The True Authentic Self

In this essay, I talk about the relations between the conscious “external” and “internal” selves and the non-conscious “true” self, and the importance of cultivating the true self for authenticity.

The “self” is shaped by external and internal influences. The external self consists of human relations and institutionalized patterns of expected behavior derived from education, history, associations, and social media. The internal self consists of doing things for oneself in accordance with one’s pleasures derived from one’s information, one’s habits, and one’s books.

The external and internal selves are often competing “conscious” selves. When the external self has precedence over the internal self this is called the extroverted self. When the internal self has precedence over the external self this is called the introverted self.

Self-criticism is questioning the external and internal causes that make up the sum of the conscious self and deconstructing these causes to understand their controlling influences on the self. The quest is discovering the true self and cultivating it among the external and internal selves. After all, life is cultivation. Therefore, cultivate the higher self, which is the “non-conscious” true self. When people feel that they know and can express their true selves in an “intelligible and socially respectful and humble manner” then they are authentic.

Nietzsche’s idea of discovering the true self is rigorous like tough physical training possessing a kind of athletic mindset. To discover one’s true self is to be mindful of one’s non-conscious self. To actualize the non-conscious self is to overcome the conscious selves that negate it from becoming the true authentic self.

To discover one’s true authentic self is difficult because social factors suck us into its vacuum every day to pacify the need to belong to an esteemed group that make the conscious selves feel loved with an emoji affirmation. This results in the non-conscious self’s struggle to affirm itself as the true authentic self. The true self is caught in the social web of the conscious selves – what the true self is not. Nietzsche tells us that “every man is a unique miracle” and not “factory products.” He continues:

The man who does not wish to belong to the mass needs only to cease taking himself easily; let him follow his conscience, which calls to him: ‘Be your self! All you are now doing, thinking, desiring, is not you, yourself.’

No one can construct the bridge that you must cross into the stream of life to discover your true self. Only you can do it, and you alone. Do not ask where it leads; just go along it.

To journey to self-discovery is getting in touch with your higher self by consciously referring to your stable values, your motives, and your beliefs. To become your true self is to “reduce” the information flowing into your conscious selves from the external world. “Be who you are” is freedom and happiness and is perhaps the greatest reward and prize in life.

The quest for the true authentic self is a quest for the individuated self. According to psychologist Carl Jung, individuation is the “process” of becoming your authentic self through “personal experience” and making oneself and not others responsible for what and who you are.

The true authentic self leaves the past behind, leaves family and friends, leaves the social structures that have enveloped it, strips off the obligations and constraints imposed by others, until it finds and owns itself as it is. In Emerson’s essay on “Self-Reliance,” he writes:

Whoso would be a man, must be a nonconformist. He who would gather immortal palms must not be hindered by the name of ‘goodness,’ but must explore if it be goodness. Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind.

The true authentic self rejects social conformity and has freed itself from convention and tradition declaring that nothing is more “sacred but the integrity” of its own mind. Morality and truth can neither be found in institutions like religion nor in books; it must be discovered by the higher and true self.

To be true to oneself is to have an obligation to express oneself freely rather than a duty to the “social mores” of a culture and following an institutionalized pattern of expected behavior. Social mores are invisible rules that guide behavior each day and tell us how to entertain ourselves to advance the spirit of consumer capitalism. We often follow the habits of culture without thinking about them.

To remain true to the self is to put oneself out there and “live dangerously.” Nietzsche says, “the secret for harvesting from existence the greatest fruitfulness and the greatest enjoyment is to live dangerously.” He continues, “Build your cities on the slopes of Vesuvius! Send your ships into uncharted seas! Live at war with your peers and yourselves!” Nietzsche is saying: Put yourself out there. Take risks. Get out of your comfort zone. Life is short. Live passionately, and on your own terms.

Humans are herd animals. One of the deepest human desires is to belong. We want to fit in, to bond with others, and to earn the respect and approval of our peers. We continue to follow the script handed down by our friends and family, our church or school, our local community and society at large. Each of these cultures and groups comes with its own set of expectations and standards – what career we choose, when and whether we get married, how many children to have, how much money we make.

Both genuine knowledge and authenticity are subjective. Genuine knowledge is first achieved by doubting all that was learned through indoctrination, then re-examining what once was called ‘knowledge’ and, finally, re-discovering knowledge through intuitive insight by the power of our own minds. This “experience” produces a higher level of consciousness of human knowing that is active and dynamic. However, when we lack self-criticism, our knowledge can be filled with “prejudices” of a pretext self-understanding that we cannot shake off and we become self-righteous in our knowledge.

