🔼: [[💡 Cognitive Distortions]]
# Labeling
We generalize a single characteristic of ourself or another person as their entire identity. This is an extreme form of [[💡 Overgeneralization]]. We do this often while watching the news or browsing social media. It's easy to point out a mistake or shortcoming and define the whole person as that one thing.
Sometimes we are [[💡 Blending|blended]] and over-identify with labels:
- "I am a trauma survivor" rather than "I survived trauma."
- "I am (occupation)" rather than "I do work at x," or "I x for a living."
- "I am (emotion)" rather than "I'm feeling (emotion)."
- "They're an angry person," rather than "a [[💡 Parts|Part]] of them gets angry."
###### See Also
- [[🔑 Hold labels loosely]]
- [[🔑 Parts are not their burdens, roles, or strategies]]
- [[🔑 Parts evoke Parts]]
- [[The Halo Effect]]