Ask your family why they picked your name. Knowing the story makes it harder for anyone to make fun of it.

REFLECTION

WHAT THIS MEANS

A name with a story behind it stops being an arbitrary sound you have to defend. Once you know it came from a grandmother, a city, or a word that means something specific, the teasing has to compete with that and loses. Information works as a kind of armour here.

Ask this week, while the people who remember are around to ask. Get the details: who suggested it, who argued, what the alternatives were. Keep the answer somewhere, and use it the next time somebody has a comment, because a story ends a joke faster than an argument does.

A QUESTION TO SIT WITH

What story would you learn by asking how you got named?

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