Authenticity is the subjective experience of knowing and being one’s true self. The “true” self generally reflects people’s appraisal of who they are at their core, irrespective of how they might act or what characteristics they might present publicly. Subjective authenticity refers to when people consistently express who they truly are and act in accordance with their dispositional character traits. Most importantly, the true authentic self is self-motivated and has self-directed action toward activities of promotion-focused goals that are fulfilling and rewarding.

Living An Authentic Existence

We ask ourselves at one time or another or several times, “Where has the time gone?” We ask ourselves this question because we feel time has escaped us, it has lapsed too quickly. But it is not time that has lapsed too quickly; it is we who have escaped time. We spend most of the time doing idle things, that is, things that don't make a difference in our lives or in the lives of others. Consequently, we “waste the time away.”

The fact is that we will die someday. We start to regret not having done enough to “make a difference.” We either feel we have not produced enough or spent enough time with those we love or completed our “bucket list.” We feel time has gone by too quickly because we have not fulfilled a desire that we've put off for so long. And before you know it, in a “blink of an eye,” I, you, and we will be gone. We cannot turn back time, but we can start living our lives now.

Time governs the existence of physical matter. That is, without time we would not exist. Time is the unit of measure that gives legitimacy to a substance’s being. Without time, matter and being are nothing.[i] The saying, “Time is of the essence,” gives each one of us an imperative. It asks: What are you “doing” to live your existence with meaning and purpose before death comes and takes you away?

In Martin Heidegger’s 1927 Being and Time, he questions the nature and meaning of ‘being,’ which is neither defined nor definite. Heidegger seeks to explain the nature and meaning of being through a concept he calls ‘Dasein’ with an understanding of the interpretation of time and conception of death.[ii], [iii]

According to Heidegger, the most basic state of being is ‘Dasein’ or “being-there.” “Da” means “there” and “sein” means “being.” Human existence, therefore, is a ‘da’ – a “there-ness.” Dasein, thus, is the existential structure that makes up a human being how people exist in the world.

A person has the freedom to choose a “mode” or “way of being” to exist in the world by either being inauthentic and not living true to oneself with no meaning or being authentic and living true to oneself with meaning.[iv], [v]

Choosing to be inauthentic is choosing to be nameless as an “it” or some “thing” like an impersonal object by conforming to the idleness and ways of the world and being “there” with no meaning and purpose until it (“there”) chooses to activate a name for itself.[vi]

Choosing to be authentic is choosing to make a name for oneself with one’s unique talents, projects, activities, and abilities for being “ownmost” in the world, which is a personable being who cares for self with meaning and purpose.[vii]

On the one hand, being “there” has an attitude of indifference towards self and being of the world. Being “there” is conceding to the unaccountability of a nameless being designated as an “it,” and being influenced by the world to hate authenticity. Not living true to oneself is resigning over to Bacon’s Four Idols of the Mind, which has sway over one’s mental, physical, and spiritual being, and the burden to conform to the ways of the world.

Surrendering to Bacon’s Four Idols of the Mind, one “accepts” the fearmongering of authority, one “uses” common language to engage in idle chit chat and to gossip fallaciously for manipulation, one “believes” one is the way he or she is and cannot change, and one “entertains” oneself by contributing to the billion-dollar salaries of athletes and artists and feeding one’s food, drink, drug, gaming, and social media addictions to advance the spirit of consumer capitalism.

On the other hand, being “ownmost” has an attitude of “care” towards self and being in the world. Being “ownmost” is owning up to the responsibility of one’s own name and influencing the world to aspire to authenticity.[viii] Living true to oneself is rejecting Bacon’s Four Idols of the Mind and recognizing the danger of conforming to the ways of the world.

Repudiating Bacon’s Four Idols of the Mind, one chooses to throw oneself into mindful activities that feed one’s inner being. One such activity is engaging in the humanities to promote the growth of one’s mental and spiritual being as outlined in my forthcoming book, Existential Essays for Personal and Spiritual Growth. In addition, one also chooses to throw oneself into physical activities that feed one’s outer being. One such activity is engaging in exercise training to promote the growth of one’s mental and physical being as outlined in my self-help 2021 book, The Fitness Mindset: 7 Habits for Peak Performance.

