Meandering thoughts on Authenticity: What is authenticity, to me? How can I act authentically and still be kind and compassionate?

This was the basis of a “daily meditation” with an app I use. I do strive to meditate every day, as I feel it’s good for my brain. My brain is always going a million miles a minute, and I’m always thinking about different things, paths of thought and pondering, so meditation forces me to stop—just stop the rumination—something that feels like ice skating up Mt Everest sometimes.

But rumination, or the propensity to ruminate, has been found to be a signifier of depression, or perhaps a symptom of depressive people—and so it’s something that I try to keep a handle on.* Rumination is, at its most basic, “chewing over a problem” but never actually dealing with it, or finding a solution. Depression is good at this one; all you can see is the problem, but you can’t actually problem-solve your way through whatever triggered that ruminating.

So, my meditation today. Authenticity with compassion and restraint… can you be authentically yourself and still be compassionate, still show restraint? For many people (just check any random Insta, Tumblr, or other social media feed for examples) people who shout about being “Authentic” are usually the first to use this so-called authenticity to harm others. “I’m just being authentic” and “I’m telling it like it is” are bandied about, ad nauseum… when they should just say, “I’m unfiltered right now, and feeling cunty”. At least the latter is honest.

But it got my thinking. I mean, that’s sorta the point of a guided meditation: to give you something to think on, while you quiet your mind from other distractions, before letting that thing go, too. To look at something, without becoming attached to that thought—kinda like the clouds going by, which is the most common explanation of meditation I’ve heard used: see your thoughts like clouds in the sky, notice them but don’t really “watch” them.

So, what does “Being Authentic” mean to me?

It means being true to me values. Values like honesty, kindness, compassion, empathy, love, wisdom, caring. It means working to magnify my virtues, and working to mitigate the harm I have, or might do, as I go through life. It means leaving the world a better place, every day, even if tht only means that I made someone laugh. It means being genuine, and not pretending to be someone I’m not.

It also means that I have to know who I am, before I can be true to myself. If you don’t Who you are, you cannot truly be You.

This is so hard, especially for a female-bodied person in the world. Even in my hippie-dippie, liberal, animal-rights, SJW, “Down with the Patriarchy!”, Queer, Witchy, world, it’s hard! There is so much baggage forced on women, women-presenting, or “assumed to be women because ‘reasons’” persons. Even being a slightly feminine person comes with about 700 tonnes of “Thou Shalt” and “Thou Shalt Nots” of social expectation. Add in someone with breasts, or who paints their nails, or has a voice in a higher register, or who likes frilly dresses, or has killer makeup, and those expectations compound.

[Because I’m a feminine-looking genderqueer person who uses “her and she” pronouns, I often “pass. I am aware of this privilege, but I can’t speak fully about what transwomen and transfeminine, NB, and other gender-non-conforming persons have to live with, with societal expectations about their reproductive tract. Often they are lumped in with women, or women-appearing persons, and we’re all given ALL of the shit. From here in on, all non-cis-men are included when I say women, or women-presenting persons, and I’ll use We.]

We’re expected to take up very little space, to be small and submissive, to take what we’re given and be happy with it, to never be angry, assertive, aggressive or unhappy. We have to smile and “be sweet”. This leads to all of us being inauthentic: we might not even know who we are any more, with all the expectations of others piled on us so high.

So, the first thing to do is to figure out who we are.

This means we dig into ourselves, find our likes and dislikes, sit with our emotions, and our discomfort and figure out “why” they are, as well as “what”. We learn about ourselves, and we decide what we support, and what we want to burn down. We learn what we want to build on the ashes.

This means we dig into ourselves in the most uncomfortable ways. We poke and prod our feelings, shine a light into the cobwebby corners of our hearts, pick out the biases and prejudices we were given by our families and our communities as children. We take a metaphorical scalpel to these poisons and strip them out of our hearts, so that we can heal. Poisons like racism, sexism, homophobia and transphobia; cancers like religious hatred and insidious things like “benevolent sexism” that religion often teaches.

We have to find these dark corners of our minds and hearts, so that we truly know ourselves. Even the parts we don’t like.

This leaves scars. Sometimes the scars are only in our hearts; sometimes it means excising family members, removing entire branches of our family trees. Those scars are easier to see—and most often are met with “Oh, they’re your family, you have to forgive/love/etc no matter what!” Those scars are the ones more likely to be gaslit by others—even well-meaning people.

