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What is a personality? My question on being authentic...
There's something that's been really bugging me, so I wanted to seek few words of wisdom from you guys.
I’m going through a phase where everything I held as the “truth” about myself is slowly falling apart.
I used to think that I was being authentic with people, but I'm starting to see that I'm just fulfilling a social "role" that I have assigned myself with different people. I used to assign myself with the “funny guy” or the “tough guy” type of role or personality.
Whenever I'm out and socializing with people, I find myself asking "how am I supposed to behave?" If I tell myself to "just be myself" and behave a certain way, I know that's also not the real me, so how can I be myself without being anything?
I'm aware that we have to play into the social roles in one way or the other. Yet, how do we become our authentic self while fulfilling those social roles?
This dynamic between social roles and one's personality feels like a big puzzle for me. I don't even know what my "personality" is anymore.
If I tell myself to be a “compassionate” person, I feel like I’m just putting up a facade to live up to an ideal image of how a good person should behave.
If what I really am is not any of the social masks and the personalities, then how can I be authentic in any social interactions?
Hope that made sense. Thanks.
I’m going through a phase where everything I held as the “truth” about myself is slowly falling apart.
I used to think that I was being authentic with people, but I'm starting to see that I'm just fulfilling a social "role" that I have assigned myself with different people. I used to assign myself with the “funny guy” or the “tough guy” type of role or personality.
Whenever I'm out and socializing with people, I find myself asking "how am I supposed to behave?" If I tell myself to "just be myself" and behave a certain way, I know that's also not the real me, so how can I be myself without being anything?
I'm aware that we have to play into the social roles in one way or the other. Yet, how do we become our authentic self while fulfilling those social roles?
This dynamic between social roles and one's personality feels like a big puzzle for me. I don't even know what my "personality" is anymore.
If I tell myself to be a “compassionate” person, I feel like I’m just putting up a facade to live up to an ideal image of how a good person should behave.
If what I really am is not any of the social masks and the personalities, then how can I be authentic in any social interactions?
Hope that made sense. Thanks.
0
Comments
You are right ... who "you" are is not your assigned roles, whether these roles are assigned by others or assigned by yourself.
Watch your discomfort. Watch your inner reactions to what goes on. Watch how your desires push you this way and that. Learn to watch with gentle compassion for yourself.
Watch others as well. Watch how they play roles, and understand them in context of how you, too, played roles ... this leads to the understanding that we are all the same, and this leads to true compassion.
You will be "authentic" when you are aware of what is going on inside yourself. When we see ourselves clearly and openly, then all the other issues resolve themselves.
I mean, of course there are several ways to behave - eating at home, eating at a restaurant and eating with the family. In all cases you apply a different set of habits (formal eating, casual etc.)
Likewise meeting the president of the US will require other manners than meeting with your uncle.
All this doesn't mean that you can't be yourself - and thereby be honest at all times
"threat anyone who is with you in this moment, as the most important person in the world for you."
For me, a good way to be myself in social gathering is to focus more on others feelings than myself.
actually not more but equally.
if there are 5 people in the room, i try to give attention and threat everyone equally, including myself.
I believe this would help someone who obsess over their own feelings constantly...
Pain,
I think I hear your pain. (sorry, the pun was too easy to pass by
You have a great and powerful mindfulness to be able to ask the questions "how am I supposed to behave"... it means you have a gap between the phenomena and the response to the phenomena, which is great! It only takes a little tweaking and you'll be in tune in no time
Instead of asking "How am I supposed to behave?".... ask "What am I seeing, what am I hearing?" In that simple shift, you'll begin to look more deeply into the other people, willing to ask questions about where they are, and dive into the world with curiosity. How to respond to them becomes obvious as you recalibrate yourself to absorb rather than project, because you'll know them well enough to understand what is best in the moment. Then, just let your compassion for them take over. Does that make sense?
With warmth,
Matt
Unconditional condfidence is the kind of confidence that we need on the path to awakening. It comes from the clarity, openness, and sensitivity of our being. Whatever the conditions are we open to them. Then there is a gap of nothingness. As we start to see clearly and have a sensitive response develope. It is important to allow the gap to not be frightened of it.
We often have the experience of being frustrated and the moment we give up trying to figure something out (emotionally) at that time the gap is allowed to form. And chances are soon after we had given up because we allowed this gap the answer will hit us.
I think you need to work on your unconditional confidence and just allow there to be a gap for this issue for awhile. Just notice things and align with the wish to be clear open and sensitive. In time the right response will naturally bubble up.