Jesus and St. Paul also admonish followers to be neither “of this world” nor “conformed to this world” and its standards because of its influential power and control over one’s existential being for the same reasons why one must recognize the existential dangers of conforming to Bacon’s Four Idols of the Mind.[ix]

To our amazement we suddenly exist, after having for countless millennia not existed; and in a short while we will again not exist, also for countless millennia.[x] The awareness that you and I will die someday can hurl a ‘there-ness’ of indifference to comporting oneself to an ‘ownmost-ness’ of care to live an authentic existence.[xi]

The anticipatory thought of coming “face to face with the nothing” of being-toward-death and the possibility of nonexistence causes anxiety in us and we comport to the full realization of desiring to make something of our lives and be in the world in a meaningful and purposeful way, which is revealed through time.[xii] Thus, time governs whether we choose to live authentically with meaning and purpose or we choose to live inauthentically with neither meaning nor purpose.

Being true to oneself, one will be living an authentic existence with meaning and purpose driven by passion and reason. In Friedrich Nietzsche’s first published book in 1872, The Birth of Tragedy, in a new preface of 1886 entitled “Attempt at a Self-Criticism,” he muses over, “the big question mark concerning the value of existence.”[xiii]

After the preface and in his main text, Nietzsche introduces two Greek deities that express two forms of works of art: “the Apollinian and Dionysian duality…involving perpetual strife with periodically intervening reconciliations.”[xiv] Apollo and Dionysus correspond to opposed drives. Apollo’s principle nature symbolizes the drive of reason and Dionysus’ principle nature symbolizes the drive of passion.

The Apollinian deity represents “art of sculpture,” and the Dionysian deity represents “art of music.”[xv] In Nietzsche’s 1888 Twilight of the Idols, he says these two deities are “conceived as forms of intoxication” fueling an authentic existence.[xvi]

On the one hand, the Apollinian work of art is a visionary who has an attitude toward life that is motivated by “thought” in a precise and calculating way to satisfy the intellectual pleasures of living. On the other hand, the Dionysian work of art is aroused with excitement who has an attitude toward life that is motivated by “emotions” in an instinctive and impulsive way to satisfy the sensual pleasures of living. 

The Apollinian element of reason and the Dionysian element of passion are antitheses yet simultaneously complement one another. Reason keeps passion in check rather than having it uncontrolled without reason. Reconciling both reason and passion the two become “sharply defined” and there is an “exchange of gifts of esteem.”[xvii]

Nietzsche refers to both combined deities as the “Dionysian-Apollinian genius” (D-A genius) because fusing both passion and reason in the appropriate measure unifies human nature.[xviii] Our attitude toward living life is having passion in the primordial sense but not without having passion controlled by reason in the human sense too.

Our Dionysian nature is characterized as the dark side because it lacks control, whereas our Apollinian nature is characterized as the light side because it controls the dark side. However, because the Dionysian nature knows no restraints it defies limitations and, therefore, can also be characterized as the “dynamic stream of life.”[xix]

Thus, Nietzsche’s ideal is “the passionate person who has his or her passions under control.”[xx] On the one hand, an Apollinian man or woman who is ruled by thought and control tests an approaching stimulus and reacts slowly to every kind. On the other hand, a Dionysian man or woman who is ruled by the body’s instinctive nature reacts spontaneously from an overabundance of the pleasures of life.

Living is a work of art. We either live to exist and live to think or we exist to live and think to live. Nietzsche would opt for the latter. He would rather have it that we possess an excess of passion together with an excess of reason to live a meaningful and purposeful life. Nietzsche, says of himself that he is, “in the last analysis, an extremely exacting man.”[xxi]

Together the D-A genius symbolizes controlled passion and embodies the superabundance for more life. Our project is to get as much out of life as we can before we die. The D-A genius exhibits a high for life but with the utmost extremes from one pole to the other. This does not mean behaving like a Dionysian extroverted party animal to one extreme or an Apollinian introverted homebody to the other extreme. Both extremes must be met with an incommensurable mean or balance. This could be more passion and less reason or less passion and more reason. Notwithstanding Nietzsche’s extremes, our goal is to aim toward the Aristotelian golden mean for balance to own an authentic existence and lead a great life.

Be a producer. Feed your ownmost being and grow physically, mentally, and spiritually. Have a passionate plan of action and accomplish it!