But they’re scars, and they’re real, and you have them because you’re working to be a better person! I know I Have them, I have a shit tonne of them.**

Second: Let’s figure out what we stand for.

This comes back to values. I know this is a really, politically and religiously loaded word, so bear with me.

I mean “Values” as in: the things in your life that are meaningful, give you joy, that you strive for. The things that make life better.

These could be hiking, or cooking, reading and writing, good coffee, chocolate, and friends over for game nights, in addition to the other things often called Virtues like love, patience, compassion, and joy.

My values, the things that give my life meaning, include music and art; joy and laughter; compassion and care for animals and others; justice and equality; mercy and love; good beer and food with friends; tea and biscuits on a quiet evening; cats and other critters; the sunset in the desert; star gazing; learning; trying to grow plants (and sometimes failing); learning more knowledge; gaining wisdom; singing in the car, and dancing in the rain…

Friendship, companionship, being a good friend, and being honourable; saying what I mean in love (I mean with tact, so I’m not harming when being honest); working to make the world better; genuine love and kindness, even when I want to strangle someone.

It means forgiving myself and others when we fall short of our values—and truly want to do better. It means not forgiving because “you have to”, but if, and only if I want to. It means knowing that I’m going to fuck up, and giving myself space to do that, and to get back up. It means failing sometimes, to reach the goals and standards I have for myself—but being ok with it, because I’m not dead, so I can still try.

It means throwing out the "isms" I was taught, overtly, or covertly, and knowing that I have certain biases that I need to work around. It means tossing the ideals of "what Real Women TM" are, and being willing to do it my way. It means meeting people where they are, and being willing to put my money where my mouth is.

Third, it means working to live our values, every day!

Now we know who we are, and what we stand for… and this next step is probably the hardest part.

Try making a list, even if it’s only a mental one, and see which values you want to encourage—maybe you’re not as patient with yourself as you are with others (Hello, my name is Emma, and I’m talking to myself here!), or you want to be more actively compassionate. Knowing what you value will help you find the places you can improve. Our values, the ones we hold dear, are what make us human, and what we can use to create full lives!

Then, we work to live these values. We can act our values, every day. Practice these values. Like you’d practice a good habit (eating right, meditation, whatever).

I know, I know, “Something, something, 30, 45, 150,000 days to make a habit”, right? I never know how long it’s supposed to take, and I’m the last person to say keep doing this every day! I can’t even journal for 5 minutes every day. But I can do it 3 times week. That’s what worked for me. Find a centred space-- that “works for me” sweet-spot.

Pretty soon, you’ll find that the values you want to promote will be easier. You’ll be more actively kind, you’ll think that half a second before being nasty-honest, and be kind-honest; you’ll work to mitigate the harm you might cause.

We actively give compassion (to others, and especially ourselves!), we forgive ourselves when we fall short, we love ourselves for trying. Every virtue you share with others, you’ll give to yourself.

And yes, I know, it’s so fucking hard to forgive and love yourself. It’s so goddamned hard to be kind to yourself every day, to forgive your fuck-ups, and to be patient. But, if your values include these things, aren’t you just as worthy of them as someone on the street, or in the Circle K? Aren’t you a person too?

This is my authentic self: this struggling to be my best me, every day. This struggling to love, nurture and care for myself, to give compassion to me, as often as I extend it to others; the patient “deep breath” before I berate myself for some perceived failure. It’s hard as fuck, every day.

But, if I want to be authentically me, then I owe it to myself to work to be kind—especially to myself. I can hold myself accountable, just as I can hold others to account. I can, and am, responsible for my fuck-ups, my mistakes, and my “Yep, I totally did that on purpose, when I know I shouldn’t have” actions. I can also be loving and give myself room to evolve and grow.

What do you do, to live authentically? How are you still compassionate and loving?

*https://www.apa.org/monitor/nov05/cycle It’s from 2005, and I haven’t read the whole thing, but it is the study I’ve seen mentioned in a few places

 ** Interesting thought experiment: what would we look like if our internal scars were visible? Would our emotional pain be treated better? Would our mental illnesses be treated as legitimate illnesses? Or would we be further marginalized?