How honest are you with yourself about what you feel and believe? Is it easy for you to act naturally or do you tend to adopt personas you think will give you the best chance of being accepted? Would you like to be more authentic but you aren’t sure how or what this really means?

Authenticity is a popular topic; there are plenty or articles, posts, videos, books, and more proclaiming its value, as well as some saying that it is, at best, overrated.

While the scope and potential of authenticity have been exaggerated by some, it’s nevertheless a rewarding and important practice.

People who don’t practice authenticity instead live inauthentically. This is often painful and exhausting. You have to consider the best persona to adopt and maintain the role. As you do this, you’re sending yourself the message that who you really are isn’t good enough and has to be hidden or else there will be consequences, often exclusion.

Authenticity enables you to save energy that would otherwise be put into maintaining your role. You can do and say things that reflect who you really are, follow your passions and genuinely engage with others instead of filtering and preforming, which helps you form a healthy relationship with yourself as well.

Thinking that who you are is someone that you can reveal freely to others is a very rewarding mindset. You can appreciate yourself while feeling confident that you’re good enough.

What is authenticity?

The definition of authenticity is “the quality of being real or true”. The word comes from the Latin for “to have a self”. So without authenticity you can feel that there isn’t a real you who you can get to know or share with others – you’re self-less.

When you’re authentic, you know who you are: your favourite pastimes, ambitions, hopes for the future, boundaries, habits you’d like to break, the types of people you want in your life, and much more.

Living authentically means that you give yourself permission to be who you really are. You don’t hide your opinions, preferences, aspirations, etc. from the people you’re close to. You recognise what’s important to you, both your interests and honouring what you believe in, and you and do your best to incorporate these into your daily life, even when they aren’t popular. This could be admitting that you collect model trains and defending political decisions you agree with even when others have different opinions.

Authenticity also makes relationship more enjoyable because you’re comfortable being honest about your interests, beliefs, and preferences, while showing your true nature. Without authenticity, relationships remain at a surface level.

You accept who you are, even if there are changes you would like to make, such as trying to break a procrastination habit and wanting a more interesting career. When you make mistakes or do things you’re not proud of, you recognise this and reflect on what you did to better understand yourself and feel prepared to avoid doing the same thing again.

Because you accept who you are, you think that you’re worthy of love and connection with others. This is very important as feeling this way is essential to being happy for just about everyone.

However, being authentic can be challenging. You can feel vulnerable because you’re showing people who you really are and what you care about, which allows them to judge the real you. And speaking up when you have opinions that aren’t shared by the people you’re with can be intimidating. But taking the risk of being unfavourably judged is for most people preferable to having to maintain a character in order to be approved of by others.

It’s inevitable that there will be times and places where you don’t feel at ease being your whole authentic self, and occasionally modifying how you behave is normal. You can consider what is appropriate and adjust your behaviour according to the situation while still being authentic: you might normally have a vulgar sense of humour but you don’t tell your usual types of jokes in front of children or people you think would be embarrassed because recognise that would be inappropriate.

This isn’t the same as feeling that you must pretend to have a different personality because you’re afraid of showing people who you genuinely are. You don’t attempt to be someone else, say things you don’t believe, or be dishonest.

It can take time to feel comfortable being yourself around people you’re getting to know, such as being on your best behaviour while you’re new to a job or getting to know a new friend, but you’re confident that you’ll eventually be able to relax and behave more naturally.  

While some people are comfortable being themselves in the majority of situations and rarely feel the need to adapt their behaviour, others are able to be authentic occasionally but not as often as they would like to be. They could adopt a false persona at work or in social settings but they can easily, and often with relief, resume being their natural self once they’re somewhere they feel comfortable.

Some people, however, are playing a character the vast majority of the time. They can feel incapable of being who they naturally are, even around people they should trust. Often they’re afraid of how others will respond to them and they’ve lost touch with who they are so they struggle to be authentic even with themselves. This is a difficult and painful way to live.

While authenticity can create challenges, it contributes to a sense of pride in yourself for practicing integrity and feeling comfortable showing others who you really are.

Why do some people live inauthentically?

What makes some people choose to adopt a persona, either generally or in specific settings? Does inauthenticity have any advantages? What are the costs of inauthenticity?

While there are benefits to inauthenticity, these are largely short-term gains and they come with long-term costs.

Inauthenticity is usually fuelled by a combination of factors but they all converge with the message that it’s safer and more beneficial to put forward a persona, at least some of the time but potentially always, because of the belief that your genuine personality is unacceptable or just not good enough to get ahead.

Most people who are frequently inauthentic have been made to believe that who they are isn’t worthy of love and acceptance, which is what everyone wants and needs to be happy. They could have had their feelings neglected at home, been excluded by their peers, treated unfairly at work, rejected by a love-interest, used by someone they thought was their friend, or have gradually come to the conclusion that they can’t be themselves if they want to be accepted. As a defence against feeling rejected, they do their best to be someone who will be liked.