By being fully present and reacting to the circumstances without any judgement or preconception. What separates "you" from authenticity are your thoughts, feelings, beliefs and judgements.
FoibleFull says it well.
I didn't say that you should treat the President better than your uncle. But your uncle you hug, the President you shake hands with
When I'm out with my friends no one ever has the idea about anyone as the "funny one" or the "tough one." Everyone has their own unique collection of characteristics that only they possess and don't fit into one little "social role." The thought of social roles never even crosses my mind because, well, they're not really there.
You be authentic by not trying to be authentic or be anything for that matter. Don't try to be anything.
.
I'd like to disagree with that statement. Those characteristics aren't unique to an individual. All those characteristic or "personalities" are all results of social programming and domestication.
Every word and concept you use to express, interact, analyze and think was made by the society. You simply learned to believe and use them.
Almost all of our behaviors are learned behaviors. If you were raised by wolves in a jungle, you'd crawl on your four limbs and howl like them. There are actually few real-world examples of such stories.
Just take any of your good friends. You might say, "John is unique in this and that way because that's just the way he is." Well, actually John has developed a self-image of himself through years of social feedback and conditioning, as just a girl that behaves like a wolf due to her self-image as an animal that walks on four and howls.
A person's characteristics are manifested as our mind develops our sense of self or the ego. Even you at this moment, you assigned yourself a role according to your self-image as a man, a Buddhist, an intellectual and (insert any identity/concept).
As your ego dissolves, those "characteristics" that you thought were you or somehow unique to you reveal themselves as another manifestations of the ego. In which the question of "what/who/how am I really?" begins to emerge.
So, that's where my dilemma is coming from. I have realized that the characteristics or personalities that I thought were me or unique to me aren't the real me.
Personality is simply a preference. I like Thai food, and that becomes part of my personality. Being that most of our actions do have a preference, you can observe this in the most aspects.
Next time you think you should be behaving a certain way, ask yourself what the goal of the preference is, and soon enough you can find yourself.
It might help to distinguish between roles and personalities.
The way I see it, roles are generic social functions an individual can perform. I can perform the roles of a parent, spouse, teacher, etc.
My friend can also perform the same roles; but the way she performs her role might be very different from mine.
"Personality" is a hard term to define, but if we let it mean the sum total of a person's mental and behavioral patterns, then we can say the reason why people perform the same roles differently is due to differences in personality.
I think both roles and personalities are subject to change. Yet, we could assign ourselves new roles tomorrow, whereas our personalities won't change much overnight.
Personalities are multifaceted and the way people behave is often situation specific. If you behave differently towards different people, it doesn't necessarily mean that you are being inauthentic. Of course we want to have goodwill towards everybody, but that doesn't entail having the same reaction to everyone we meet. That would truly be artificial.
Authenticity in social interactions, I think, is really a matter of relaxing. If we can relax in the company of others, then the better parts of our personality can shine through effortlessly.
I agree wholeheartedly. I think at the root of my question lies the core issue which is my social anxiety and discomfort.
I'm not sure how to go about being relaxed and comfortable in social situations and not care too much about what people think.
All the best to you on this road.
This very behaviorist (and thereby deterministic) view can well stand in your way. Contemporary philosophers and psychologists still discuss the environment factor determining how humans grow up to be. The latest is the discussion about what role genes play in the forming of an individual. The "pure-environment"-thought was abandoned years ago, and scientists supporting such a standard, uncompromising version as you do here are rare indeed.
I think you should decide that you, your self can decide things for yourself and then start doing it - instead of drowsing your mind with the comfortable "truth" that everything is as it inevitably will be and become because of mechanical factors in the universe.
You can object that what I say now is what eventually makes you believe in a more free development, which again means that you were formed by your surroundings - but does it ultimately matter? Seek wisdom within yourself as well as around you, reflect (self-reflection is part of being individual, not-formed btw) and make up your mind: What do I want to be?
where did you get this idea?
It could be possible to come to such a conclusion 10-20 years from now, but as of this moment, people are still discovering the tremendous impact of the environment on the development.
As a matter of fact people are only beginning to discover the physical impact of certain behaviors on the brain, which is only scratching the surface of understanding the mind... let alone the development of the mind.
the rest are philosophical discussions still mainly based on a psychology background. Interesting but mainly intellectual masturbation.
psychologist are still very far from understanding the self, psychology come with an attitude of "fixing the self" to fix the brain with very limited understanding of what that self is and how it work.
Have barely no idea whatsoever of the potential of the mind...
i don't think that this is true at all.
where did you get this idea?
It could be possible to come to such a conclusion 10-20 years from now, but as of this moment, people are still discovering the tremendous impact of psychologists on the development.