My great-great grandfather, Silas Charles Dishno (1858-1961) may not have known the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche by name, but his advice for living an energy-filled and intoxicating life sums up the D-A genius. His advice was simple: “Don’t be moody.”

[i] Adapted from the 2014 movie, “Lucy.”

[ii] Martin Heidegger, Being and Time (1927), line 1.

[iii] Heidegger, Being and Time, paragraphs 46-53, lines 236-267. Abbr. 46-53.236-267.

[iv] Heidegger, Being and Time, 48.242.

[v] Heidegger, Being and Time, 49.247.

[vi] Heidegger, Being and Time, 47.237.

[vii] Heidegger, Being and Time, 53.263-264.

[viii] Heidegger, Being and Time, 50.249.

[ix] John 17:16; Romans 12:2.

[x] Arthur Schopenhauer, “On the Vanity of Existence,” in Essays and Aphorisms, Translated by R. J. Hollingdale Penguin Books, 1970, p. 51.

[xi] Heidegger, Being and Time, 53.263. Empasis added (‘there-ness’ and ‘ownmost-ness’). His emphasis (authentic existence).

[xii] Heidegger, Being and Time, 53.266. His emphasis.

[xiii] Nietzsche, The Birth of Tragedy (1872) with a new 1886 preface, “Attempt at a Self-Criticism,” Section 1.

[xiv] Nietzsche, The Birth of Tragedy, Section 1. His emphasis.

[xv] Nietzsche, The Birth of Tragedy, Section 1.

[xvi] Nietzsche, Twilight of the Idols (1888), “Expeditions of an Untimely Man,” Section 10.

[xvii] Nietzsche, The Birth of Tragedy, Section 2.

[xviii] Nietzsche, The Birth of Tragedy, Section 5.

[xix]Stumpf, Socrates to Sartre and Beyond, 7th Ed. (2003), p. 381.

[xx] Stumpf, Socrates to Sartre and Beyond, 7th Ed. (2003), p. 388.

[xxi] Middleton, Selected Letters of Friedrich Nietzsche (1996), Letter to Paul Ree, November 1882, Hackett Publishing, No. 106.

Self-Confidence or "How One Becomes What One Is"

Have you ever had those days when your self-confidence is so high that no one can bring you down? You’re so much on a self-confident high that you feel like you are too good even for God?  Everything seems to click into place just by the feeling of your presence and people respond.

Knowing that we all encounter a series of situations in our daily lives and how we respond to them we are sometimes self-confident and other times we are not. Have you ever felt fear or been fearful of something? You felt a diminishing of self-confidence and encountered uncertainty.  This is fine but it is not good to stay in a state of uncertainty. Or is it?  Does not uncertainty probe our minds into a world of thoughts and wonderment trying to figure out what harm this uncertainty is doing or can bring us if we don’t first confront and respond to it in a positive way? We re-examine ourselves. We evaluate responses. We choose a response in light of our divine and anticipated outcomes that is positively rewarding for ourselves and others.

Fear or uncertainty is a test from strong external forces that beset and challenges self-confidence. Our goal is to increase self-confidence by over-coming whatever fear is decaying self-confidence, which means mastering that fear.

Self-Confidence is essentially knowing ourselves and applying our unique powers and abilities at something we are already good at. It is simply a deeper self-understanding, self-awareness, self-knowing or self-consciousness.

Knowing ourselves also means knowing how to preserve ourselves, i.e., self-preservation. Some philosophical minded individuals, like Nietzsche, like to call this “selfishness”. Others prefer to call it the ego. Whatever word you choose to call self-confidence, it is this self-preservation that is fighting, defending, and staying strong despite external forces that have the potential of altering self-knowledge, self-understanding, or harming self-confidence. Nietzsche said, “What does not kill me makes me stronger”.

Three things help to develop self-confidence: (1) interacting with others and responding to them in a positive way, (2) facing challenges and taking risks, and (3) going on adventures and encountering the unknown. To ensure that self-confidence remains at an altitude, positive outcomes must occur, which comes from being motivated and having persistence, prudence, and above all enthusiasm.

Yet, there is a riddle with self-confidence. It is learning to accept what we are not as perceived through the eyes of others. What does this mean? It means pretending to be someone who you are not. This can be from peer pressure or group acceptance. It also means accepting the power of suggestion that something, someone, some persons have ascribed to you and you behaving in like manner to the suggestion but is inconsistent with your true self-knowing. This is a contradiction to self-confidence. This can be from any form of gossip, rumors, lies, mistaken perception, misrepresentation, etc.  Instead of learning to accept what we are not we need to start learning to accept how to become what we are, that is, what we know, and not what we are perceived to be as through the eyes of others.

