Yet Untitled 087 - Labels I Own

Nerdy, Hangry, Softy Me!

Dearest Yet Untitler,

Thirty two years ago, I collapsed during athletics try-outs at the boarding school I had just joined as an 11-year-old. I was taken to the infirmary where I told them that I had been breathless while trying to finish one round of the school’s 400m running track. I was thereafter designated at potentially asthmatic and was given the choice to be excused from athletic training.

As the months went by, I found greater joy in dramatics, debating and other extracurricular activities than in sport. Over time, I was recognised more as a “scholar” than a sportsman, even referred to as so not only by the students but also by faculty. Over time, I began to accept this classification and didn’t really challenge my physical limitations till much later in life when I learned that I could indeed breathe and run at the same time - that I had just not know how to, initially. When I discovered that there was a lot more possible for my life, physically, than what the sticky label of “scholar” and sometimes “nerd” suggested, I went on a rampage of transformation. I YouTubed, I researched, I taught myself to breathe while swimming and swam more lengths than I ever had. I perfected my breathing while running and ran more miles than I ever had. It suddenly felt as if there was oxygen on the other side of my label’s imposed limits, and that I had stuck my head through a hole I’d dug with my own fingers and drawn a long, deep breath on the other side.

Lining up for P.T, The Doon School, c. 1992. (it’s the same field I collapsed in!)

I don’t blame anyone for feeling trapped by those labels I mention above. I bear responsibility as well: I’m guilty of being lazy - my labels in school afforded me an easier life, without having to sometimes rise very early during cross-country season. I preferred it. So I owned my label of ‘scholar’, ‘academic’ and - grudgingly - ‘nerd’ in order to enjoy certain benefits. It was easier for Them, because through those labels, they felt they understood me. It was easier for me, because I found a way to thrive within those labels.

“Sickly”

Lately, labels have been pissing me off. One label I’m particularly grappling with is the label of being ‘sickly’. I’ve experienced repeated bouts of upper-respiratory infection since September, which ended up in a bout of Pneumonia at the start of the year. I grapple with my irritation at the response of others to my illnesses - their apparent confirmation to themselves that “Yes - he’s sickly/his immunity is sub par/this keeps happening to him”.

Convalescing from a slip-disc at 18, Panipat, c. 1998

Of course, there’s truth to their observation. And mostly, their feelings are rooted in concern. So why is it that my own response is that of irritation and impatience?

It was in looking squarely at my irritation, dear Yet Untitler, that this instalment came to be. My irritation pointed me in the direction of the various other labels that have fallen to my lot. Labels that I, thus, own.

“Soft”

It’s something I’m called often, often as a counterpoint to “ruthless”, often while someone is making a point about the “necessity” of “ruthlessness” in this world. My irritation begins when I detect tones of the following meanings bundled in the use of that label in reference to me - “incapacity”, “incapability”, “unsuitability”.

My chosen line of work is famous for trumpeting the virtues of “hardness” and “ruthlessness” in its gamut. I have fundamentally disagreed with this and resisted changing myself to fit the template that is most often lauded as the right configuration for leadership and getting the job done. A lot of things that “hard” and “ruthless” leaders do have seemed immediately repugnant to me.

It took years of experience to strike a balance between the firmness, clarity, initiative, dignity, respect and conviction needed to lead in a way that’s both effective and acceptable to me. But I found that it’s possible - to lead well while maintaining my own standards - without compromising my dignity or robbing those I lead of theirs. Sometimes, on the surface, this way of mine may still be perceived as “soft” + “ineffective” but repeated deployment tells me that it is not.

Directing, c. 2023

But the label exists always, as a haunting question to myself. It is capable of opening up a rent in my conviction, letting doubt flow in sometimes, especially in the face of occasional, inevitable failure - did it not work because I was “soft”.

Labels be damned, if just for this tendency to punch a hole in my conviction. But Long Live Labels, for being a trigger for so much self-reflection and growth.

