Name my God.

I've begun incorporating elements of Shin Buddhism into my religious practice. Unfortunately, I really know very little about Shin Buddhism or Buddhism in general, and everything I do know I learned in my Religions of East Asia class. However, from what I know, I think Shin will suit me exceptionally well.

Shin is a type of Pure Land Buddhism. One of the major concepts of Pure Land is faith, and the belief that other-help is better than self-help.  Whenever I pray, I often focus on the (Christian) concept of surrender and giving everything up to God.  Thus, I rely not on self-help and the things I can do, but on other-help, and trusting God to guide me wherever it is that I should go.  A major element of Shin and Pure Land practice is nembutsu (Chinese: nianfo), or the repetition of Buddha Amitabha's name. The concept of nembutsu is slightly different in Shin Buddhism than in other Pure Land schools. Instead of calling upon Amitabha for help, nembutsu is a form of gratitude, a way of saying "thank you" to the Buddha.  I absolutely adore this concept, because asking God for help has always seemed anti-faith and anti-surrender to me.  By asking for help, I am assuming that God otherwise wouldn't help me and taking it upon myself to find assistance. Often in prayer, I find myself saying thank you to God as I come to realize how much I have ignored when lost in my own mind of worry. I especially adore the concept of nembutsu because it's a tangible action that I can put my finger on, something I can actually hear. Rules have always helped me with my practice (which is why, when I initially decided to be Taoist, I incorporated what I understood to be Christian practices), so speaking God's name seems like a fantastic idea.

The only problem is: what is God's name? I can't even figure out what pronoun to use with God, much less God's name. (For a while, by default, I used He. That made me angry, though, so I began using gender neutral Pronouns. However, those don't seem to suit God either, so I started switching them up. More recently, I've given up using Pronouns all together, as God is a short enough word that it can be God's own pronoun. Perhaps the royal We would be a more appropriate way to express my relationship with God, as I do very much experience religion in an Existential Christian way.) I tried saying "Amitabha" and "Namu Amida Butsu", but neither of those felt quiet right to me. They refer to a specific Buddha, a concept that I don't quiet embrace, as I am a strong believer in the single God. Saying "God" doesn't work either, because, although I incorporate a lot of Christianity in my practice and in my beliefs, I do not obey solely or even primarily by Western religious beliefs, so I use God more as a title or a description of what I am talking about rather than Our actual name. I tried saying "thank you", but it sounded and felt more like a desperate plea than actual gratitude.

So, I need your advise, or at least your thoughts. Can/Should God have a name? How should I refer to God? And, if not, what should I say to God to tangibly, verbally express my gratitude?

Self-Identity

One thing that I love about the queer community is the appreciation of self-identity. This extends beyond sexuality and gender identities, but into all aspects of life. I've noticed myself and others speaking about almost anything in terms of an identity: anything from social class, to political orientation, to emotional conditions, to simple descriptor words like "a flirt" or "stoner" have beecome things you do or don't identify as. However, the community is also especially accepting of the fact that not all people's identities fit a label. Identities like "queer", for example, are flexible and have no solid definition, allowing people to identify however they wish.

In discussions about different identities, I've often had people say something along the lines of "why do we need to label?" or "labels are for jars!".  I've found this to be very frustrating, mostly because it hinders discussion, but also because, in my opinion, someone's self-identity is an integral part of who a person is, and an important aspect of how we understand ourselves. Although not every person may need a label to understand who they are and not all people have a label that fits them, I don't feel that way at all. Instead, I am constantly searching for the identity that suits me the best, and this is constantly on my mind. If labels are for jars, I must be full of pickles.

In the greater context of philosophy of language and metaphysics, however, such a perspective seems to go against everything I believe it. The view that I most often subscribe to sees the world as one whole. However, when we choose to define something in this whole (usually through language), we pull it out of whole. Once we define "chair", we no longer have one, but two: "chair", and everything other than "chair".  My personal favorite philosophy, Daoism, describes this very perspective:

All in the world recognize the beautiful as beautiful.
Herein lies ugliness.
All recognize the good as good.
Herein lies evil.

Therefore
Being and non-being produce each other.
Difficulty and ease bring about each other.
Long and short delimit each other.
High and low rest on each other.
Sound and voice harmonize each other.
Front and back follow each other.

