This is the third in a series of six sidenotes, the first two can be found here:
How hard can it be, to be me (1)
How hard can it be, to be me (2); dissecting the authentic life

Do I know who I am?
Do I know who I’m going to be?
Do I want to be who I’m becoming to be?
Do I know if it is really me?
Or if it is what I think I want to be?
Or if it is what I think others want me to be?

Not the easiest questions, in my opinion anyway. I give these questions a lot of thought. They interest me in several ways and, philosophical in nature as they are, I want to investigate them in a pragmatic way.

I have found a way to test if something I think is part of my authentic me, really is part of my authentic me. This testing involves creating a working hypothesis, a method of testing and criteria for acceptance or rejection.

Creating the hypothesis

If something is part of my authentic me, it has to add value or meaning to me and to others, I use my power of free choice, and it allows (or even encourages) me to grow. So as a working hypothesis I use a sentence like:

To ensure my authentic future growth <enter topic/goal/ambition here> allows me to add value or meaning to my and other people’s lives.

Examples:

• To ensure my authentic future growth, starting a blog about personal development allows me to add value or meaning to my and other people’s lives.
• To ensure my authentic future growth, participating actively in the upbringing of my children allows me to add value or meaning to my and other people’s lives.
• To ensure my authentic future growth, starting a community theatre group allows me to add value or meaning to my and other people’s lives.

By creating the hypothesis, I already think about the three elements of authentic life. A hypothesis like “earning a million dollars in 2008” makes me wonder almost instantaneously how and why that activity would create value in other people’s lives. It is a goal, that’s for sure, but what purpose does it serve? The purpose behind the goal (the “why”), needs to be in the hypothesis.

Next sidenote is about testing.

This is the second in a series of 6 sidenotes, the first one can be found here.

Heidegger believed that, when we accept the fact that our existence is finite, we have met the base-requirement for being able to lead an authentic life. Authentic life is lived exercising our personal freedom to create a meaningful existence and continually grow (becoming). Let’s dissect that sentence:

…exercising our personal freedom…

My first associations are: “free will” and “self-ownership”. In other words, it is up to me to decide, and I am accountable for my choices. Sounds fair enough.

…a meaningful existence…

Existence speaks for itself, but what is meaningful to me? Looking at the extensive article about meaning on Wikipedia, this is not an easy one, and requires investigation. The first thing that comes to mind is that it has to have meaning to me, but that would create a loop in reasoning: authenticity is meaningful, because meaning is authentic. That’s not helpful, now is it?

The second thing that comes to mind is that meaningful might be that it creates meaning or value in other people’s lives. But creating meaning or value in others people’s lives doesn’t necessarily mean that it creates value or meaning in my life.

While writing this, it dawns on me that I’ve arrived at a stalemate. Meaningful is about me and about others. I’ve come across that concept before, amongst others in the excellent book by Marshall Goldsmith, “What Got You Here, Won’t Get You There”, but he relates it to behavioral change (I’ll review his book soon). On a more generic level, a particular scene from the movie “A beautiful mind” comes to mind: the scene where John Nash experiences the birth of his Nobel-prize winning theory, the Nash equilibrium. The equilibrium is a solution concept in game theory for games involving multiple players making decisions in an attempt to maximize their returns. In short, the equilibrium states that the optimal strategy for each player is to do what’s best for him or her and what’s best for the group (remember the blond girl and her friends?)

This is good enough for me. Meaningful existence creates meaning or value to me and creates meaning or value to others.

…continually grow (becoming).

Authentic life is apparently not only about the now; it’s also about the future. It’s not only who you are, but also who you will be.

So the authentic life, in my own words is:
“living a life where free will is used to create meaning or value for the individual and create meaning and value for others, now and in the future”

Not bad, I feel I understand it. In the next sidenote in the series: how does one go about creating the authentic life?

Authenticity is about being you, about being true to one’s personality, spirit and character. Easy said, easy done? For some maybe, it seems to come natural to some, but not for me.

I have two challenges when it comes down to authenticity:

1. How do I really get in touch with my own personality, spirit and character
2. How do I remain authentic amongst all societal forces and pressures

They are actually not really separate challenges, they have an intertwined relationship. How do you know that what you define as part of your authentic you, is not really a translation of a societal force? Is it what you want to be, or what others want you to be? Do you really want something, or do you want it because some marketing-people are really good at their job?

The difference between the two challenges is that the first can be actively worked on, through a variety of methods. The latter is in my opinion purely an experience driven challenge, where experience teaches you to recognize the processes that are driving you away from your authentic self and teaches you to do something about it. However, if you don’t know enough about yourself, you will not recognize the processes related to the second.

This is the first in a series of six sidenotes. In the next one I will investigate authentic life.

Authenticity is a word with several meanings, and (not only for the purpose of this blog) it’s helpful to define what I mean when I talk about authenticity. Wikipedia and Wiktionary are (always) a good starting point, if in need of clarification or definition, so we’ll hop on over to see what they’ve got for us.

Wiktionary; Authenticity

1. The quality of being authentic or of established authority for truth and correctness.
2. Genuineness; the quality of being genuine or not corrupted from the original.
3. Truthfulness of origins, attributions, commitments, sincerity, and intentions; not a copy or forgery.

Wikipedia: Authenticity (Philosophy)

Authenticity is a technical term in existentialist philosophy. In this philosophy, the conscious self is seen as coming to terms with being in a material world and with encountering external forces, pressures and influences which are very different from, and other than, itself. Authenticity is the degree to which one is true to one’s own personality, spirit, or character, despite these pressures.

Wikipedia: Authenticity (Psychology)

“Authenticity” in psychology refers to psychological concept in which the individual derives gratification and positive emotions from exercising signature strengths.

Following the reference-link for this article, I found this little piece of information on Authentic Life:

Martin Heidegger (1889-1976) believed that we are free to choose the nature of our own existence. It is essential, though, that we accept the fact that our existence is finite; only then can we lead an authentic life, exercising our personal freedom to create a meaningful existence and continually grow (becoming). The alternative is to live an inauthentic life, give up our freedom, pretend, accept conventionality, and be concerned only with the present. Most people don’t exercise their personal freedom, and consequently they experience guilt. Leading an authentic life minimizes guilt. But, leading an authentic life also takes courage, as our life becomes filled with uncertainty. We experience anxiety, first because we are experimenting with life and second because we must take responsibility for the consequences of our choices.

So what does this bring us? Well we’ve learned that authenticity is about:

• being genuine
• being true to one’s personality, spirit or character.

We’ve also learned that:

• it’s hard
• it takes courage
• it brings uncertainty and anxiety
• we have to accept that our existence is finite
• we have to take responsibility for our choices

And we’ve learned that the rewards are most gratifying:

• personal freedom
• meaningful existence
• continuous growth

So in a cost-benefit assessment, do we want to be authentic? Well it costs a lot, but the rewards to me are invaluable, so my answer is a full-blown YES! I can’t answer it for you (that’s what philosophers try to do, I don’t consider myself to be one). Only you can answer that question for you. And, as you’ve apparently read this article all the way down, my guess would be that you answer is gonna be yes as well.