Authenticity. What is that?

If you’re talking art, then it means a piece is not a forgery. If you’re talking about ways for human beings to live, then some have asserted that authenticity is living well and in accord with what one actually is but that it is difficult because social pressure drives us obscure who we are, what we really think, value, feel, desire, or intend.

Thus, to be authentic, one must really know him or herself, and one must be willing to let other people do with that whatever they may when we reveal ourselves to others.

This reminds me of a story in the Old Testament. Moses had brought the people out of slavery in Egypt, and they had come to Mount Sinai. So, he went up on the mountain to be with God, while the people waited down below.

When Moses met God it had an effect on the way he looked. His face reflected the glory of God, and he came down from that meeting radiant. The people saw it and remarked about it. However, as the days began to pass, the shine on Moses’ face began to fade; so, in order to hide that from the people, Moses put a veil over his face.

To me that is a perfect analogy to what we do when we attempt to hide ourselves from others. We put a veil over ourselves so that other will not be able to see what’s really going on inside.

That veil has been called various things, but by some contemporary psychologists it is knows as a “false self”.

It’s a role one plays, and it’s even a personal one takes on with which to fool oneself into believing one is something other than what one actually is. The false self is a veil for others that blinds the eyes of the person wearing it.

Thus, some people, who feel very little and who feel they do not measure up to others, often make as big a splash as possible when they jump into the water. It’s as if they say to themselves and others, “Now, wasn’t THAT a great splash?!”

And if you don’t show that you know it was a great splash, they reject you as not worth their time.

Beneath the veil, however, is the true self, the person who actually suspects he or she is not competent, intelligent, attractive, conversational — not wanted by others.

That is so painful the person cannot get close to it, and so that veil, the false self, becomes something he or she must assert and must seek to get others to accept.

It’s a horrible way to live. It usually has the opposite result in terms of the person’s relationships.

To be authentic, one removes the veil. If you’re tired, people see fatigue. If you’re happy, then that is what they see.

The veil of the false self is a whole package and gets out for public consumption in what we say and do: how we walk, the tone in our voice, the intensity of our gaze, the slump of the shoulders, the words we choose to say, and of course the thoughts we provide to our social audiences.

Everyone must decide how much of themselves to reveal to this person or that person, but what they may be losing track of is the experience they have and the stories they tell themselves about themselves when they are with this person or that, in this social context or that.

Often, people lose track of who they really are because too much of a veil “comes home” with them.

I sometimes ask people, “What’s that like?” after they tell me about some aspect of their current situation. What I’m trying for is an authentic expression of what they are going through.

It’s not that I need them to say it, but I believe they might need to attend to and become more aware of it themselves.