Do you say what you think people want you to say?
Or what you think will impress or interest people?
Think about it.
Our teachers
Our bosses
Even our friends
Sometimes, weirdly, even strangers.
We learn that if we desire a particular response we best say a certain thing or have a certain opinion or similarly not say other things regardless of what we believe or think.
We act and ‘be’ a certain way in the attempt to get a need met and we may not even be consciously aware of the need.
We seek this outcome or response thanks to an underlying desire to ‘feel’ something, to feel worthy, valued, liked, loved, seen, …. the list could go on.
This is where it gets interesting. What if our core desire is to be valued or admired for example and it hasn’t been being met. In order to elicit the desired response we think we have to try and guess what that other person wants us to say, what they will agree with, laugh at, find interesting or impressive or admirable.
We try to guess what the other person thinks, desires or likes and then we formulate what we will say or how we will act in order to have the best chance of getting that response. This is all interpreted through our own focus and perception.
This approach rarely works.
I know!! I’ve tried. Unknowingly I have done it for years and years.
The thing is even if we manage to say something that other person finds impressive it won’t actually give us the feeling we seek!
Why?
Because our true self, our authentic self has been pushed aside and judged by our very self not to be good enough.
If we aren’t seen or heard for who we really are then we aren’t seen or heard at all, regardless of how much attention we receive.
To have any chance of filling that desire, the need to be seen, heard, acknowledged or even admired, looks up to we must act authentically, we must behave authentically, we must BE authentic.
We can’t pretend.
We can’t fake it.