True Or False - How Are You Showing Up To Others?

My wife works as an educator at the Science Museum of Minnesota. This is truly what she calls her "dream job" loaded with a playground full of fun treasures that she gets to explore with her learners. Every so often, she brings one of her creative creations home for show-and-tell. Her latest gem - an Amethyst geode. You have seen these jewels of the earth. They are sedimentary or volcanic rocks with cavities that hold beautiful crystals inside. The outside of a geode is fairly unremarkable; but once you break it open, you see a formation of clear quartz or maybe purple amethyst crystals. Quite remarkable indeed!

Fact: Until you crack a geode open, it is just a rock. Hidden away inside their bland, crusty exteriors are crystals in magnificent colors and delicate formations reaching into the empty space in the center.

Truth: Each of us has a core sparkling of strength, skill, and natural ability that radiates unmatched opulence.

Question: How are you living and leading from this unique brilliance held within? How have you intentionally broken through the flat and crusty exterior that preserves this attraction so others can marvel? How are you showing up to others? True or False?

100% True

The question of how to become your true self and live most authentically is one that pertains to every aspect of our lives and has a residual impact on our families, our teams, organization, and community. All of our goals and aspirations, from the biggest and broadest to the smallest and least significant, are part of the calculus of living the good life tightly calibrated to living 100% true to whom you were made to be.

It is better to be 100% you than 100% perfect.

On the outside, leaders learn to completely tame their inner genius and magnificence to the extent that many built a dull, conforming crust around themselves to blend in with everyone else. It is safe. It is predictable. It is secure. After all, blending in keeps us protected, helps us fit in so we can belong, and makes us more acceptable to those around us. Those efforts to fit and belong gradually encase us in hardened shells that hide our inner wonder even from ourselves. We begin to identify more with the dull outside and forget about the amazing colors and striking beauty we hold within. This occurs until something breaks us open and that magnificent beauty becomes visible to all.

Being yourself is important. We know the damage done by being false to ourselves and others. The trick is distinguishing what your true self is and what is not. If we had a switch that could turn off the everyday self and turn on the real self, our challenges would be much simpler. However, human nature is divided. There are moments when you feel secure, accepted, peaceful and sure. At those moments, you are experiencing the actual self. At other times, you experience the opposite and living in the grip of the everyday self or the false self. The trouble is that both sides are convincing. When you feel overwhelmed by stress, crisis, doubts and insecurity, the True Self is incredibly hard to access.

False Self or True Self? – Don’t be mistaken. The qualities of the false self and the True Self are entirely different. Here's how:

1. The True Self is at peace. The false self is easily agitated and disturbed.
2. The True Self has clarity.  The false self is influenced by many outside forces, leading to confusion.
3. The True Self is love. The false self, lacking love, seeks it from outside sources.
4. The True Self is stable. The false self shifts constantly.
5. The True Self is driven by a deep sense of truth. The false self is powered by the ego and the incessant demands of "I, me, and mine."

According to the "self-concordance theory," the most important thing we can do to become our True Self is to pursue the goals that are right for us. If we choose wrong – if we pursue goals that do not reflect who we are, what we care about, and what we are good at – then even if we achieve those goals, we are not going to feel fulfilled or significantly happy.

In a recent issue of Personality and Social Psychology Review, Kennon Sheldon reviewed the social science research relevant to the question of how we choose goals that best serve our quest to become our true self. Here's what I see as some of the implications of the research.

When you set a goal or make a plan, how do you feel about it?

1. Do you feel ambivalent about it?
2. Do you find that you just can't get yourself to follow through?
3. Do you disparage your goals or plans when you are talking to other people?
4. Do you feel pressured by other people to pursue the goals you chose or the plans you made?
5. Do you feel constrained to pursue particular goals (for example, getting a law degree instead of a degree in English literature because you think you will need the better salary that a law degree might bring)?
6. Do you worry that if you do not pursue a particular goal or plan, you will feel guilty?

Alternatively, do you feel entirely differently?

1. Do you enjoy pursuing your goals or plans?
2. Do you identify with what you are doing? Does it seem like what you are doing reflects who you are?
3. Do you find what you are doing interesting? Meaningful?
4. Is it challenging in a way you appreciate?
5. If you are doing something in some sense because you have to (for example, you are doing your job because it pays), do you sometimes find that it is so engaging that even if you did not need the money, you might want to do it anyway?
6. Are you more attuned to your feelings of growth and self-improvement than to other people's evaluations of how you are doing?

If the second set of feelings describes you more accurately than the first set, then you are probably doing a good job of becoming your True Self. You, too, are a geode with more beauty within than you have ever imagined!

How does this image of a geode speak to you? What facets of your inner beauty have you rediscovered in the process of life breaking you open? What's holding you back from breaking through? What are you afraid of losing? What are you trying to hide? What are you trying to prove? To whom?

Tough Questions To Help Break Through Your Wall of Self-Preservation

It is not always easy to ask ourselves the hard questions—the kind of issues that leave most resentful in the latter days of life but are often squeezed out by more “pressing” things in our 20s, 30s, 40s. Questions like:

• Do I speak up when it counts?
• What do I love to do but never make time?
• In regards to the risks I am afraid of taking, what do I have to lose?
• What am I most proud?
• Do I speak kindly to myself and others?
• Am I living or existing?
• What impact do I want to leave the people I love?

If you are in the midst of this breaking open process of exploring True Self and could use some guidance from one who knows the journey well, contact me to talk about how I might be able to help you navigate the terrain you are facing while staying true to whom you were made to be.

About the Author

Joseph is a Creative/Connector with zeal to Encourage, Equip, and Empower the leader’s journey from “success to significance.”  Dr. Hill has a wealth of experience in organizational leadership, human development, and teaching as a practitioner, educational leader, executive coach, author, and blogger. Joseph holds a post-graduate degree in Educational Leadership with an emphasis in Servant Leadership and is a Licensed Executive Coach through the International Coach Federation. Learn more about Dr. Hill at www.giantworldwide.com/dr-joseph-hill/ or follow him on Twitter @liveleadserve. Email - [email protected]