Yeah, I struggle with this one too.
I liked Stephen Covey's idea of distinguishing between a circle of concern and a circle of influence. The idea is that we all have many concerns, such as how people will react towards us; however, there's only a fraction of these concerns which fall under our direct control or influence.
In other words, while I can't control another person's reaction towards me, I can work on my intention towards them. I can focus my energies on cultivating the habit of coming from a friendly, cooperative intention, instead of wasting my energy on worry and self-consciousness.
Focusing on intention and letting go of my preoccupation of how others perceive me is like a meditation on emptiness.
I like this quote from the Zen master Dainin Katagiri, where he's focusing on the practical application of the Buddhist idea of emptiness:
" ... If after careful consideration we decide to do something that we believe is the best way, from the beginning to the end we should do our best. We must respect our capability, our knowledge, without comparing ourselves with others, and then use our knowledge and capability and think about how to act. Very naturally a result will occur. We should take responsibility for the results of what we have done, but the final goal is that we shouldn't be obsessed with the result, whether good or evil or neutral. This is called emptiness. This is the most important meaning of emptiness. " (Entering the Stream, p. 240 )
Thank you for that beautiful quote.
I guess everything comes back to the ego trying to define itself through validation and approval from others which can lead to the anxiety and fear of rejection.
Meanwhile, I will stop asking questions of "How or what should I behave like?" Instead, I will focus on detaching myself from the ego and grow my awareness on my cravings for the approval from others.
Thank you again.
Our 'personality' is the sum total of our behaviour. Some behaviour is unconscious, so you really can't change that.
As for what we can influence, i think 'finding yourself' is essentially making decisions about those things that you believe in - your core values. What are yours?
Once you have your values, it's about having the courage to live by them. From my understanding, this is the hardest path, but also deeply rewarding. People who live like this feel alive to their true nature, uncompromised, free.
Namaste
Can you give me some examples of those core values?
When deciding your values, try to look past typical, superficial goals such as money, fame, success. Be genuine and open about what you value, and you'll probably find that these things are not that important. The thing about goals, is that no matter how many you achieve, there's always another, so they are not really the source of happiness. True fulfilment comes from living by your values. And they are always with you, always available.
Namaste
all conditionned reactions are based on the unconscious mind.
With Meditation, you can deal almost directly with the unconscious.
if you couldn't change unconscious behaviors, no major changes could occur in a person.
If you couldn't change unconscious behaviors, we would not develop these unconscious behaviors to begin with
by definition, you can't (directly) access your unconscious mind, even in meditation.
but by changing your conscious behaviour, over time this affects your unconscious mind.
think of it as a chain reaction.
For people with very raw level of consciousness, they can only access the very end of that chain reaction. The general feelings and sensations, and the bubbly mixte of mental chatter.
these general feelings are only the end of the line, triggered by the accumulation of much more subtle fundamental thought processes and feelings.
these are the direct result of the subconscious mind, doing what it was designed to do which is to keep us alive and help us learn and progress in life. (but used unknowingly of it's functions, mechanism and pupose, it lead to the accumulation of many processes that lead to undesirable results)
now with deep meditation, you can deal directly with these.
That fundamental fear about something you picked up as a kid, that is the root of so many behaviors in your life. drive so many of your thoughts and emotions.
without this higher level of sensitivity and consciousness, all we can deal with are the branches of the tree. We can deal with the result of that fundamental fear, not that fear itself.
subconscious mind remain subconscious as long as your conscious level is too raw to perceive it.
Once one developed a higher sensitivity, much of the previously completely unconscious processes become conscious, observable.
Ah Patbb, I can picture you being so serene and nice as you threaten everyone equally.
Sorry I could not resist. Me and the wife love spotting typos, and this one because I can't see you being a thread to anyone was too funny to pass up.
I hope you understand that I could not help my self and point it out in jest
I had a horrible experience with Youtube pulling my classical guitar rendition out of all things of What a Wonderful World and giving me a strike without any warning or a chance to pull it myself. And leaving thousands of other renditions of Commercial versions (ripoffs) in place never mind all the other garbage out there. so I was furious and trying to deal with my anger.
And so your innocent typo made me smile and come back to the present moment and my path. Thank you for making me smile!
Ivan
This is very true. How do we go about increasing our "level of sensitivity and consciousness?"
If you can, try a 10 day retreat
I think for me, the hardest part is learning that I can let go of all that anxiety and control and the world won't fall apart. Lots of times I feel like I have of control things, my behavior, other people's perceptions of me, etc but life goes on just the same.