Therefore, the sage abides in the condition of wu-wei.
And carries out the wordless teaching.
Here, the myriad things are made, yet not separated.

-- Daodejing Ch 2

The Tao produces one, one produces two.
The two produce the three and the three produce all things.

-- Daodejing Ch 42

By abandoning definitions and dichotomies, you can become one with the Dao.  Thus, I think Lao Tzu would discourage us from creating and claiming labels. However, I find this somehow counter-intuitive. I would rather we have a plethora of labels to choose from and be able to create our own as we see fit than subscribe to a limiting binary. Though it would be nice to eliminate labels entirely, I don't see that happening any time soon: whenever we meet someone, they're going to want to know if we're gay or straight (well, actually whenever we meet someone, they'll assume we're straight, but if they question it, they'll want to know); I'd much rather be able to tell them I'm "queer" then identify as "neither of those" as I attempt to break down the structure of labels. Somehow, it seems that if we keep adding labels and making them acceptable, eventually, we will break down this structure, and it will be much more pleasant and effective than trying to forcefully destroy it the other way around.


Another element of self-identity that has been on my mind is the idea of "self": if we decide to do so, can we identify as whatever we wish? I've seen a few discussions recently about appropriation and misuse of identities such as queer, genderqueer, and even ally. This seems right on par with another Eastern philosophical tradition: Confucianism. Daoism, as I discussed, rejects labels and names, and it was in many ways intentionally built to contrast with Confucianism, which instead puts a very strong emphasis on names. One major element of the Confucian tradition is the rectification of names: one must act like whoever they are to actually be that person. For example, a "king" is a kind ruler who rules for his subjects. A selfish ruler who cares more about profit than rightness and humaneness is not a "king", but a "tyrant". Now, I'm not trying to say that there's a certain way someone must act to really be genderqueer, but I do think that Confucius would agree with anarchafemme on Questioning Transphobia. I think that article does a really good job with discussing the problems associated with the appropriation of any identity, and actually being something is an integral part of identifying as such.

What's in a name?, Part II

Part I was my story. These are just some scattered thoughts.

In lit a few days ago, we were doing presentations, introducing ourselves and presenting something that's contemporary to us. There was a girl who did a beautiful, passionate presentation, blowing us all off our seats. At the end, the professor asked, "So, what's your name?", for she'd forgotten to mention it. "Oh, Sophia," she answered, "Names don't matter. There's a guy from home, he works in a record store, we have so many great conversations about life - I don't know his name. I just don't pay attention to such meaningless little things."

I've been thinking about names a lot lately. Your name isn't who you are. Your name doesn't define you. Your name, truly, is just an convenience. Yet, for some reason, we see it as a measure of knowing someone, of closeness. Is it really? Names are arbitrary.

"What's in a name? That which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet."
Romeo and Juliet (II, ii, 1-2)

Isn't all language arbitrary? By definition, language is a set of arbitrary symbols and sounds, only our knowledge lends them meaning.

But names are different. I'm a person. I'm a student. I'm an American. I'm so many things, yet I am my name. There's no actual or implied connection between myself and any other Ксения in the world, like there is between one rose and the next. Then why, why do these arbitrary sounds matter?

What if a name does matter? I ended my previous blog on this topic by mentioning something I saw on the news once: a woman who would help parents name their children based on the personality traits they wanted them to have. You want your kid to be friendly? Optimistic? Intelligent? Well, you should definitely name him Ryan!  Have you ever noticed any similarities between all or most people of a certain name? Junior year, my best friend and I determined that every guy named Kyle was gay (Kyle, I hope you're reading this and laughing).

I've been thinking about chosen names. A chosen name serves the same purpose as a given name, a convenient title with which to address someone, to call them out of a crowd. Yet, something seems to be missing - or is there something more to it? Without the experience of growing into it, of carrying it from birth, is a chosen name as "real" as a given name, or is it more real, more a part of oneself than a given name could ever be?

Of course, there are those that change their name for no apparent reason. Then, there are certain communities, certain groups of people, where all names are chosen names, not given names. What is a name in such a culture? I'm thinking about Asian-American immigrants, trans folk, and Deaf culture.

The latter I find especially intriguing. We watched a film in my linguistics class last semester about ASL and American Deaf culture. Deaf individuals discussed selecting names upon entering schools for the deaf. Their name signs weren't arbitrary, but represented something about them, such as the way their hips swayed. Now that, to me, seems like a real name.

I'm thinking about spelling. How you spell your name is a huge part of it, and many people put a lot of thought into how they spell their chosen name. I've been thinking about the first letter of a name, and how fond people grow of it. When I decided to choose a new name for college, a friend said "Why don't you just choose something random? Like, Chloe or something." I couldn't. What mattered to me more than anything else was that the first letter of my name - "K" - remained the same; and not just the "k" sound, but the letter - "K".  I'm not the only one, and I've seen this first letter phenomenon again and again and again.

I've also been thinking about a different type of chosen name, nicknames within a certain group of people: camp names, online personas, drag names, etc. These names are still real, but in such a different way. I'm not a different person when I'm Cream - really, I'm not - but yet I have a different name.

Why names? Why do we love them, hate them, think about them, learn them when we meet someone? Why do we gasp them during sex? I am more than my name. I am more without my name.

What's in a name?

I've never liked my name. I've never felt comfortable with it, never responded to it like I should.

If I was born a guy, I would be named "Sergei", the name of my grandpa, my uncle, my father, and now my cousin. I don't like that name, but, to tell you the truth, there are no Russian men's names that I like.

Instead, my mom debated naming me either "Ksenia" or "Alexandra". At the end, she settled on Ksenia, and my sister - born two and a half years later - got Alexandra.

Now, to understand my name, you gotta understand how Russian names work. There's the formal name "Ksenia" or "Alexandra", in this case; and the casual version, the nick-name for each name, used to refer to children and friends: Ksenia is "Ksyusha" and Alexandra is "Sasha".

So, for much of my childhood, I grew up, pretty pleased being "Ksyusha". Then, at the age of seven, I moved to the US, and went by "Ksyusha" here, too (I think I might have spelled it "Ksusha"). However, no one could pronounce my name, and, after a while, my mom and I decided that I would - from now on - go by "Ksenia". Now, no one could pronounce that either, but I didn't change it again.

I never felt like my name was a part of me. When someone would refer to me as "Ksenia", I would feel like a sudden distance formed between us, mostly caused by the fact that it was mispronounced. Whenever I said my own name, it made me cringe, because it's Russian pronounciation sounded so wrong within the context of the English language, and I could never intentionally mispronounce it, as my sister often does with our last name when people ask her what it is. What more, at home, the only time I was referred to as "Ksenia" was when my mother was angry at me, and I did enjoy being called "Ksyusha" at home.

What's worse, I envied my sister's name "Sasha". It was unique, yet simple, and easy to pronounce. And that name was almost - ALMOST - mine, while my name could have been hers. Would things have been different?

Summer 07 I became a CIT at Girl Scout camp, and I chose my camp name to be "Cream". The name comes from the character Cream the Rabbit from the video game Sonic the Hedgehog. A few of my friends from the internet had already been referring to me as Cream, so I quickly got used to it. Finally, I had a name I felt was my own, and began talking about myself in third person. "Cream" is still the name I am closest to.

Last summer, before starting college, I decided I needed a new name to go by in college. I quickly chose some variation of the name "K", because I had long ago decided it would fit me, simply because it's the fist letter of my first name, and a simple nickname. However, I didn't want to spell it "Kay", because I wanted to be unique, and went through a long list of possible names, trying to create a new one. At last, I settled on "Kae", a simple variation of the original using only letters from my given name. I'm starting to grow into it, and I'm enjoying being called "Kae" and reacting to it. However, I still feel distant from my name. At times, I would have great conversations with friends, and I would feel a sudden gap form when I they'd call me "Kae", especially over text or online talk, when I'd see it typed. I think it still takes getting used to, but I simply don't like the spelling, and I don't think there's a spelling of "K" that I like.

I feel like my whole life I'd lived so far away from my name, and I can't even imagine having one name that's me. Sometimes, I feel like I simply cannot have a name, that my identity transcends names. That's not necessarily a good thing, but just who I am and who I became throughout my life.

What's in a name, I wonder? Does your name affect the person that you are?
I saw on the news once about a woman who'd help parents choose their child's name based on the personality they wanted their kid to have.