“Hangry”

Sometimes, I have amused people I know with my green goblin antics when deprived of food. Those who have seen this side of me know how much I can swing when hungry beyond a certain threshold. It’s a Dr. Jeykll and Mr. Hyde kind of spectrum, in which my friends and family have encountered a different person altogether when they were in the presence of a hungry me.

This state of being was entirely chemical - a function of fluctuating sugars in my blood. When I stopped eating gluten about a year ago, this mood jump ceased completely. However, many people I know were not so ready to let go of the label. Like an old, comic nickname, references to this physical trait would keep popping up despite it not being there. They would surface around conversations about food or when mealtimes would go off schedule. I would get this palpable feeling of all eyes being on me, pupils narrowing with anticipation about what I was going to do in this instance of my hangry-ness.

When nothing happens, I wonder if sometimes I detect a tinge of disappointment. I feel this applies to all labels - signifiers as they are for certain behavioral patterns. When that pattern doesn’t play out for my observers, somewhere someone’s definition of me is proving ineffective. Perhaps it’s a weariness at the need to figure me out afresh. But, perhaps, I’m being too hard on my observers and it’s all in my head!

Still, I don’t blame anyone for wanting the comfort of predictability. I so wish my own children could be predictable, but, hell - they aren’t. Our twins keep confusing Vani and me about who they are. One of them who’s consistently been an extrovert through her 7s and 8s is now suddenly the introvert at 9. The timid one became a banshee last year!

A and A - forever in flux! c. 2023

Reading my irritation correctly

One of the earliest labels I found stuck to my being was that of a Sulk (!) I wrote about it here:

Yet Untitled 018 - The Incredible Sulk

Over the years, I have found myself desperately battling any signs of this tendency showing, lest it reinforce the label for those who labeled me with it in the first place. On the one hand is my own internal battle to overcome the triggers that pull me into brooding in ways that are not or any value. On the other hand is the expression of real feelings that come up within me - like wanting to eschew company for a bit, even for its own sake.

My irritation is directed at how quickly the world catches on and reinforces its understanding of me by reapplying the relevant label with even stickier adhesive.

However, Dear Yet Untitler, such is the way of the world, and perhaps I should not dwell on it so much. Perhaps, all I can do is be more giving and open when those around me reinforce their own patterns that I perceive. I can and I should tell them that these patterns can change and they are not trapped. I’ll spell it out: You, and I, are not trapped inside the labels the world gives us!

Let me say, though - this instalment has directed me towards the understanding that my labels are not things to be rejected. In casting them out, I feel I’d be casting out more of myself than I bargained for!

I breathe easier when I realise that these labels are mine. They are clear markers via which I can read myself. By reading my relationship with the labels that have persisted over time, I understand how I have changed. They are static markers I observes from a window as I move through the years. Like looking at trees and milestones from a moving car, I perceive movement. Sometimes growth. Sometimes regression.

Do it like Miyazaki San

I recently watched this amazing four-part documentary on Hayao Miyazaki of Studio Ghibli. It gives a fascinating insight into his creative process and I was delighted to learn that it’s been available on YouTube and the NHK website for a while now.

Towards the end of the first part, the documentary shows Miyazaki withdrawing into isolation before going into production for Ponyo, one of his very successful later films. He shoos away the documentary crew, totally unapologetic for being grumpy and irritable. He asks for the space he needs before going into a difficult creative process, aware of the perceptions of his behaviour that are going on record.

Of course, he’s Hayao Miyazaki and nobody’s going to stop him from behaving just as he likes. And it’s apparent in the documentary that his moods have consequences for his relationships with his family. But I perceived that he understands that there were time when he needed to let himself be a certain way. Perhaps he isolated himself to minimise the effect of this-life state on others. He did it despite knowing how the world would view and judge him.

I thought it was brave. I thought it was brave of Miyazaki to own his labels in the way that he did. He owned them and he owned the struggle they put him through.

I think there’s something significant to learn in there.

Thanks for listening!

Lots of love

V

PS. I’d love to hear about the labels you own, and how you own them like a bawse. Drop me a line and let me know!