Why Being Your Authentic Self Seems So Difficult

Being your authentic self should be the easiest thing in the world, and it would be if the world wouldn’t do such a fantastic job at convincing each one of us that being yourself is the last thing you should be.

How does the world do it?

Why Do I Struggle Being Authentic?

Simple. From a young age, the world conditions us to crave approval, security, and control. And as soon as we’re addicted to approval, security, and control we’re pretty easy to puppeteer.

Someone doesn’t like what you’re doing? Time to punish yourself by feeling bad. Not sure if others will approve of you when you start being authentic? Might as well lie about who you are and what you are about, and instead of being and doing what resonates with you deeply, you start tuning your song to other people.

You might not like the song you’re playing, but hey, at least other people like it, right?

If we put it this way, it seems silly, and it is. But it’s also the norm, which doesn’t mean it’s less silly. It just means that silliness is the norm.

Now the question is why do we succumb to silliness when we know that it’s silly and doesn’t serve the most important person in your life — you?

The answer is fear.

Fear is natural. You can’t avoid fear. Fear beckons you to look closer. And, of course, in rare circumstances, fear is a justified response of your body; for example, when you’re in the middle of the road and a truck is approaching at high speed, fear could be the signal to get out of the way.

This doesn’t mean that the majority of fear is to be judged and condemned. It means that most of our fears are a mental story we’re telling ourselves with no substance — the fear is empty; it’s fear of nothing, which is akin to the fear of non-existence, no self, or death.

But still, fear, even the fear that holds us back from living life intensely, has an effect, a protective effect

Fear builds an invisible barrier around your artificial self — the you that you think you are — and protects you from unwanted intruders. But by doing so, we not only keep unwanted intruders out but friends as well. A closed door will keep enemy and friend out alike.

How Can I Be My Authentic Self?

To be your authentic self, you have to open the door. Better yet, remove the whole door. Be as open as you’ve never been.

Sure, you’ll be vulnerable but if you’re courageous enough not to hide, to get all your bullshit out into the sunlight, this vulnerability will become a source of strength.

Imagine you were to expose everything about yourself to the whole world. Seriously, give yourself a moment or two and imagine it.

Of course, there’ll be fear. Who wouldn’t be afraid? It’s like suicide. And some of us would probably rather die than commit this kind of radical self-reveal.

And that’s why it’s so hard to be authentic. To be authentic takes fearlessness. This doesn’t mean that you’ll no longer experience fear. It means that you’ll no longer be afraid of fear. It means that you no longer need to protect anything.

Imagine that as well for a moment.

What if you never felt the urge to hide some aspects of yourself? What if you were to no longer feel the need to project a carefully crafted yet ridiculously inconsistent self-image into the world?

And in any case, you don’t need to be protected because there is nothing to protect. All that’s being protected is a story. The content of the story doesn’t matter one bit. Most of us think the story is us. So, naturally, we want to keep the story safe and secure.

Take some time to reflect on this.

What is the price of bending backward, sideward, and over for this story? And if it’s still hard for you to accept the idea that what you think you are is a story the mind is telling, don’t fret. You don’t need to accept anything on belief here.

Instead, start looking. Really looking. Don’t just think about looking. Look and see if you can find a ‘you’ in any kind of form inside this story that you assume yourself to be.

When you do this, something interesting will happen.

Much of the previous fear will be replaced by trust because you’ll experience that most fear is a mirage. Fear is simply the absence of trust, faith, love, or whatever you want to call it. And all the energy that you previously poured into keeping this artificial self (the story) alive and secure, is now freed up for authentic expression.

What Else Stops Us From Being Authentic?

Although this all seems like more or less practical advice, I can’t tell you what you should do to be your authentic self. Neither can your friend, parent, priest, therapist, or favorite rambling cornerstone guy.

Sure, I can tell you: “Hey, look there and see for yourself.” But how everything unfolds is unique to you.

That’s where courage comes in. Courage plays an important role in being your authentic self.

You have to strip naked of all outside authority and plunge butt-naked into your own inner authority (which can seem like a black hole).

You have to recognize how fear is pushing you around and then decide what the best choice is to move further into fearlessness, that is if this is what you want.

If not, well, that’s fine too. But, because you’re reading this, I assume it’s not fine with you and there is a willingness in you to be on more intimate and unobstructed terms with life.

But for that to happen you have to take off the floaties and dare to see whether you can swim or not. You have to risk drowning in the dark deep waters of fear. The only thing is that it might not be as deep as you think because the assumed depth of fear is just another layer of fear.

You might trash around for a while until you realize that you can actually stand.

But reading about base jumping doesn’t equal hurling yourself off the cliff. This might sound a little abstract and metaphorical and impractical to you but you don’t need me to give you a how-to guide about cliff-jumping. Reaching for step-by-step advice and guidance is just another illusionary stability, fear convinces you that you need.

Let me say this again differently.

You don’t need an instruction manual for life (and I’m not speaking about taxes and stuff here) because there is none that will satisfy you!

Just think about how many self-help, personal development, and life advice books you have read, and then in all honesty ask yourself if they have brought you any closer to living life fearlessly. Life can only be a deeply fulfilling experience when you burn these manuals and start living with vulnerability, honesty, and uncertainty.