Words are powerful. Nietzsche knew this. Words influence perception. Philosophers know this.  Attach a word onto a perceived behavior and you become a creator of a personality, which is designed to behave in the way(s) suggested. Words are dynamite. Words create and they also destroy. Words immortalize a person to being this or that way. Words can deprive a person’s right to his or her life.

Words must not be allowed to immortalize anyone because of perceptions from preconceived ideas from whence we are taught by culture. Preconceived ideas arise from impressions, and from that our senses. Can our senses be trusted to judge what is sure, certain, and accurate? No. This is our error when we unknowingly or knowingly toss words out at random when describing certain behavior of another who is clearly unlike ourselves, because in the process they lose confidence in themselves. We should not allow this to happen if we truly value our well-being and the being of others. If we are going to immortalize anyone it is going to be ourselves. It is only a constant over-coming of the Other that one learns how to become what one is: Self-Confident.

If we are perceived to be this way or that way, then we allow external forces or outside influences control our thinking and dictate our behavior in such and such a way. It is because we have accepted this perception of ourselves.

Nietzsche said, “I do not want to be taken for what I am not – and that requires that I do not take myself for what I am not”. Increasing one’s esteem and confidence is a continued upward goal most of us share. We thereby agree that we are all seeking to be self-sufficient functioning human beings in control of our destiny.

“Do not go where the path may lead; Go instead where there is no path, and leave a trail.”

Copyright Randy M. Herring, Existential Essays

Be True To Yourself

The journey of self-discovery is one of the greatest difficulties, yet the greatest reward in life to achieve happiness. Nietzsche says, “Every human being is a unique miracle…beautiful, and worth regarding.” He echoes Emerson’s words verbatim, “‘all experiences are useful, all days holy and all people divine’!!!”

Nietzsche’s idea of self-discovery is rigorous like tough physical training possessing a kind of athletic mindset. To discover oneself is to be mindful of one’s “existential” or internal self. To actualize the internal self is to overcome the external self that negates it from becoming the true authentic self.

Discovering one’s authentic self is a process of deconstructing one’s own life to understand the relationship between the internal self, the external self, and the external world of controlling influences.

It is difficult to “find oneself” because social media has us sucked into its vacuum day in and day out to pacify our need to want to belong to an esteemed group and make us feel loved through an emoji affirmation. As a result, the internal “non-conscious” self struggles to affirm itself as the true authentic self because it is caught in between the social web of the “conscious” self – what it is not. “All that you are now doing, thinking, desiring,” Nietzsche says, “is not you, yourself.” Becoming more mindful of the non-conscious self is an everyday constant self-overcoming of the conscious self.

To discover “who” you are is to “get in touch with yourself.” To “be true to yourself” is to consciously refer to your stable values, your motives, and your beliefs. To “become yourself” is to reduce the conscious information you have about yourself from the external world. “Be Who You Are” is freedom and happiness and is perhaps the greatest reward and prize of life.

Nietzsche’s formula of happiness resides in his concept of the Overman or Superman. It is embracing life’s joys and hardships and overcoming the latter. To turn “muck into gold” is to master hardships and overcome them and become self-overcomers. We should be happy and learn to love the choices we make (good and bad) and be our own heroes by affirming them wholeheartedly.

Nietzschean happiness is not relying on externally driven goals that society sets before us as means to an end, but internally driven goals that we value for their own sake, which makes life more rich, intense and meaningful. It is a path that we set and create ourselves. There is no universal path. It is a path that can be dark and frightening because there are no blueprints. It is a rigorous and narrow yet fluid path. It is your path and your life. This is happiness.

Suffering through hardships is the key to unlocking the secret of happiness. Happiness is not in opposition to pain and exertion. It is rather striving toward something in suffering through a great task that we’ve set ourselves. Overcoming our sufferings is part of the experience of happiness. It is not just pleasure, but pain that can be happiness. Pain is almost an enabling condition of happiness.

Nietzsche admonishes, “Any human being who does not wish to belong to the masses needs only to stop taking things easy for himself. Let him follow his conscience, which calls to him: ‘Be Yourself!’”

Copyright Randy M. Herring, The Fitness Mindset