Authenticity & Being Yourself
A quote from Rumi says “Appear as you are or be as you appear”. This is a powerful statement teaching authenticity. What is authenticity, then?
Authenticity, or being our true selves, means living in alignment with our own values and virtues we stand for. How many people are able to act with their own selves? Is it possible to be purely authentic? Are there some exceptions that we can be inauthentic?
Unfortunately, living in a fast-paced lifestyle in our era forces us to lead pretend lives. Some of us need to act against our authentic thoughts, and in many cases, against their real emotions due to several reasons such as community oppression, for the fear of losing social or vocational status, or for pleasing others. This, naturally and unfortunately, makes them develop some psychological issues such as feelings of guilt, lack of self-confidence, feeling hostile, and loss of trust in others.
Authenticity is related to some other aspects including being trustworthy, transparent, and genuine and can be performed at different levels. Some people may have such a very low level of authenticity that they are not aware of how much they have strayed away from their own true selves.
On the other hand, some people have a high level of self-awareness on their own true selves, and are in good harmony with their values and with what matters for them. Thus, they nurture their mental well-being by sticking to their values and living by them.
There is another group who are aware that they breach the principle of being authentic, but they may not have enough self-confidence and courage to act with their own selves. This group is in the risk of having a path towards being the first group aforementioned.
There is a saying “If you don’t live how you believe, you start to believe how you live”. This suggests that we need to take action to develop self-awareness about what kind of life we are leading, so that we maintain authenticity.
It has been thought and accepted that identifying and measuring authenticity is difficult. However, one thing is certain: that individuals need to be authentic towards themselves in order to be authentic and genuine among others. Therefore, it is the individual themself who is the main assessor of their authenticity.
This requires us to ask ourselves certain questions. What are my values? What am I standing for? Am I leading an authentic life? Am I, foremost, honest with myself? Once we start to ask these questions, we start to develop self-awareness skills and can act on our authenticity.
In order for us to pursue an authentic life, there are some practices that we need to do. As mentioned at the beginning, the main factor of living away from an authentic life is the busy lifestyle that most of us have been living. We need to stop and spare some peaceful moments in order to meditate. We need to embrace our failures and shortcomings. We need to make peace with ourselves and accept ourselves as we are. Truthfulness and authenticity will open authentic and honest relationships, which open great life achievements.