Do you pride yourself on being authentic, or are you wondering how to be real? Being authentic is more than giving your honest opinion when we see something wrong. However, the definition of being genuine or real doesn’t include attacking, blaming, or judging others.
Instead, authenticity involves making a sincere effort to explore ourselves to uncover our genuine experiences and communicating them. What it means to be real is you’re checking in with yourself before responding instead of venting emotions. Let’s look at how to be real in greater detail.
Don’t Be Afraid to Express Your Individuality
Do you love building model cars? Talk about that interest. Are you passionate about vintage antiques? Share that passion with others.
Each time you express your individuality, you’re uncovering your authentic self. Your interests and passions are what make you different from others. When you show your authentic self to others, that helps them find themselves. When you hide who you indeed are, then you’re not real.
It’s Not About Being Popular
When you’re living in ways that make you feel like you are part of a popularity contest, that isn’t authenticity. Trying to be the most popular means you’re chasing a dream that might not ever come true. During that chase, you might lose sight of your authentic self.
Being an incredibly popular person in social circles, at work, or within your community isn’t as glorious as it sounds. Instead, you end up becoming someone you’re not. You wind up becoming a role model who has to be “perfect” all the time. Authenticity, or being real, means you don’t care about popularity. You would prefer to trade that in for being your “real” self.
There’s Always Going to be Competition
That competition isn’t with others, though. You’re competing with yesterday’s version of yourself. That means, today, you’re trying to be better and more authentic. How valuable is the advice you’re giving? Could it be more useful? When you’re sharing your life experiences and advice, make sure it’s honest and is extremely valuable to your listener.
Competing with yourself also means admitting that you’re not afraid. Don’t be scared to tell others about your fears, your wishes, and your vulnerabilities. When you’re sharing these things, that’s how to be real.
You’ll Attract Authenticity
When you eliminate fake people from your life, those who are real and authentic will gravitate toward you. These people are successful in the most genuine sense of the word. They’re more loyal than another you’ll meet and fun to be around.
Creating this kind of network is exceptionally beneficial. These individuals will help lead you toward your goal or distract you from what isn’t favorable. People are naturally attracted to peers who are real, don’t brag, and are willing to say what’s on their mind.
How to Be Real in Three Ways
There are three ways to be real, including:
- Understanding the definition of authenticity
- Committing to being self-aware
- Reflecting through writing
Let’s dig in a bit deeper into each of these topics so you can have a better idea of how to be real.
Understanding the Definition of Authenticity
If you don’t know the definition of authenticity, or real, then it’s time to get to work. According to psychologists, those who are genuine are consistently striving to align their beliefs and core values with their actions. They do this in hopes of discovering their true selves and then acting in sync with that discovery.
What this means is your core self reflects in what you believe, do, and say daily. People who know how to be real will accept their strengths, as well as their weaknesses. These individuals avoid behaviors that don’t align with their values. They also behave in ways that are in alignment with their values.
First, you must act toward deciding you want to be authentic. You have to choose consciously. Even though you will sometimes feel challenged or vulnerable, you must acknowledge who you indeed are and act by that. For example, being real may require you to do things that aren’t popular with your peers.
Being real also means you’re not afraid to expose parts of yourself that are less desirable. It’s an important step, though, because you’re revealing what you do or do not value about yourself honestly and genuinely. In doing so, you’re on your way to leading a more “real” life.
You’ll also find that, when you learn how to be real, it has mental health benefits. Research conducted in 2017 indicates that those who live authentic lives are more likely to show resilience in the face of adversity and feel better about themselves.
Committing to Being Self-Aware
When you’re self-aware and have self-knowledge, those are the keys to how to be real. You must take steps to get to know yourself on a deeper level. What that means is, instead of living according to the lives of others, you’re living one that’s entirely yours. Throughout life, especially during our childhood years, picking up messages that are based on the actions or words of others is common.