That, and I finally realized that when I'm trying to impress someone or be something I'm not, I look like a person who is trying to impress others and be something he's not. lol I always had been, the only person I ever fooled was myself.
OP: Ever read about wu wei? Effortless action? I think you'd enjoy it. It's all about 'doing without doing' :P
That is so true.
So, what happened when you realized that you were only fooling yourself and that you actually "looked" like a person who was trying to be someone he's not?
If you can realize the absurdity and pointlessness of basically torturing yourself, with results that are completely opposite of what you intended,
(you want to have a good time but because you tortured yourself for 2 hours, you end up having a terrible time, or, you want to be cool and relaxed but you end up being edgy and sweeting), then you are well on your way to to not get carried away by the feelings, and eventually you can realise the absurdity of ever reacting with negative emotions to any circumstances that ever arise.
When you catch yourself, you can simply observe the feeling in your belly.
Like going to a social gathering, you catch yourself worrying and babbling about being worry inside.
immediately, you can look at the conditionned reaction of your body.
You can look directly at the feeling itself, the butterfly in your belly.
If you realised the absurdity of reacting in such a fashion, you can easily look at the feeling (butterflies) with equanimity.
What usually happen is that the feeling evaporate, dissipate.
(easier to do when meditating and everything is calm, you can remember that situation so the conditionned reaction will come up again, that feeling).
What is happening is that your brain remember how to react in certain situations.
This is perfectly normal. This is how the mind was designed. So you can learn not to burn yourself twice on the oven, after you burned yourself once, next time your hand will be near the oven you will have a fear feeling in your belly).
unconsciously in the past, you reacted with anxiety to social gatherings (one or a series of negative experiences), so eventually, your brain figured it would be good for you to remember this so not to have negative experiences anymore.
So your brain remember to be anxious in social gathering, so to help you, it give you the butterflies in the stomach so you can remember.
(if you are anxious in social gatherings, you don't have to go to one to observe this. Just think about a social gathering, and see the body generate the feeling of butterflies in the stomach.)
By looking at the feeling with equanimity, you are basically telling the subconscious mind "allright, it's fine. I thought about it and i don't think i need to be anxious in this situation anymore. You can erase this conditionning."
If you can look at the feeling with equanimity during a meditation session, it will not come again. you erased it. but be careful not to immediately re-record that conditioning.
this is obviously a very simplistic example.
Anxiety in social gathering is often a combination of many conditioned reactions, and often there can be a major underlying feeling that is driving many smaller ones.
Like a traumatic fear as a kid that affected much of the way you behaved and interracted with the world everyday of your life after... These kind of feelings wont go away easily, and developing equanimity toward them will be more difficult...
I just made a simplistic example for clarity sake.
I suffer from social anxiety, constantly monitoring and critiqueing myself when I'm with others, and trying to anticipate/second guess how well I am coming over (I have good times and bad times). To me the issue of learning otherwise has been two-fold. Firstly, I've found it helpful to be more mindful in my interactions with others, rather than keeping somewhat removed from it all and watching/commentating (I'm talking to much, they've changed posture, etc). In this, I mean actually paying attention to the physicality of it: listening to what they are saying, how they are moving/looking, what sensations that I feel like warm/cool etfc.
Secondly, the biggest issue for me has been self-cherishing, and worrying less about the potential to be hurt/rejected and trying to develop more open compassion for others. I find that just the effort of trying to generate more compassion those arround me makes me feel more secure. It allows me to be more relaxed and I don't see other people as quite so dangerous.
Well, it made me stop and think 'I should stop pretending, and just be myself', and I was surprised to find I didn't exactly know who 'myself' was. I'm still learning about myself all the time, I don't think that ever really stops.
The best way I could think of to find out what was really me and what wasn't was to watch myself. I would just observe the thoughts, feelings, and emotions that would come to me. I would watch the way I ate, the way I drove, the way I talked to people, everything.
After a while, I noticed that the difference between the authentic me and the show that I put on for everyone (including myself) was effort. Not effort in the way you might traditionally think of. All my attempts to 'be who I should be' or 'do what I should do' were attempts to change what is. Things can never be what they aren't, so any attempt to make them so is only struggling, going against the current. So now, I just let everything happen.
My advice to you is to do nothing. Just relax. Don't try to make anything happen, stop anything from happening, gain insights or epiphanies, to think or not to think, just relax. You have to be completely honest with yourself. It doesn't come from understanding everything, or even accepting everything. Eventually, you just have to give it all up.
Good luck my friend, just remember you're always exactly where you need to be. Always :smilec: