but the interesting part is the meaning that people put into that vocabulary that matters. And it’s fascinating because you mentioned earlier about us giving a diagnosis to somebody having depression or anxiety or one of those things. 

It’s amazing because the meaning that goes into that sometimes when I help somebody by explaining their diagnosis, they are extremely relieved. It makes sense for them for the label. Because they’re relieved. It makes sense to them of what’s happening. Other times, people feel shame and they feel crushed. 

So, the same word, to two different people can mean different things, but also, I think one of the things that happens is sometimes labels are used as weapons. Yes. You spent a fair amount of time talking about meaning. As if to say, some labels get hijacked and infused with meaning that is not intended. 

Is that a true statement? That definitely can be a true statement. I think the reality is, let’s take some popular labels today. Like somebody’s narcissistic or somebody is abusive and those are real labels. They fit in certain circumstances, and they are descriptive and can be helpful. They can also be thrown around casually and can be pinned on people in ways that aren’t helpful. 

Okay? So, narcissism is a great term, and it seems to have caught a lot of drift these days. So, let’s just take that term for example. What would appropriate use and inappropriate meaning be by using that term? Yeah, so in a clinical term, there is a personality disorder called narcissistic personality disorder. And it has a number of criteria to it and I don’t as a psychologist just get to take things and apply them just to, you know Oh, I don’t like Matt, so there you go, Matt. I’m going to give you this label. That’s not how it works. The point is we’re supposed to be able to look at this cluster of descriptors or a cluster of symptoms or behaviors or other things and then when we see that cluster together, then we can say, oh, this label represents this cluster of traits. 

Okay, so now from a layman, I’m going to call myself a layman, to a professional, I detect that sometimes we use terms too freely. And that there is a reason for a diagnosed term. That makes complete sense. If I go into a medical situation, don’t say it’s diabetes if it’s not. That’s right. That’s not helpful to anybody. 

And we wouldn’t say that somebody has diabetes when they don’t. Right. But sometimes with these more mental health and relational words and personality terms, they become free for everybody’s use. So, doctor, set us straight, right? I think it’s very interesting. When we think about some of these different things, that’s why the label in one circumstance can be so helpful and in another it can be hurtful. The casual label can sometimes be interpreted differently or lead to different consequences? 

Okay, the way that I thought about it was when labels help understanding, and they help us to love well. When they give understanding, I think they’d be very helpful. They can be for a person. Yeah. Okay. And you go back to that medical term of diagnosis. A doctor would never label a person diabetic without the intent that it would help that person. 

That’s right. And so, I think you’re somewhat redeeming this concept of a professional diagnosis, when you diagnose somebody with any of these labels. It is for their own benefit. And I think that’s where sometimes there’s a little bit of a dance like, do you label, or don’t you label? For example, let’s say somebody has a learning disability. To not know that a child has dyslexia, for example, as they go through school, puts that child at a great disadvantage. They might think they’re stupid, they may struggle in school, they may not get the appropriate help. At the same time, there can be a cost to just knowing that I have this condition. 

But when we help people to understand that opens up a pathway. And that’s why I think this is so key. Labels, for the sake of putting people in boxes that diminish them or punish them, are oftentimes our human way to psychologically create space with them, to separate them from us. 

I love that pathway to flourishing. Are you saying then that there are no labels that have to remain on a person for life? That’s a great question. I’m not sure that I can answer that question that broadly because here’s the thing. I had heart surgery three years ago. I’m going to from now on be somebody that had heart surgery. 

I can’t make that go away. The question, however, is not about whether that label goes away, it’s where that label fits in my overall identity, and what is my primary identity. Because we’ve got lots and lots of things that you could attribute to us or to categorize us by. And in fact, it’s very understandable or very helpful to understand that labels help us to simplify things. 

And when we’re trying to deal with so much information, we have to have categories or buckets of things because there are just too many things. Yes. As a professional, being able to apprehend a condition is really helpful. Now, I want to come back to this pathway to flourishing. Do labels stick forever?  

Because the example you gave about your heart condition is, I think, a different category than narcissism. Yeah. So, I just want to push back a little bit and say, let’s take narcissism on. Sure. Once a narcissist, always a narcissist. The question is, is this particular thing in the process of being sanctified? 

Okay. Is it, or does it continue to define me? Let me just take Alcoholics Anonymous, if I understand it right, they self-identify as being alcoholic forever. Am I right about that? In general, yes. I am an alcoholic. So, let’s take that one in AA programs. Let’s take that one as a case study. 

I think that’s a good example of a label. Yes. So, here we have a person living on into their future still with the tag of the past, because it has some purpose now in the future present moment. Yes. Can you explain how one should understand that label? Yes. As God in Jesus Christ, as he comes to be the Redeemer and to make all things new, one of the things we find is that he gives us a different way to label our core identity, and that is as a child of God. 

