Let's Talk About Labels & Limits

This was originally posted on our Facebook page on August 27th, 2021.

It’s not super comfortable for me to post a no makeup, hair-like-it-is type photo but I think this is a good opportunity to talk about labels.

I’m an introvert.
I have generalized anxiety disorder.
I’m also a big, mixed bag of PTSD and various other diagnosis.

If you read all that without knowing me, you may assume that certain things are just off limits for me. One could easily assume that my capacity is limited by those labels. (To be fair, at times it can be because I’m human above all else.)

But last night at our grand opening I basically talked for 3 hours straight to lots of strangers at a brand new business I’ve opened. I even hugged a lot of them.

This isn’t my first business, either.
I’ve been doing this awhile.

I’ve also written a book.
I’ve spoken to large groups of people.
I’m in my third year of college at age 37 and I’m a straight A student.

My point is, regardless of our labels we are still able to accomplish a whole lot.

BUT….

We also need to give ourselves grace and accept that maybe we CAN accomplish a lot despite our challenges but it may look different for us.

Maybe it’ll take us longer.

Maybe we will have to adapt and find a way to make things work around our “labels”.

Maybe we have to take different roads to end up at the same end that others do.

Maybe we’ll have to spend the next 24 hours after an event in our sweats, looking a bit disheveled, while we accomplish absolutely nothing other than snuggling our dogs in order to recover.

And that’s ok too.

We can have challenges and still succeed. We can embrace and give grace to the things that make our paths different than others without necessarily making an obstacle into a full roadblock.

We can do big, hard, scary and overwhelming things.

We just have to do it our own way.