It’s also common for us to incorporate those things into our belief systems. In doing so, we eventually assume those are part of our original thoughts. Becoming more self-aware involves picking apart those beliefs and determining which are yours and which you incorporated based on your peers.
This reflective step is beneficial because, once you understand your values, you can move on to determining what actions will ensure they align with those values. That’s your next step toward becoming genuine and real. Self-awareness is a constant effort and not something you can achieve and never think about again.
Reflecting Through Writing
One of the best ways to discover who you are and learn how to be real is by reflecting and writing. Create a list of all that’s important to you, as well as what resonates. Going through the process of writing could help you achieve clarity regarding your inner values.
Do you write in a journal? If not, consider picking one up and using it for this exercise. First, a journal helps you become more self-aware. Next, journaling gives you a written track record for you to look back upon when reflecting on your past. You’ll also find and track patterns in your journal.
Use prompts to help you move past writing around issues you have trouble diving into or if you have trouble journaling. Prompts like, “What kind of person am I today,” or “What do I love about myself,” are excellent places to start. Set a timer and write about your chosen topic for ten minutes.
Setting a timer helps you focus your energy on precisely what you want to discover or understand about yourself. You can also write in your journal by completing the following sentence and expanding upon it, “If you know who I am, this is what you’d know about me _____.”
Diving Deeper in How to Be Real
Do some of your peers pride themselves on being real, but you find yourself feeling terrible about the interactions between the two of you? Do interactions with these individuals make you feel bad about yourself? It might be that these people aren’t aware that they’re hurting you when they’re shaming, angry, blaming, or accusatory.
They proudly declare that they like to tell it how it is, precisely what they think, and with complete honesty. Responding to such declarations of honesty is challenging, even when you believe something is wrong. You might be thinking that, yes, you want them to be honest. However, that person’s tone and voice are hurtful.
There’s a significant difference between authenticity and obnoxiousness. When someone is authentic, that person doesn’t spend any time telling others what’s wrong with them. They don’t use the word “honesty” as a way of blaming, judging, or shaming their peers. What they’re doing is defending themselves against vulnerability.
Instead of discussing the perceptions of other people, authenticity involves expressing what’s inside. However, those expressions often include vulnerability. The main reason is that we’re putting things that are tender into focus. For example, if you’re sensing fear, pain, or sadness, or you’re longing for understanding, that’s vulnerability.
It takes strength and learning how to be real to reveal those longings and feelings. Defaulting to attacking others is a common form of communication when we feel hurt or threatened. When protecting our inner selves from experiencing a deeper level of vulnerability, building walls and preventing anyone from getting close often occurs.
Learning how to be real and your authentic self involves the following:
- Constantly redefining your core values
- Keeping an open mind
- Letting the past stay in the past
- Being courageous
Let’s dig deeper into each of these topics, so you can learn more about how to be real.
Constantly Redefining Your Core Values
When you’re learning how to be real, that’s an evolving process that remains a constant in your life. As you go through changes throughout your life, your values will continue changing as well. At thirty-years-old, you’re not the same person as your sixteen-year-old self.
Throughout your life, you may suffer from what psychologists refer to as cognitive dissonance. That happens when you experience discomfort or stress when your actions and beliefs don’t match, or you’re holding contradictory beliefs. That means, as life continues, you must consistently learn about yourself while discarding values or belief systems that aren’t yours.
Learning how to be real is a process that continually involves redefining who you want to be, as well as the “self” you are right now. For example, your fifteen-year-old self might have envisioned your twenty-five-year-old “self” married and with children. However, if you’re now thirty and neither of those came to fruition, it’s time to reevaluate your beliefs and goals.
Your goals might shift because you believe attending college and embarking upon a career is more important. Or, it could be because you haven’t found the right partner yet. Another scenario might be that you no longer believe in marriage or want children. Reflecting on yourself and diving deep inward to understand your feelings helps you redefine your beliefs and identity.
At any age, it’s challenging to learn how to be real. You’ll find that’s especially true if you don’t understand your fundamental needs, wants, values, and desires. You must be willing to accept that, as things in your life change, you will also.