Interpreting painful experiences in this manner can make you believe that people won’t like the real you, especially if you don’t like yourself. You can develop an unhealthy and likely distorted image of who you are and unreasonable beliefs about how you can expect others to respond to your authentic self.

Inauthenticity can feel advantageous in the moment – agreeing with others and echoing their beliefs is often easier than disagreeing and justifying potentially unpopular opinions. These short-term gains can reinforce the need to be inauthentic while the long-term costs can be ignored or blamed on other things.

The thought of being genuine can even become anxiety-inducing since you’re used to the perceived security and advantages of inauthenticity and intimidated by the vulnerability authenticity can cause.

But inauthenticity has consequences:  

• You have to work to maintain the character(s) you’re playing, and there’s always the risk that you’ll slip up and be called out
• You send yourself painful messages about your lack of worth
• Relationships stay at surface-level
• You rely on others for validation
• You’re less likely to be happy because you prioritise being someone you think others will respond well to instead of allowing yourself to be genuine

Even though inauthenticity can help you feel safer and more accepted in the moment, it often damages how you think of yourself long term, which makes it difficult to be happy and fulfilled. So choosing to live authentically, despite the challenges that can arise, is healthier and likely not as risky as you may fear.

What are the benefits of authenticity?

What makes authenticity worth it? Are there any drawbacks? Are authentic people really happier?

Being authentic can be challenging, especially if you have long-held habits of inauthenticity. But you can feel more comfortable being authentic, both with yourself and others, if you understand the benefits of authenticity.

Relationships are stronger

Relationships that are deeper than surface-level requires both people being their authentic selves with each other. You can’t claim to know someone or be known if either of you are playing a role.

As you get to know someone, you should feel comfortable sharing the types of personal information that can make you feel vulnerable but makes relationships special, such as the story of your first heartbreak or letting a friend that you’re worried about your mother’s health. So if you share what you think and feel, in a way that respects their feelings, and encourage others to do the same, you can have deep and meaningful relationships.

Being authentic in relationships, especially if you’ve been inauthentic, can potentially carry a cost – revealing that you aren’t truly as outgoing, accommodating, confident, experienced, etc. as you’ve led people to believe can feel like a threat to your reputation and potentially even jeopardise relationships.

It’s possible that fewer people will respond positively to you than you’re used to if you’ve often been inauthentic, but the connections you do make will be deeper and more rewarding.

You determine your own worth

When you do and say things, it’s common to want validation. This can come in the form of approval from others, but you can also ask yourself how you feel about what you did.

Getting validation from others is known as external validation. For many people, this is the most important form of approval and they can even modify how they behave in order to get it; a great deal of inauthenticity is motivated by gaining external validation.

But validation can also come from yourself: internal validation. While this type of validation might not be as rewarding as having someone else tell you they agree with you or complimenting your work, it’s more reliable because it doesn’t rely on the opinions of others, which you have no control over.

Needing others to give you approval can be risky because you can’t guarantee that there will consistently be people you can please. If you start a job where the company culture is very competitive, it’s unlikely that your colleagues will give you much praise or positive reinforcement, so you can be left feeling anxious and unsure of yourself.

But if you can determine the value of your actions and accept praise from yourself, you can feel confident and proud of the things you do, even if no one else knows about them. This isn’t to suggest that the opinions of others must be meaningless or else you aren’t being authentic as you can learn a great deal from people you respect.

When you don’t need praise from others to reinforce your decisions and what you produce, you can be more satisfied with yourself and what you’re capable of.

You’re more self-aware

Authenticity also improves self-awareness. This is highly useful as it enables you to check in with yourself to determine how you’re feeling in a variety of situations.

When you feel a positive emotion, you can recognise this and ask yourself what caused it so you can do that again. This is useful for self-improvement because it usually requires effort to begin and is unappealing in the present, but you feel rewarded afterwards. So if you recognise how satisfied and accomplished you feel after doing something that is challenging but good for you or productive, you can be motivated to do the same in the future.

This also applies to negative emotions and challenging situations. When you do something that’s not aligned with your values, you recognise this. You can be kind to yourself and acknowledge the context that contributed to your actions, but you take responsibility instead of making excuses and you remember how it made you feel so you can use this to inform your behaviour in the future.

These are just some of the ways that make living authentically enjoyable. You know what you think and feel, what is rewarding, and you pursue your own interests while recognising why this is meaningful. Your priority isn’t to become someone who others will respond well to but to be someone you can be proud of.

How to be authentic

Authenticity is a practice you choose on a regular basis, not a singular accomplishment you can ever finish.

