Authenticity Has A Fatal Flaw. It Wants Us To Be Authentic!

Everyone wants to be authentic this year, or so it seems.

I know that for a fact, since I have received no end to emails and blog posts on the topic.

Yes indeed, “AUTHENTICITY” appears to be 2010′s official buzz word.

Then again, didn’t I hear the same word being tossed about last year . . and the year before that? I wonder what happened to it – and to all the good intentions we burned to fuel its hungers those other years.

Maybe the urge to aim so high was an overly robust result of bad gas.

Maybe, resolution fever.

In any case, it looks like AUTHENTICITY is back tugging on the communal conscience again.

I have a disturbing feeling, though, that our noble intentions aren’t going to work much better for most of us this year than they did in the past.

(Sorry. I don’t mean to be an anti-authentic-type party pooper. It’ really just a feeling. Then again . . )

Authenticity’s Fatal Flaw Revealed

You see, the challenge is that authenticity has a built-in fatal flaw:

For authenticity to work, we actually have to be authentic. And I don’t just mean authentic. I mean AUTHENTIC!

We have to not only appear to be real – from the outside. We have to actually be real – on the inside.

We have to know ourselves, and then reflect that knowing to all around us. No hiding behind pretenses or phony what-if-ifications. Straight up. The real deal.

Can you believe it?!

That means some serious and ongoing inner work is called for.

What ever were we thinking?!

And authentic reality stuff can be really tough. I mean, everyone’s reality is so different . . sort of . . at least on the inside.

That means no one of us can’t reach the height of authenticity and then pass the rewards on down to the hungry thronging masses. No one else’s reality is going to fit another, try as we might.

Not sure what I mean? Fair enough. Answer the following two questions for me.

Am I being authentic if I:

1. Pretend I am someone I’m not, because I’ve convinced myself the mask I wear is real? (Does my reality support a label of authenticity?)

2. Show different parts of myself to different people, but my whole self to no one? (One could say I’m authentically keeping myself hidden . . or not. What do you think?)

Whatever your responses might be, I guess we just have to face the fact that authenticity is the most sincere form of individuality – and vice versa.

Now do you see why it’s such a problem?

Authenticity’s Messy Connection With Reality

And that brings up a whole other kettle of smelly fishes in the name of our individual “REALITIES”.  You . . I . . all of us get down-right creative when it comes to our individual, personal realities, don’t we? You know the ones I mean . .

I guess we can be sort of proud of ourselves – in an odd sort of way. Without much effort at all, we find more ways to cover over, hide behind, and generally deconstruct and reconstruct our realities than professional improvisational-type actors have to . . well . . improvise.

The down side of all this hiding and covering over, though, is that we eventually lose track of where WE (the REAL you, me – we) are hiding.

And there, my friend, is the catch: Before we can resolve to be authentic, we must first know who we authentically are. And I’m here to say, most of us don’t have a clue.

Difficulty #1:  Getting “real” – in the authentic sense of the term – takes real time and effort. (Okay, probably not as much time or effort as we put into hiding from ourselves in the first place, but you get my drift.)

But think about it for a moment.

Do you have the room in your busy life for getting rid of all the masks you so cleverly created and hid behind when you were young . . just getting started . . making all those many impressions . . trying to be strong, brilliant and braver than you ever truly were?

Are you able to set aside the time to open your heart and peel back all the layers of excuses, belief, fear, intolerance, jealousy, and so on, in which you’ve wrapped your fragile self over the years . . so the real – authentic – you can make an appearance?

Would you even begin to recognize yourself if you came face to face on a sunny day in May? Would any of us, really?

Oh sure, we see glimpses of our real selves in the mirror . . or the window. Somewhat curious. Somewhat familiar . . in a “Didn’t I used to know you?” type memory sort of way.

The thing is: We rarely wait for the answer to that question, and probably wouldn’t believe it if it came. So we strive to be authentically ourselves in our own fuzzy-headed cubby-holes where we hold up, hoping against hope that reality treats us well.

And there is Difficulty Number 2: We want reality to treat us well without our having to commit any equal time or effort in the process. We want to be “done to” – in a good way, of course.

We want authenticity to be easy. After all, life is hard enough without any added pressure to be REAL.

But Here’s The Good Part

You didn’t really think I’d feed you all this tough stuff and then drop you like a rock on a hot sidewalk, did you? Heavens no. There is a good part to this discussion, and I’m going to share it with you.

The fact is, we are already fully authentically ourselves in each and every moment.

Okay, so we’re also in a constant state of change from one second to the next. But doesn’t that just mean that each change creates a whole new – fully authentic – me . . and you?

And if that’s the case, aren’t we already real in each individual moment?!

Then again, despite all the wise teachings and books on the topic, we do a horrible job of living in the moment. What do you imagine that says about our perception of  our own realities?

Don’t you just love confusion?

But if you’ll hold on just a moment longer, this whole gist of a puzzle kind of takes us back to a conversation I was having with a commenter on my last blog post: In that post, I was talking about how hard it is to really get to know people – beyond the superficial sort of knowing.

Whitney asked in response if, given that we connect through common experience, isn’t having an experience or making a connection – however short-lived – important as a shaper of our larger reality in its own right.

And, don’t we tend to worry more about others being “authentic” in their dealings with us than we consider our own responsibilities to deal authentically with others.

All very good points, particularly given our ongoing concerns with identity protection.

I don’t know that there are any true and final answers to the questions I’ve introduced today. Just like so much else of life, the call to authenticity is a complicated one.

Before I leave you, though, let me throw out a couple more questions for your consideration. (As with all else, I’d be very interested to hear your thoughts on these. So please comment if you’d like to connect your current reality with others.)

Consider:

If we do not really know ourselves, are we any less authentic in our blissful ignorance?

And, is there any way to truly NOT be authentic?

.   .   .   .   .

Oh, just one more thing before I go. I mentioned at the beginning of this post that I’ve been getting all manner of email and blog posts about 2010 being the year of authenticity. I wouldn’t want to drop that ball without sharing a couple links to posts of bloggers I respect when it comes to this topic. Here you go.

Jen Louden, The Comfort Queen, with her post on Static Free Authenticity; and

Seth Godin, with his post on Authenticity.

Check them out. They’re good people.

Okay, that’s all I have to say for now. If any of this catches you where you live, share a comment or two. I’d love to hear from you.

Keep growing my friend  – gail

Tagged as: Authenticity, buzz word, good intentions, reality