Those are not designed by God to be secondary labels. And I want to highlight this because when those things that are meant by God to be primary labels, okay, I am a member of the family of God. I am redeemed through Jesus Christ. Those were never meant to be secondary labels, and when they become secondary labels, you’ll almost always find that whatever is in front of that is either an idol, or something that’s going to create crippling shame. 

What we find in Jesus, however, is that he allows all of us, no matter our age, our ethnic background, how much money we have, all those things, he allows us entrance into this family and into this place of being a child of God, which is so amazing because you get that label based on him. And I think that’s why it’s ultimately the primary label, because all the other labels, we either get them or don’t get them because there’s something we’ve done, or something done to us or something we shouldn’t have done or whatever. 

And the family of God, the only entrance there is by grace. Yeah. So, I really like this. Now, when you talk about primary identity being Christ, and then we have these secondary identities that are maybe even further down the list, right? You almost posit the idea that we don’t maybe altogether lose the label as much as it comes into proper proportion. 

Is that a better way to I think that’s a better way to say it. Because here I’m still thinking. I’m still going back to the alcoholic. Yes. That there is some value that history in that program has found to keep this label for some reason. So, there are some things that occur in life as an episode. You have had this problem for six weeks and then it’s gone. There are other conditions that last and linger. So, when I would say with the alcoholic example, or any kind of addiction is that before it is being redeemed. Okay, where it defines a person. It’s describing just a pattern of sin and it’s describing this person as being part of this pattern of sin or part of the struggle because it’s a bunch of different things. 

But as it goes forward, as this person comes to see themselves as needing to submit to Christ to submit their sin to Christ, submit themselves also to the help of the body of Christ and then actually part of the process of healing is to go through a transformation of instead of being defined by my sin, being defined by God. 

And as that goes on, using the 12 steps example, the end of the 12 steps is interesting because the goal of those 12 steps is to be able to become part of the solution. And part of the reason that it’s there is so that person who was once defined by being overcome by the addiction now is living an overcoming life, but they don’t forget from where they came, but not for the purpose to humiliate and shame, but for the purpose of now being a vehicle that gets to share the hope with somebody else. 

They’re not saying I’m any better than you. They’re in fact saying I’m not any better than you, but what they are saying is. There is a path, and there is something here in God, in the family of God, that allows us to not be defined by that label. I am a redeemed child of God. Yes, this defines a struggle that I have, but it is no longer my primary label, either as a badge of honor, you know, and I can put away more Jack Daniels than you, or as the weight of shame that says, I’ll never be worthwhile. 

I really like that. As you can tell, I’m fixated on this concept of can we lose labels? And what I’m learning is that labels find their proper place. Yeah. And if we’re going to exalt a Redeemer, there’s only one way to do that, but to exalt what He redeemed us from. Yes. And I think there’s something really actually beautiful, poetic, amazing, that Christ still bears scars. Yeah.  

He may be the only one in, I don’t know, but he’s got scars on his hands and his feet and his side that I believe we’ll be able to touch. Yes. Right. So, in a sense, the gospel still possesses the mar of the cross. Perhaps we can say that while a label may come to us, it then finds its proper place. 

And God’s redemptive end is his desire? Yes. I love it, Matt, because I think what happens is people see it in a black or white sense, like, either I’ve never had this problem, or I’ve had this problem, and now that I’ve had this problem, or I’ve had this label, whatever it is, I am now stuck with it, and now I’m fixed with it. 

So, talk to the public now. Yeah. Because sometimes I do think we have this concept, once a this, then always a that. Well don’t you know he’s a this? Yeah. Or don’t you know she’s a that? Yeah. Do we need to straighten out how we view these things? I think one of the things that we need to remember is that first of all, all of us, you and me included, are in a process of growth and change. As believers, that process of growth and change is centered on becoming more like Christ and being more directed by his Spirit. For unbelievers, there’s growth and change going on as well, but it’s directed by other things. 

But let me ask you. Do you want to be labeled by your worst moment? Do you want other people to look at you and go, there’s Matt Kaufman. And then whatever your worst moment or worst struggle was. That is the label. And I think your worst tendencies are labeled, and I think that that’s what’s so powerful about Hawthorne’s book the Scarlet Letter. 

One of the things was she actually had to wear the red A. Yeah, and there’s a bunch of people in our churches and outside of our churches who are not actually wearing a scarlet A, but they feel it. And as they interact with people, they sense whether they should or not. I don’t know I can’t always say because sometimes people around them are reinforcing a mentality that you have a scarlet A and other times people feel an A, but we don’t intend for them to feel it at all. 

So, I think that’s why it’s so important for people to understand the labels which they use for themselves. And how they express those to other people. We can be in times of anger, in times of frustration. We can be very easy in giving labels. And we don’t realize sometimes how quickly those things become part of how somebody internalizes that about themselves. 

Now we’ve all done it, Matt, and please don’t hear me as saying that I think that nobody is ever going to say something that they shouldn’t have or that they don’t regret because I think we do we absolutely do that. But I think it’s really helpful for us to understand that when the Bible says to let our words be always with grace, seasoned with salt so you may know how to answer every man.  