Why How-To’s Don’t Work

Fear is a call — a call that beckons you to look closer and destroy all these artificial borders and walls you have built inside. This is why you have to listen first. You have to recognize the walls that keep you from being your authentic self.

To make this more comprehensible, here is an example that might happen in life:

A person doesn’t want to accept a good job (good pay, bonuses, responsibility, and so on) because deep down he knows that he wants something else. But our person is afraid that such an opportunity won’t ever come again and that everyone around him will think him a fool for declining such an opportunity. Nonetheless, our courageous protagonist doesn’t give in and confronts his fear directly by declining the job offer.

In most situations, there is the choice to either walk straight into the arms of fear or avoid it. Although — and no matter where you are in your life you can sense it; deep down you know it — that you can’t avoid the fear forever. For that exact reason, no one can ever tell you what the right decision for you is.

Continuing our example, now imagine another person in the same situation as our previous courageous protagonist but instead of being afraid of declining the offer, this other person is afraid to take the job because he thinks he’s not cut out or skilled enough for that position and therefore decides to not accept the job.

So, it might look like both people have made the same decision. But in reality, our courageous protagonist has decided to follow the call of his authentic expression, while our second protagonist has chosen to avoid fear.

How Do I Know If I’m Being Authentic?

Instead of remaining on the safe shore of certainty, you’ll dive head-first into the deep waters of the unknown. You’ll live life in pure uncertainty. No past, no future, only the everchanging now.

This is how you’re authentic because authenticity is divorced from rules of conduct, ideas, morals, and any other concept about life, which means authenticity is spontaneous, which is the way of life. And to be spontaneous, you have to be willing to remain in uncertainty.

You have to ditch the calculated way of life for the moment-to-moment way of life.

This is easier said than done, I know. Most likely you won’t get there by forcing yourself to “be present”. Instead, you get rid of all the false ideas about life. And this includes moving through fear.

In the end, being your authentic self is different than what you think it is. But it’s also the only way life can feel like how it’s supposed to feel.

When you’re living from authenticity, you’ll navigate life differently than most people around you. Thoughts no longer will be your primary source of navigation. Instead, your new compass is what is often called intuition. Intuition is simply a pattern recognition of life.

You no longer try to make sense of life. You are life, or more accurately life is you. You are being lived by life and thus everything is simply unfolding perfectly — no matter how crazy things seem.

If you’re thinking that this here is too abstract and that you don’t get it, stop for a moment.

If you’ve read this article up until here and the words resonate with you, then you’ll most likely have a sense of what I’m pointing towards. Once again, fear might be trying to convince you that you don’t get it, and thus there’s nothing you can do.

Listen more closely. There’s nothing to get. There’s only everything to lose. And in losing everything, you’re gaining everything.

Shifting to Being Your Authentic Self

Most of us have been brought up with the idea that some radical change like this takes time. But what takes time is not the change itself, but your hesitating — not making a definitive decision.

That’s all you can seemingly do anyway. You won’t be the one doing the change. The change will happen through you.

And this is literally just a decision away. If you’re already aware of you’re invisible protective barrier, know that you’re often closing down in the face of life, and feel a pull towards this natural open state of being, then you’re closer than you think.

This doesn’t mean, however, that everything will necessarily change from one moment to another. The whole personality (all those little thoughts, beliefs, shoulds, emotional wounds, fears, habits, stories, etc.) didn’t form in a day, so they usually don’t collapse in one day either (though I’m not saying it’s impossible).

But still, you can decide to tear your self-erected fortress down and simply no longer close down in front of life. You can choose truth over lies and self-deception.

This decision is available to you in every moment. It doesn’t go anywhere. But you’re the only one who can make that decision, no one else.

And yet, until that decision is metaphorically hitting you in the face, you’ll probably want to avoid it.

Why? Well, again, because it’s out there, or rather in here where everything is uncertain and nothing is fixed in stone — there is no comfort zone here and no place to rest your head.

It’s normal, I guess. Even the most deplorable mental states and self-inflicted suffering can become our comfort zone. And, for most of us, it is our comfort zone. Many of us are so numb, we’re not even aware of the tiniest fraction of the depth of our suffering.

The way to being authentic is often uncomfortable. First, you become aware of the suffering and how you’ve been more dead than alive so far, which is a painful realization.

You’ll have to face all the elephants in the room which is usually not something we want to do because we’ve spent our whole lives learning how to navigate around them.

So, it’s kind of a journey from oblivion/numbness/unconsciousness to pain/suffering/recognition to freedom/flow/joy.

Being authentic includes ceasing to compromise with life. You no longer accept half-baked truths and one-hour strolls in the prison courtyard. You go all the way.

This shift most likely doesn’t happen all at once. By choosing steps towards fearlessness and allowing more spontaneity into your life experience, you’ll gradually develop a sense of trust — a knowing that things are working out by themselves without you playing the role of overseer.

The more you develop this sense of trust, the more you’ll be willing to live in uncertainty, which at this point will be the natural way of life. Your old way of navigating life will seem clumsy and inefficient.

But this whole thing does require an initial leap. This leap is nothing more than a getting out of the way so that life can flow smoothly and effortlessly.

Surrender fully to life and see that nothing was ever at stake. And then the only question you might ask yourself is what the hell has taken you so long?

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Luka

Hello friend! My name is Luka and I am the creator of mindfulled. Here you'll find illustrated essays and stories about spiritual awakening and the art of living.

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