Authenticity

Being authentic, being actually and precisely what you claim to be (and claiming to be precisely what you are),requires that your behavior prove your claim. We said earlier that you are what you do. If what you do is aligned with your claims about your identity, then you are being authentic. However, if you claim to have a certain set of commitments, while your actions serve other ends, you are being inauthentic. Your commitment to some goal is only authentic when that commitment shows up in your actions; when that goal, rather than all others,actually governs your behavior.

INAUTHENTICITY

Before defining authenticity, it is useful to distinguish between different types of inauthenticity. Authenticity and inauthenticity are not absolute categories, but are different ways of being and acting; you could be authentic in one respect and inauthentic in another. You're inauthentic when your behavior is aimed at convincing yourself and others that you have certain commitments, not because you really do, but because seeming to gets you certain payoffs. Your real commitment is to the payoffs, not to that to which you claim to be committed. Inauthenticity can take at least three different forms which I'll call:(1) drifting,(2) bad faith, and (3) dogmatism.

DRIFTING

The drifter is a person who just does what anyone else in his cultural circumstance would do in life. He is a conformist, doing what is expected of him, what is normal. Whether the drifter is inauthentic or not depends partly on why and how he is conforming to the cultural drift. It's possible to seem to be conforming while leading a rich, satisfying life. What makes the drifter inauthentic is that his main goal is to remain comfortable by avoiding the anxiety that arises from being abnormal or having to cope with abnormal situations. A drifter will spend his life either trying to avoid situations that might result in his looking “abnormal," or, when confronted with such situations, will try to force things back to what is “normal” and comfortable. Being normal is the highest priority of the drifter, more important even than the well-being of the people involved or the positive outcome of events. For example, there are various “normal” ways to be a father in our culture, but these norms don't anticipate having a homosexual son. A drifting father will not be able to respond creatively to this situation. If he can't talk or coerce his son out of his homosexuality, he will do whatever he can to deny,repress, or avoid it,to the point of denouncing the relationship altogether. While he claims to have a genuine commitment to his son, his ultimate commitment is to looking like a “normal” father. He does not take his own stand about fatherhood over and above the conventional cultural stand. In situations like this, when cultural norms conflict with each other, you must decide who you are in the matter.

There is an especially shallow and sterile way of conforming with the drift that is prevalent in modern society due to the character and pervasiveness of the mass media. When you conform to the media drift, your interpretations and behavior are mediated by the norms celebrated in the media. These norms are intended to sustain and expand the influence of the mass media itself, and they will tend to flatten and blur peoples' ability to make distinctions.

In all cultures we learn through our involvements in concrete relations, like our family, church, and school.In a media culture,those relationships are shaped, in large measure, by the media. “Looking good" in a media culture like ours is all about conforming to the prepackaged images created by the media. Our identities and interpersonal relationships take on a highly generic character. Insofar as you strive to emulate these generic types, you open yourself only to the commitments and concerns that are represented in the mass media and are available to the generic drifter.

Consider the areas of your life in which your inauthenticity may be characterized as “drifting.” Use your journal to write your thoughts.

• How important is 'looking good' to you?
• Where did you get your definition, formula,or model,for looking good?
• Have you acted inauthentically merely to avoid looking bad,even when you were aware that some other creative action would have been more effective? What were the circumstances? What were the consequences?
• Where in your life are you 'drifting'? What action would you have to take to stop drifting? What will it entail? Will you take that action? When?

BAD FAITH

The “bad faith” brand of inauthenticity is much more cunning than the drifting brand. This person is the great pretender. In bad faith, you develop a certain inauthentic identity, not with the intention of conforming, but of reaping specific payoffs traditionally associated with that identity.

To illustrate, consider the difference between two ways of being a “suffering mother,” one of which is authentic and the other bad faith.

An authentic woman might genuinely suffer for the sake of her children in the sense that she has to work hard and forego other opportunities for their benefit. But what governs her behavior is her concern for her children and it just so happens that, in her circumstances, suffering is an unavoidable consequence of that. If she could serve her children without suffering, she would.

On the other hand, the mother who suffers in bad faith is less concerned with the children than with the privileges that suffering mothers earn. Mothers whose circumstances are such that they have to make sacrifices for their children get attention and acknowledgment. Moreover, a suffering mother has a legitimate excuse for not engaging in activities which, if not for her commitment to her children, she would otherwise have to pursue, given the principles she claims to value. Therefore, insofar as a woman convinces herself and others that she is a suffering mother, she can provide excuses for herself and lay moral claim on others. The mother who suffers in bad faith is willing to suffer in the name of her children even when suffering isn't necessary to promote their welfare and even when it runs contrary to their welfare.

