Labels on bins are great. Labels we give ourselves can be limiting. This week, Janine and Shannon talk about the problem with negative labels we apply to ourselves, along with the benefits of positive labels. We also discuss some of the labels we’re trying to shed in our own lives.
Discussion topics include:
- Words matter: By talking tendencies, not labels, we allow ourselves room for change
- How Janine, who is naturally good at good enough, sometimes acts in a perfectionistic way
- What should we call people who embrace good enough? (Good enoughers?)
- That positive labels can be helpful, but negative ones are limiting
- How our self-applied labels don’t necessarily reflect reality (Shannon had run three marathons before she would call herself a real runner!)
- How Shannon overcame a swimming phobia as a gift to herself for her 40th birthday
- Thinking about which labels can be useful and which aren’t helpful at all
- The shift in Janine’s thinking about her self-applied “messy” label
- Labels Janine and Shannon hear from their clients
- Just-in-time productivity versus procrastination
- How if your label becomes your identity, it’s something to explore (particularly if it’s holding you back)
- Janine’s label as a “non-handy” person and her strategies for changing it
- Shannon’s label as someone with a bad memory and how she’d like to change that
Links
- Shannon’s learning-to-swim blog post
- Shannon’s post on just-in-time manufacturing and procrastination
I had to laugh when Janine talked about being messy. My mother and I traveled together a lot over the years. We would check into a hotel and she would put her train case on her nightstand. She would turn around, and it would look like there had been an explosion in the room! My stuff would be *everywhere*. She could never figure out how I did it because she never actually saw it happen. We also slept in a fashion similar to our neatnik and messie personas. She would pull the covers up to her chin and not move the rest of the night. I, however, slept just like my dad in the other bed. My mom said we were helicopter sleepers because we had every folded-in sheet untucked and in a wad, trapping our legs and torsos and arms!