To the world, I am the smart one, the quiet one, the shy one. To my friends and family, I am the energetic one, the happy one, the spoiled one. My entire life, I have been put into categories as others try to make sense of me and exactly who I am.

   However, I always have felt as if I don’t fit into the categories set out for me. Sometimes, I don’t know the answer to a problem. Sometimes, I can be a chatterbox. Sometimes, I can push myself and talk to strangers. Am I really just “smart?” Just “quiet?” Just “shy?” 

   I understand why people label me. I understand that it’s just easier to put me into a nice, neat box and simplify me into a couple of words, but that doesn’t mean these labels define who I am. The world is not black and white. It is impossible to fit everybody into just one category.  Instead, the world is filled with many shades of gray, and that’s what people are. Personalities can’t, and shouldn’t, be summed up in a couple of words.

   However, by labeling me, others often pressure me to live up to their standards instead of living for me. For example, being labeled “the happy one” only pressures me to be happy all the time. It pushes me not to let people see when I am feeling down or having a bad day. I feel like I am expected to always wear a smile on my face and to be energetic and happy, so I try to give other people that. I become a different person to satisfy everyone, until I don’t know who I am anymore.

   Labeling may seem harmless, but it is actually incredibly detrimental to a person’s mental health and well-being. For me, it was mentally exhausting and made me feel isolated from the people around me. Blocking out others’ assumptions and expectations just drained me and ultimately didn’t help me deal with them. I still feel pressured to embody the labels other people use to describe me, and I don’t see an end in sight.

   It is important to understand that no one feels just one emotion or acts a certain way all the time. No one has endless amounts of energy for their entire life. No one always feels gloomy, or is always optimistic, or is always quiet. It is more likely that you are just witnessing a snapshot of their life, a tiny portion of who they are as a person. It is even more likely you are seeing the show they are forced to put on, the mask they wear to please the world.   

  However, connecting labeling to its destructive consequences gives others the chance to remedy them. By shifting the way we look at other people, we can lessen the pressures that others face. Together, we can build a community for others that I never had: one that encourages them and shows them they don’t have to change who they are, one where they are accepted just for being themselves. 

   Nevertheless, the only way this can happen is if you try to change, if you try to make a difference in the lives of all those around you. There is only so much I can do to change how other people view me, but there’s a lot more you can do to change how you view other people. Instead of just calling someone “the shy one”, “the funny one,” “the cheerful one,” take a step back and think about why they act that way. Is that just the way they are or is there more to them than meets the eye?    

   I am not the stamps others give me, the nicknames other people use to identify me. I do not fit in a category, in a box, in a simple phrase or a short name tag. Look beneath the label and try to see the complex person underneath. Look beneath the label and see the real me.