Acting in bad faith is a way of attaining the goodies that go along with a certain identity, without actually being committed to the principles of that identity. It allows you to say “I deserve X because of who I am, or because of my circumstances" even in situations when you would otherwise have to take effective action in order to get X. In this way, it can relieve you of your own responsibility to act; you automatically inherit benefits that you would otherwise have to earn.

Of course, bad faith has a heavy price as well. You artificially narrow your opportunities by cutting yourself off from any possibilities that don't reinforce your chosen identity. If you are going to be a suffering mother and enjoy its entitlements, you have to play the part. Also, it is manipulative; to the extent that you use suffering motherhood to coerce attention and deference from others, you are engaged in a kind of fraud. In spite of the fact that you must pretend not to know what you are really up to, this fraud and manipulation will inevitably color your world, and will affect how you experience yourself and others. Since it is mandatory that you not be exposed, you will often see others as threats. You'll have to be constantly on guard, suspicious of peoples' questions and opinions, worried that they might expose you. You also experience yourself as cut off from others, as not “really” the person they think you are, and as not really deserving the attention and sympathy they tender.

It's a tough one to admit, but examine the possibility that you are acting in bad faith somewhere in your life.

• Where are you reaping benefits that you have not actually earned? What are the benefits?
• How is that inauthenticity limiting you?
• What would you have to give up if you became authentic in that area?
• What would you gain by being authentic?

DOGMATISM

Dogmatism is a more subtle form of inauthenticity than either drifting or bad faith. You don't hold a dogmatic commitment because it is normal (even if it is), but because it is “right.” Unlike the drifter, you may take a stand that can actually bring you into conflict with the norms,and unlike the person acting in bad faith, who exploits cultural norms for their moral entitlements, you will hold the norms in contempt if they contradict your sense of what is right

What makes a commitment dogmatic is the very strong, righteous way you hold it to be objectively and absolutely valid. You believe that this commitment automatically supersedes any other considerations in all contexts. Your cause is objectively the most important cause to which a person can be committed and allegiance to it supersedes all other allegiances in any situation. There is little room for new possibility in dogmatism.

The payoff of dogmatism lies in avoiding the ambiguity and the anxiety of having to choose one course of action over another when faced with the twists and turns of life. You are relieved of the burdens of interpretation and choice and of the risk of really participating in a vulnerable way. Dogmatism is a way of not taking responsibility for your actions because you claim not to be acting out of interpretations, but out of absolute principles.

The cost of dogmatism is loss of freedom. Its rigidity and inflexibility cuts you off from other points of view and from the richness that accompanies the ambiguity of human life.

Ask yourself these questions about dogmatic inauthenticity:

• Is there any example in your life in which you hold a dogmatic interpretation of right?
• Do you believe in objective standards of right and wrong, worthy and unworthy,good and evil?
• What prices do you pay for your dogmatism?
• What are the payoffs you get?

AUTHENTICITY

Unfortunately, we are much less clear about the nature of authenticity than we are about inauthenticity. One way to characterize authenticity is to contrast it with its converse.

In being authentic, your chief concern is neither to be normal and safe nor to be abnormal in a way that justifies special treatment, nor to put yourself on the side of right. In fact, your commitments sometimes require behavior that runs contrary to the norms and will not produce the payoffs associated with drifting, bad faith, or a dogmatic commitment.

In being authentic, you will simply do what you do. In contrast to drifting, however, in situations that cannot be anticipated by the cultural norms, which demand a creative response, you will be more flexible than the drifter because you are willing to take a stand that puts you in opposition to the drift. If necessary, you'll give up looking good in favor of the unique demands of your particular ideals and goals. So, the authentic father who discovers he has a homosexual son can deal with the situation creatively although it is not provided for in the norms of his culture. He doesn't flee from the situation by denying it or repressing it. Of course, in responding to his son, the authentic father will have to draw upon cultural resources and these will limit his room to maneuver. But how he draws on these resources will depend on how they contribute to the welfare of his son rather than on how they reinforce his own identity as a certain kind of father. Authenticity requires that you think for yourself, struggle with questions rather than simply go along with the drift. An authentic stand exists within the drift, but is not aimed at fitting in with the drift