I think there is something powerful because we help people see who they are by how we describe them. We have compassion on some labels, and others we don’t. Yeah, that’s very interesting, isn’t it? When I hear that somebody is struggling with depression, what is generated within me? 

Compassion. For me, it’s compassion. When I hear that somebody is an abuser, what is generated within me? Oftentimes anger or frustration. Rage. Right. They need to get their just desserts. Right. Yeah. For obvious reasons. Yes. You know what I’m saying? Sure. But I think that’s part of what we’re dealing with. 

We’re dealing with that as a culture, as communities. And that’s why we send some people to Siberia, right out to pasture. So, everything you’ve said there, is it true that a narcissist can find a clearer future than maybe what their narcissistic past was? And so, the answer is yes, but. 

So, here’s the yes, but. Part of the struggle of narcissism is the willingness to be able to submit to accurate humility and if someone is able to come to accurate humility instead of egotism or shame, the Lord Jesus can redeem and heal, and it might be a process. But I think what’s so important is that for some labels, I’ll put it this way, and particularly particular problems, you mentioned abuse, in order for some people to be able to work through or to move past or to move to a different or better place, they oftentimes have to go through the path of humility, honesty, accountability, and transformation. We are less likely to give grace to people who we feel hurt by, or who feel threatening to us, or we disagree with. 

The reason it’s hard for me to answer that question definitely is because I can think of situations where I watch people given the opportunity to come out of an addiction. Or come out of living in a narcissistic way of life. Or come out of whatever, and they’ve chosen not to but have stayed in that path. So much of this is about coming to God’s process. For the person who feels incredible shame, they won’t come for help because they don’t think they’re helpable. You know, there’s no help for me. I’m unredeemable. And then somebody else might look at it and go, I don’t need help. You’re the one with the problem. So, both of those actually render themselves helpless. And we desire to reach out to all of them. But the fact is, if the person doesn’t move in that, then the label’s going to stick around.  

As I hear this conversation, I’m learning not all labels are equal. The reason why not all labels are equal is because some are predisposed to favorable qualities such as humility. Some are predisposed to difficult qualities like pride. But here’s my question to you, Ted. Across the spectrum, you have treated lots and lots of people. Yes. You’ve seen it all. 

Sure. Have you seen positive change in people away from the label that you originally assigned to them? And Matt, I could say a resounding yes and a very hopeful yes. I wish that every case ended up the way that I wish that it did, and it doesn’t always. But I will tell you this, when people are in a place where they are seeking support and help and they’re open to that in the ways that God has made available to us, and oftentimes it’s different for different people in different situations, but I will tell you that God is at work in the lives of people today.  

And I think what happens is oftentimes one of the transformations I see is what it means to people to be dealing with that particular thing. I treat a lot of obsessive-compulsive disorder, OCD, particularly as it relates to religious and moral matters. And oftentimes when people come in at the beginning, they feel very shameful. They also, many times, feel like they’re the only person who has this. So, they come in and they think they’re the worst. And when I get to be able to share with them, here’s what I think is happening. And then I explain it to them, and they go, yeah. They start to feel understood. And when they feel understood, then I start saying, here’s the path that I’d like to take you on to help you walk through this. 

But then over time they start to go, I’m not alone. Oh, other people have this. Oh, you mean there are options that I have for treatment as we work through this, and then not only do we get to the end where the symptoms are lower we start to work on what is your role in the body of Christ? And how do you become part of the solution and all these different things? 

And what ends up happening is their relationship to the label changes 180 degrees from I am bad, and I am worthless, and I’m struggling and stuck to, I have a purpose that, yeah, this is a struggle in my life. And they don’t minimize it. It’s been big for them, but it’s not the central defining feature of their life. 

All right. So, I think that explanation was really helpful, Ted, and helped us have a good understanding of labels. What it does to that person, as it says, you’re not alone. Yeah. We’ve labeled this thing. I mean, it required more data points than one. It brings an understanding of themselves as well as to their community. 

Yes. There’s an awareness, which then charts a course for remedy. Without that diagnosis, without the label, where do we go from here? Well, now we know, and so this is the hopeful trajectory for the next to happen, which would be that the label finds its place in the past. And turns them loose for the future. 

And I think one of the things is that many times, even if people go forward with some kind of condition that they’re dealing with, it’s no longer the thing that says, because I have this, I am of no value or have no use. What you see then is that a person can flourish with what they’re dealing with. 

They have a future of hope because that’s in Christ. And as long as there’s breath, there’s hope. Thanks, Ted. I told you there at the outset that this is a topic that I’ve just been musing on, right? Labels. Adult name calling. And I think we’ve been properly cautioned. It’s just usage of labels that we need to be careful about it. 

We need to know the meanings for them. Am I using it for or against a person? Yeah, and do I see it in a larger context of labeling? And this is one of my hopes as well, Ted, that people are not afraid of the label that well describes them and understand it in the context of a larger redemption here. 

Yes. That’s the key. Thanks a lot.