We’d been hanging out at Amy’s house, a group of us.
The next week I bumped into Amy, and she told me her friend Liz liked me and wanted to go out. I had no clue. I barely talked with her, didn’t really know her, she was out of my league. She had been observing me being me, in a setting that was comfortable.
I was being authentic.
Now of course I blew it, I took her out and was totally inauthentic. I got some beers and took her to the cove and talked about God knows what trying to be impressive. But people are not attracted to you trying to be attractive, peacocking, they are attracted to people who are comfortable in their own skin.
They want to be around people who are okay with being themselves.
Authentic.
This lesson is hard but it’s important. No matter what you do in life, the ability to be authentic is the secret to success and happiness. It’s the secret to liking yourself and having others like you back.
“Be yourself, everyone else is already taken.“
Oscar Wilde (maybe)
I’d love to post picks of myself doing crow pose in the woods but it’s just not me.
Kids are born authentic, and parents screw it up. They coach kids to act in a certain way to get a certain thing. A cute baby gets all the smiles and hugs. So, when kids want smiles and hugs, they do the cute baby thing.
And they’ll keep doing it until at a certain age we say, use your big kid voice, and then they shift to doing that big kid thing for all the smiles and hugs.
Later, they find out that the kid with straight A’s get all the smiles and hugs, so they think it takes straight A’s to get the smiles and hugs.
Same story with the football star, the spelling bee champion, and the first chair clarinet.
Kids double down on their successes because it feels so damn good. And along the way they change and forget who they are. They forget the things that bring them joy, exchanging them for the things that bring others joy, and bring them affection.
We coach children to be inauthentic, not what they are, but what we want them to be.
It takes work to be authentic. Mostly stripping away the conditioning that’s been laid on you.
And it’s not just kids. We keep this conditioning into adulthood.
The sales guy does the door-to-door thing, best sales guy ever is Steve Jobs, totally different.
Radio guy does that radio guy voice, best radio guy ever is Howard Stern. The best Podcast guy is Joe Rogan. Totally different.
People want to hear from you, not you playing the role of dad, husband, sales guy, radio dude, leader.
Authenticity requires that you know who you really are, that you strip away the bullshit, and that you are not scared to let that real person shine through. It takes work, bravery, and introspection.
It’s hard work, it’s important work, and only you can do it.
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