Neither is the authentic stand like the stand taken in bad faith or dogmatism.That is, as an authentic individual, you are not committed to generating special moral entitlements or being on the side of right. Authenticity is governed by concern for the welfare of the individuals involved and for the conditions of each unique situation.Thus, the authentic mother lives out of her commitment to her children. She may suffer when it is necessary to benefit her children, but doesn't suffer for the sake of its payoffs. In fact, she is willing to forego being a suffering mother even in situations where the cultural norm might be to suffer. Authenticity is not unconsciousness, manipulation,or avoidance-which characterize drifting, bad faith, and dogmatism, respectively.

You cannot necessarily identify authenticity by someone's results. An honest shopkeeper may be motivated by profit rather than by a commitment to the truth, having discovered that his reputation for honesty has attracted many customers to his shop. The result, that he tells the truth, is the same under normal circumstances. One test of authenticity would be to see what he would do when the external circumstances were varied. If, for instance, it became highly profitable to make some dishonest claims about a product he sells, or if he were underbilled by a vendor. Of course, in life we are constantly confronted with complexities and subtle variations forcing us to grapple with the authenticity of our own commitments.

Use your journal to begin an inquiry about authenticity by considering the following questions.

• Have you ever taken a stand about something even though it puts you in opposition to cultural norms?
• How would you define authenticity?
• How do you know when you are being authentic?
• How do you know when you are being inauthentic?
• How do you undermine your authenticity?
• When you are inauthentic, what is more important to you than being authentic?

SYMBOLS: HAVE-DO-BE AND DO-HAVE-BE

Being authentic does not automatically render results, and results do not necessarily indicate authenticity. If your behavior is motivated by a sincere commitment to certain concerns, then the probability of achieving the results that fulfill those concerns is high. However, there is no guarantee. You can control your motivation and your competence,but you cannot always control the results of your actions.The results you have are symbolic of, but not measurements of, your authenticity.

In our culture, we worship symbols. We look to our results for fulfillment and to validate our claims about who we are. For instance, we believe that money equals power,freedom, choices,security,respect, happiness. Consumer industries capitalize on the link between symbols and satisfaction. A car isn't a car, it's a feeling; a pair of jeans doesn't clothe you, it makes you sexy. Billions of consumer dollars are spent every year on such promises. You are not just buying products,you are buying the subjective,qualitative experience that those particular products promise you. People look to the things that they have and the things that they do to provide them a desired experience.

But are those things really the source of your experience? Take the example mentioned above of a car. All American sixteen-year-olds long for their own cars. Why? Because the cars give them freedom, responsibility,power, status,independence.And while you're at it, why not go for the ultimate dream car? After all, a Rolls Royce or a Ferrari will make you feel classier, richer, sexier, more powerful, and more prestigious than a Buick. When you actually get your dream car (or dream job, dream marriage, dream home,or whatever),it may not turn out to give you the experiences that you had counted on. You may fulfill those desires temporarily, but the car itself is merely the object of that experience, not the source of it. In fact, not only is a car not the source of freedom, power, and prestige, but sometimes your car can appear to cause the opposite experience, like when it breaks down in the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night, or when you have to take time off work to take it into the shop, or when you drive away from the dealership after having written them a $750 check for standard maintenance, or when you really don't feel like washing it.And, to look at it another way, can't you have the experiences of freedom, power, and prestige without the car? In place of our commitment, we substitute the symbols that we think generate the experience we are looking for.

The false link between symbols and experiences does not stop at material acquisitions. For example, many people believe that when they get married,they will suddenly have security, stability,friendship,companionship,family,sex,unconditional love,excitement, nurturing, and so forth. Anyone who is married can tell you that, in fact, much of the time they feel less secure, nurtured, loved, and everything else, than before they married. Furthermore, do you need to be married to be happy, secure, and nurtured? Marriage is merely an arena for you to express yourself. Your relationship with your husband or wife isn't an acquisition that comes with a lifetime guarantee of satisfaction; it is a platform on which you can act out, explore,and transform the conversations you have about marriage, commitment, family, and other matters.

