Does being authentic mean publicly sharing
\n everything about yourself, at the risk of
\n rejection or even violence?<\/p>\n
Consider this:<\/p>\n
How do you react to people who hold political, religious, social
\nviews or practices different from your own? <\/p>\n
Do you feel threatened and want to destroy them? Do you feel
\ncompelled to convert them to your own views? Do you feel the need
\nto prevent your children from being exposed to them? Do you avoid
\nthem? <\/p>\n
Are you curious to understand them?<\/p>\n
Does it depend on whether these people are in your family, your
\nneighborhood, your workplace, your profession, your country, or
\nin positions of power?<\/p>\n
I’ll admit, I’m not always as open-minded and curious as I’d like
\nto be when people who don’t value what I do appear to threaten
\nthings I care about. This, despite the fact that I like to
\nbelieve that no one has the power to create my reality.<\/p>\n
Sometimes I have to work at remembering that.<\/p>\n
Because I DO live in the world with other people, and I AM
\naffected by what I see around me, it takes some effort to remind
\nmyself that I’m always in charge of what happens in my reality. <\/p>\n
But even though I think I shouldn’t care what others think, and
\nmy well being shouldn’t depend on the approval or disapproval of
\nothers, I often catch myself wanting approval anyway. <\/p>\n
I catch myself treading carefully with what I reveal in certain
\nsettings, to avoid being the target of negative reactions. Do
\nyou?<\/p>\n
And what’s the health cost of these efforts to fit in, versus the
\npotential cost of not fitting in?<\/p>\n
Following June’s article about authenticity, “Permission to Be
\nReal,” (see the P.P.S. below for a link to the article) a long
\ntime subscriber wrote this to me:<\/p>\n
I struggled enough with my having large, often
\n dark freckles that I’ve always been sensitive
\n to others feeling “less than” because they
\n didn’t fit someone’s idea of being “just right.” <\/p>\n
All that’s lacking in your story is the fact
\n that thousands of gay\/lesbian types struggle
\n with the same issues, yet can’t mention them
\n to anyone who might help because they’re
\n “different” from all authority types; I have
\n several friends in this fix who have nowhere
\n to turn. <\/p>\n
I can’t date them (I’ve been happily married
\n 49 years to my wife,) and find it hard to
\n convince them that I ‘might have’ under
\n different conditions.<\/p>\n
Please consider them also in your discussions
\n of being real\/authentic despite how others
\n “put them down” as a matter of course because
\n they’re not Christian or legal or some other
\n stupid reason for treating them like dirt.<\/p>\n
*** Thanks, my friend, for your wonderful contribution to this
\nconversation! Here are my thoughts to everyone reading…<\/p>\n
Whatever the gender of your preferred intimate partner, there are
\nprobably a few things about yourself or your past that you’d
\nrather the whole world not know about–or wish you could share
\nwithout fear.<\/p>\n
This reminds me of a discussion by a wonderful teacher I
\nencountered last week, David Spangler. He was talking about the
\nway we identify ourselves, using the metaphor of skeletons. I
\nloved the metaphor for the way what supports us can also limit
\nus.<\/p>\n
As mammals, our physical support comes from within. We have
\ninternal skeletons–endoskeletons–of bone to which our flesh is
\nattached. This gives us tremendous freedom of movement, and
\nallows us to grow continuously.<\/p>\n
At the same time, it makes us somewhat vulnerable to injury.<\/p>\n
Invertebrates like lobsters and insects carry their skeletons
\noutside their soft bodies. They are more protected, but if they
\nare to grow, must shed their limiting exoskeletons and grow new
\nones. <\/p>\n
Our human identities, David explained, are often based on social
\nstructures that, while they offer the sense of safety of
\nbelonging, also limit our growth. These identities act like
\nexoskeletons. <\/p>\n
At a certain point of growth, we must choose the temporarily
\nvulnerable position of being without the protective shell of
\nbelonging, or risk suffocation.<\/p>\n
You can probably think of the unspoken rules of membership in
\nyour family, your community, your profession. You know what might
\ncause a person to be ostracized, or what makes a person popular.<\/p>\n
If you think of the temptation to “blend in” by not revealing
\ncertain information about yourself, or even pretending to be what
\nyou’re not, and thus enjoy social protection, while at the same
\ntime feeling constrained by not feeling safe to be yourself, you
\nalso know what I mean.<\/p>\n
For example, if you had an abortion, and belong to a family,
\nchurch or social group that disapproves of abortion, you might
\nnot feel safe to reveal that you had one. <\/p>\n
If everyone in your community and extended family disapproves of
\nany form of intimacy other than that between married adults of
\nopposite genders, and you are gay or lesbian, you get to choose
\nbetween hiding\/pretending and risking ostracism.<\/p>\n
The question is, which is the higher cost to your health and
\nwell-being–revealing unpopular information, or hiding it?<\/p>\n
This is where the question of identity becomes especially
\nimportant.<\/p>\n
Who are you?<\/p>\n
If you gain your entire sense of self from outside yourself–the
\ngroups to which you belong, your status, gender, sexuality,
\nprofession, even race–you will eventually feel the inner
\nconflict between your inherent expansion and the limitations of
\napproval from any groups that don’t favor individual expansion.<\/p>\n
The more you base your sense of self on adherence to your own
\ninner core of unconditional love, your own set of personal rules
\nof integrity, the less dependent you are on the approval of
\nothers. <\/p>\n
In other words, if you operate primarily from the strength of
\nyour inner skeleton, you have more freedom *and power* than if
\nyou operate primarily from the strength of the social structures
\naround you.<\/p>\n
If you think about this, you’ll recognize the difference in
\ncharisma and influence between someone who is trying to control
\nyou and get love and approval from you, versus someone who is
\nalready filled with her or his own inner light and love.<\/p>\n
This is true no matter what the social, religious, economic, or
\nprofessional position of that person. <\/p>\n
It’s true whether you’re gay or straight, freckled or
\nplain-skinned, male or female, young or old, healthy or sick.
\nIt’s true no matter what your history, race, or family.<\/p>\n
This is not to say there’s no pain in rejection due to things you
\ncan’t change in yourself or in others. Nor that there’s not a
\ndifference between things you can’t hide or pretend, and things
\nyou can.<\/p>\n
But all the preaching or laws in the world aren’t going to make
\nall those “other” people treat you the way you’d like to be
\ntreated. You can make yourself sick by focusing on the unfairness
\nor violence in the world.<\/p>\n
Or you can remember that you’re a complex being who can never
\nplease everyone, even if you are in the dominant group. Coming
\nout of whatever closet you may have hidden some aspects of your
\nidentity will have its costs and benefits. You get to decide what
\nyou show the world.<\/p>\n
But your true authenticity lies inside of you, and has nothing to
\ndo with what external social identities you express. Your ability
\nto connect authentically with others depends on your ability to
\nlook beyond categories, and see the being behind the exterior. <\/p>\n
The more you focus on your own inner light and love, and that of
\nothers, the more you win. <\/p>\n
No matter what.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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