Do we really need Neurodivergent labels?

Hey guys.

So I just had the best conversation with Dr. Emma Offord from Divergent Life and it's really got me thinking….

As someone who comes to this space from a very traditional perspective, from the educational lens as an educator and parent advocate, I recently have been going off the beaten path and:

I've been starting to have a really sticky relationship with this concept of labels.

We needed these labels as a result of a world that we created that privileges one right way to be and do. Which can be put into a label of neurotypical.

• Which in and of itself is like, What is typical?

• What is normal?

• Who determined that?

We know there's no such thing as a normal brain.

• That all of our brains are as unique as our fingerprints.

• That we're all uniquely wired in our own way to do and be and contribute to this world.

• That our talents are all so uniquely dispersed because we need so many different things in this world.

And so if it's all by design that we're all created, so vastly different. Because we need one another and we all fit together as these pieces of a perfect puzzle in order to make the world go round….

Then why in the world are we saying that certain puzzle pieces are better or worse than others?

And it's like, even if we're not using those words straight up… That is the message, right? There is a privileged way of being.

That's why our school systems, our cultures, our societies, everything is constructed around this one way that privileges what we've called neurotypical.

I'm just really struggling, you guys, with these labels.

And the bigger issue at hand, really is the system that we've created

A system that makes certain people feel less than, or that they need accommodations or modifications to be “normal” to fit in.

• That people have been made to feel that they need to suppress who they really are and mask their true identities, otherwise they feel rejected, abandoned and ostracized.

• And then the mental health component.

• And the shame.

• And all the things that come up with that experience that then these people are struggling with later in life.

It's like, it’s all preventable, if we just had a bit more of an open mind about how we looked at one another.

• Like what if there is no right or wrong.

• There's just right for me and right for you.

  • And the right for me might be wrong for you.

  • And what if there was no judgment about that? Because that's how it's supposed to be.

If you look at human design, we're all so uniquely wired for a specific reason.

And the way that I am designed to respond and interact with the world and use my energy is completely different from someone else.

And so we've built this world and this educational system around the idea that we're all supposed to be doing things the same. Yet, we all know that's not true.

We all know how vastly different we are. And yet we're still operating on old, outdated conditioned belief systems that were really established to exert control.

And by default have privileged certain people over others. And we're all still in the matrix of thinking that's okay and right.

I am just really really in this place where I'm like… None of this makes sense.

So many of our neurodivergent labels, ADHD included are really, when we get down to the root, trauma responses to a dysregulated nervous system.

So what if we could just tap into our nervous system, which is really the creator of our thoughts and our feelings, and then our actions?

And what if we could bring more attention to what's at the root.

• That the stories we're creating, the lives we're creating, are really just results of the state of our nervous system.

• And these symptoms these characteristics that put us all in these boxes, that give us all these labels that separate us from one another, are really just different expressions of a similar experience.

I just am feeling so like, What the heck you guys? Like, why are we boxing people up like this?

What if we're all okay?

• And my okay might be totally different than you're okay.

  • And that is okay. You know what I mean?

If we change the system we live in, to one where we all could thrive…

Would we need labels?

• Would we need to box people up?

• Would we need to make accommodations and modifications?

• Would we need to mask anymore?

• Would we need to people please?

• Would we need to adopt perfectionistic tendencies?

• Would we have so much anxiety?

• Would we feel so emotionally dysregulated because of all of our stuck trauma?

And I get it- It's a big ask. It's a big shift.

But, I'm just speaking the truth that I'm feeling in the work that I'm doing.

That's been built on a system that is untrue.

That disempowers and dishonors the gifts in people.

So, although I get it. That these labels serve a purpose within the system that we currently exist.

I want better.

• This system is broken.

• This system isn't right.

• This system isn't real.

And what if the path forward was empowering each of us to get so connected to our own truth, what is right for us.

Without worrying about judgment or acceptance or being rejected or all the projections of the outside world?

What if we could actually tap into safety in our own bodies:

• To be who we are

• To speak our truth

• To be uniquely ourselves

  • And that that's valid.

    • Not only valid it's respected and needed.

How would that shift our relationship to labels?

So I'm just curious, and would love to hear your opinions on this.

If you relate to this at all. If you hear what I'm saying or resonate with this. Drop it in the comments.

Because I honestly think, you guys, that we're stepping into a new way of operating and being as a collective. And it's time for a massive shift in the way that we look at these things.

Let me know what you think.