The “Have-Do-Be” structure of interpretation leads you to believe that symbols will inherently provide you with an ultimate experience of fulfillment. But another variation of the paradigm,“Do-Have-Be,” says that it is the process of acquiring the symbols that causes us your experience. If you work harder, making X number of calls every day, you will have more sales, will earn more money, and will, therefore, be successful,rich,happy,and respected. You are still looking to an external agent or activity to determine the quality of your life.

Of course, to go to the other extreme and say that what you do and have doesn't matter at all smacks of the old “go meditate on the top of a mountain for the rest of your life" philosophy. What you do and have definitely matters. Your behavior is your trademark,and your results, while not foolproof reflections, are checkpoints or representations of how effective your actions are. The error our culture teaches us to make is to look at activities and material objects to fulfill us.

We develop this very early. Look at babies. A baby catches on quickly that crying gets attention from Mom and Dad. All they have to do is let out one or two good “wahs” and they are immediately center stage. The love was there already, the “wah” was just a mechanism for controlling it.The baby, however, thinks that the “wah” caused the love. Similarly, symbols and activities do not determine quality of life, but we often believe they do.

I promise that your life is full of “Have-Do-Be” and “Do-HaveBe" thinking. Examine it for yourself using your journal.

• Think of examples in your relationships that demonstrate the 'Wah = Love' theorem. In other words, strategies you use to get attention or that others use to get attention from you.
• Ultimately, do you produce results for the sake of producing results or for the sake of something else? If something else, what?
• What experiences do you believe will be yours as soon as you have Car Charming? Relationship Charming? Body Charming? Children Charming? Job Charming?
• Is it possible to have those experiences without having the symbols?

‘‘AS SOON AS'’

As inclined as we are to look to external circumstances to derive meaning and fulfillment from life, it's easy to be gripped by the “as soon as”delusion. Life will really take off as soon as you get married, get your degree,make your first million, get a new car, get promoted, buy a house, move into a different neighborhood, have children, get rid of your children,turn forty, get divorced. As soon as, as soon as, as soon as.This is doomed.According to this strategy, there is always another “as soon as.” Not only can you never do enough or have enough, but your higher goals and aspirations get lost in the drive to conquer your next symbol. Meanwhile, you are only minimally engaged in your present circumstances, always with your eye on the future. Life is about ready to begin to commence to get started, just as soon as. . . .

Life is not a dress rehearsal. While you are putting off what is most important to you until just “as soon as” you reach the next benchmark, life is racing by you. While you are busy preparing yourself for the day you finally grasp that carrot dangling on the stick in front of you, your possibilities for “being” remain untapped. Your future is predictable, and it's the kind of future that leaves you with the question,“Is this all there is?”

AUTHENTICITY: BE-DO-HAVE

The “Be-Do-Have” model says your commitment is the source of your experience. Your commitment is authentic if you are engaged in behavior that encompasses your higher ideals and aspirations.“Be” is not a tool with which you can regulate the universe-you cannot ultimately control what happens to or around you in your lifetime. Integrating your principles and your actions gives you wholeness, worthiness, and fulfillment.

The concept “Be” is also not a mechanism for guaranteeing what you “Have.”“Be” is the stand you are. If you are genuinely committed to world peace, and work for world peace with sincere dedication, it is not guaranteed that you will achieve world peace.If you are committed to making a million dollars this year, and strive industriously toward that goal, it is not guaranteed that you will make it. You can control your motivation and your effectiveness, but you cannot control the external world. The “Be” part of the picture is about the powerful possibilities for achievement and excellence opened by the integrity of the human being. Regardless of the outcome, you will fortify your integrity by authentically pursuing your ideals.

“Be-Do-Have" sounds like a formula. Unfortunately, there is no recipe for authenticity. “Be-Do-Have" is a reminder of the human mystery mainly because the concept called “Be” is so vague and perplexing. “Do,” meaning engaging in actions with certain goals, is fairly straightforward, as is “Have,” the results of your actions. But what is “Being?” While the inquiry into ontology, the nature of being, has had the most powerful influence in my life personally and in the work we do at Lifespring, it is beyond the scope of this book.“Be” is that dimension of a human being that determines what and who you are, what you stand for, what you are up to on the planet. From your “being” emerges your character, concerns, and actions.

In the jargon phrase “Be-Do-Have,”“Be” refers to your commitment to your higher ideals and aspirations, the goals toward which your behavior is directed. “Be-Do-Have” asks you to pick and formulate your life projects such that what you value profoundly is authentically expressed with passion, precision, grace,and power.