Changing habits of inauthenticity can take time and often requires unlearning deeply held beliefs about your worth. Since inauthenticity so often comes from being made to believe that who you really are isn’t good enough, this story must be challenged in order for you to feel comfortable being your authentic self.

To improve how you think of yourself, pay attention to your thoughts:

• How do you feel in situations where you tend to adopt a persona?
• What do you say to yourself when you’re asked to give your opinion?
• What outcomes are you trying to achieve when you’re inauthentic? Which do you want to avoid? Are these realistic?
• What things do you do that make you reprimand yourself? Why do you feel that way? Did you come to these conclusions yourself or did someone teach them to you?
• What is the worst that could happen if you give yourself permission to be honest and act in ways that come naturally instead of holding yourself back? What are you afraid will happen if people see the real you?
• What is your opinion of yourself? Are you happy feeling this way? How would you like to feel about yourself?
• Is being inauthentic working out?

You could discover that what you’re trying to avoid and what you’re trying to achieve through being inauthentic is unrealistic and the effort of maintaining a false persona could be out of proportion for what you gain so giving yourself permission to live authentically could be much better for you.

If you’ve been inauthentic with yourself about who you are for a very long time, you may have become disconnected to yourself so you’ll have to rediscover who you are and how to be this person.

You can rebuild this connection through exploring and discovering who you are. This process can at times be difficult, especially if there are painful experiences that caused you to dislike yourself and/or have low self-worth. Processing them can be challenging, but if done correctly it can be immensely healing and enable you to accept who you are (and confident that others will do the same).

If you’re concerned this could be too difficult to do alone, you could consider working with a mental health professional. They can provide a safe environment to explore potentially distressing memories, help you gain insight into your personal narratives, and suggest ways you could learn more about who you are so you’re capable of being your authentic self. Working with a professional certainly isn’t necessary for everyone, but it can make the process of becoming authentic easier and more enjoyable.

As you learn about how you are, you can consider meaningful ways to behave authentically. This involves identifying your values and incorporating them into your daily life.

There are different ways to determine your values. Although there are online tests you can use to determine your values, it can be more effective to discover them yourself without complex tools that can fill in the blanks for you. You can do this through asking yourself questions to learn about what is important to you:

• What gives you the greatest sense of accomplishment, even if no one else knows about what you did?
• What types of things do you tend to regret doing or feel the need to apologise for?
• What types of people do you most admire?
• What sort of person do you hope to be in the future?
• What do you dream of accomplishing and why is this important to you?  
• If you have children, what do you encourage them to do and believe? What do you hope they’re like in the future?

As you reflect on what is important to you, create a list of the values they involve. Then determine which are the most important for you. This list should be quite short – no more than five.

Then consider how you can honour these values through how you behave and treat others. If you value health, you could honour this through getting enough sleep. If you value community you could look for local volunteer opportunities, or just commit to saying hello to your neighbours more often. Because these are ways of honouring what is important to you, they should help you feel more like your authentic self.

It’s likely that you already practice your values regularly in some ways, so consider what these could be. In the future, you can acknowledge when you’re honouring your values so you can be proud of yourself and want to do it again because you appreciate how these actions are meaningful.

Reconnecting to yourself can also be fun. When you want to try something, give yourself permission. You might not decide to share it, but ideally if you enjoy it and it becomes a meaningful pastime, you tell the people you care about. If you’re not sure what to try and possibly feeling self-conscious, pretend that you’re eleven. What would your pre-teen self choose to do for fun?

Think of these experiences as experiments. Even if you don’t enjoy them or are bad at them, they were successful as long as you learned something about yourself.

However, try not to think too much or put pressure on yourself as overthinking authenticity can be counter-productive; spending too much time planning authenticity can have the opposite effect and make it become inauthentic and performative. You’ll likely have the most success if you do your best to let go and live your life as if no one is watching.

Giving up habits of inauthenticity while learning to be authentic can be challenging and possibly intimidating, but as you get used to being yourself you can appreciate how life often becomes more enjoyable when you live it in ways that come naturally instead of having the goal of pleasing others.

People who live authentically allow themselves to be happy through being themselves. They know what is important to them and they do their best to honour these values, both through how they treat others and how they act when no one is watching.

Inauthenticity can feel safe because it protects you from the risks – real and perceived – of putting your true self out into the world to be judged. But it requires living a life designed to impress others rather than for yourself. You hold yourself back from being who you really are so you can’t engage in life as fully as possible.

If you’re regularly sending yourself the message that if people got to know the real you then they wouldn’t like you, it will be difficult if not impossible to think well of yourself.

But if you consider who you are as someone who is worthy of love and acceptance so it’s safe to be authentic, you can build a healthy relationship with yourself, which plays an important role in happiness and fulfillment.