Keeping an Open Mind
Another part of learning how to be real is continuously opening yourself up to new ideas as well as a variety of perspectives. Using binary thought processes, which is a combination of good and “bad” thinking, can limit your ability to be authentic. The main reason is that you’re trapping yourself in a judgment cycle.
Your authentic self is in a constant cycle of change throughout your life, as your ideas, opinions, and values shift. Opening yourself can take on a variety of definitions. For example, you could take a class or read a book about a subject you haven’t mastered or about which you want to learn more. In doing so, that puts you one step closer to developing your beliefs.
For example, when students attend university, their self-identity goes through a transformation. That happens because of the separation from their parents, as well as exposure to new things. Learning is an excellent way of opening yourself up and discovering what resonates.
Letting the Past Stay in the Past
Some people take comfort in assuming that life doesn’t change as time passes. There might be certain aspects of our identities, like being extroverted or creative, that remain consistent through the passing of the years. However, scary or unsettling changes might also be present.
For example, your childhood might have involved teachings that no longer align with your adult self. That isn’t an issue. These changes are positive and transformative. This example consists of letting go of your past self and embracing who you are today. By embracing who you are now and how that feels, you’re learning how to be real.
Being Courageous
Embracing courageousness is another aspect of learning how to be real. If you’re not conforming to the expectations of how others believe you should be, going in a separate direction might make yourself vulnerable to criticism from your peers.
You must also prepare for other shifts in your life as you become more introspective. For example, during self-reflection, you might decide that you’re no longer happy in your current profession. You might also discover that you spend a lot of your time pretending to love your job.
It takes a significant amount of courage and strength to fight against the reactions of others, as well as other social pressures. Remember, you always deserve acceptance and love. If people can’t love and respect you for who you are, then they might not be the best fit for your life.
During self-reflection, you mustn’t be shameful of yourself. As you become more self-aware, you’ll understand that you have flaws and imperfections. That’s because no one can be perfect.
For example, you might be bossy and controlling. Here’s where you challenge yourself to accept those flaws about yourself and learn how to alleviate and cope with them. Flip things around and think about how, under some circumstances, those flaws could be positive traits.
An excellent example of that is because you have a controlling nature about you, which means you’re never late for appointments or meetings. These flaws also allow you to empathize with your peers on an authentic level. Your imperfections and positive traits make you who you are and why others should accept you.
Always Be Real with Everyone
Throughout our lives, our peers train us to parade and polish a false sense of self we believe will garner accolades and acceptance. The disconnection and isolation that results are based on the detachment occurring from our genuine longings and feelings. We are too afraid of showing others what’s real, including our yearning for intimacy and love, our insecurities, and our fears.
Instead, we spend time trying to project an unruffled, self-assured, and confident self we believe will help us gain success and friendships. For example, when our partner is late, we might conceal our sadness and pain. As a result, partners might feel confused when that resentment or disappointment exposes later on over a trivial circumstance.
The deeper yearnings will feel in our heart, which includes our desire for connection and love, requires us to acknowledge that we must give something. That means we must know how to show the feelings we have inside. Instead of hiding our authentic selves because we fear rejection or shaming, we must have the courage to reveal what’s genuinely inside.
That means you must always be real with others no matter the situation. When you’re learning how to real, that involve diving deeper into the following topics:
Not Going Along with Your Peers
When we have a strong desire to fit in, it isn’t uncommon for us to act like or do what everyone else. You’ll find this fact is especially true when you’re in high-pressure situations. Those situations could be a party you’re attending where you don’t know anyone or at a business meeting where those in attendance expect you to impress them.
Under those circumstances, our desire to fit in outweighs any hopes we have about showing our “real” selves. However, that defeats all of your efforts toward learning how to be real. Remember, being authentic means that you’re doing and saying things that are reflective of the person you are and being yourself. Each time you pretend to be something or someone you’re not, you’re promoting a sense of fakeness that you’re trying to avoid.
When you’re your true self, you’ll find that you have more friends, and those relationships are closer. You’ll also experience more success when you’re sticking to the things you enjoy doing. You’ll find more satisfaction in your career and social circle when you fit things into who you are, instead of the other way around.
A hazardous and real phenomenon is peer pressure. People have done many things to others and themselves because they care about the opinions of others so much. These individuals also believe that it would hurt their reputations if they didn’t conform. If you don’t want to do something, don’t. Listen to what your heart tells you and remember that you’re the one who has to live with yourself at the end of every day.
Avoid Those Who Are Toxic
Do you find yourself around a lot of toxic people? These individuals often masquerade themselves as your friends. Instead of being friends, they’re pressuring you into doing things you don’t want to do. Each time you say no or act like you aren’t interested, they make you feel guilty about being authentic.
For example, if you have peers who continuously make fun of you for the way you dress or the activities you like participating in, then those aren’t healthy relationships. Friendships involve making those who are in the social circle feel positive about themselves. These friendships help you evolve into the best version of yourself instead of tearing you down if you don’t conform.
Other examples of toxic people that you should avoid when learning how to be real include:
- Those who are manipulative
- Judgmental individuals
- People who don’t take responsibility for how they feel
- Friends and family who don’t apologize
- Individuals who expect you to prove yourself
- Peers who continuously make you feel like you’re on the defensive
- Those who aren’t caring, interested, or supportive of the things you find important
Embrace the Power of No
Learning how to be real includes standing up for yourself when you don’t want to do something your peers want you to do. If those things challenge your values, you must embrace the power of no. We’re all natural people-pleasers to some degree. So, saying no to others is a courageous act.
Saying no might feel unsettling or nerve-wracking as you continue developing your authentic self. However, as you continue to do so, you’ll find yourself staying on track toward your goal of authenticity. That doesn’t mean you should say no to everything that makes you uncomfortable. Don’t be afraid to say yes to things that will help you grow as a result of overcoming those feelings of discomfort.
For example, your friends might invite you to try a new kind of food or an outdoor adventure. Those are both opportunities to say yes because you’re trying something new that’s positive. Being genuine means trying new things as a way of learning more about your inner self.
Understand That You Don’t Have to Prove Anything
Feeling validation from others is something many people want to achieve. We want people to feel connected and proud of us. However, you don’t have anything to prove to anyone. You don’t have to show your peers, or anyone else, that you do good things or are a decent person.
There’s also no reason for you to hide the flaws that make you human. For example, don’t beat yourself up for being late. Others are late at some point in their lives. Being real means, you’re allowing others to see your strengths, as well as your weaknesses. When you’re continuously trying to pretend to be someone you’re not, you’re exhausting yourself trying to benefit others.
Use Excellent Communication Skills
Are you someone who communicates well? Always be mindful of how you say things, as well as what you’re saying. You must be honest regarding your opinions and thoughts. However, you can be real without degrading others. This step is especially important when you don’t agree with someone or something.
That means only saying things that are constructive and valuable. If you can do that thoughtfully, your communication skills are even better. Try focusing on using “I” statements that resonate with your actions and values. In doing so, you’re avoiding using “you” statements that are often misunderstood as accusations.
If you’re in a challenging or touchy situation, always think before you speak. That way, you’re not accidentally saying something hurtful or offensive. Instead, take a few moments to think about your response and, if it’s not positive, reflect on it a bit more to ensure the person you’re communicating with doesn’t feel bad.
Final Thoughts: Talk About Your Commitment to Being Real
Find someone with whom you’re close and can trust. You might go to a close friend, family member, or partner who helps keep you centered. These people support you and help you achieve authenticity. Each time you’re honest with this person when you feel like you’re on the wrong path, they’ll help steer you in the right direction.
Learning how to be real also involves accepting the “realness” of others around you. Always treat your peers, or anyone else, with the same treatment you hope to experience. Don’t be afraid of differences between people but, instead, embrace them.