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"Curating" authenticity

For as long as I can remember I have been driven by an intense need to seem impressive to other people.  When I was nine, I was assigned a biography project—your standard “pick a famous person and write about them” situation.  I picked Marie Antoinette. I chose an 800 page biography for adults to be my main source and, instead of writing a simple report, I made a custom barbie doll wearing a hand-glued replica of Marie Antoinette’s wedding dress.  Behavior of this nature continued all through school, going “above and beyond” not because I genuinely wanted to better myself, or because it was fun, but because I wanted to be—no, appear— better than everyone else.  If that seems like dangerous behavior to you, it’s because it is.  

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As I entered my twenties and became more self-aware, that danger become evident to me.  I began to question everything.

Why was I doing this? Do I like what I’m doing? Am I good at what I’m doing?  Is this right?  Who am I really?

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One of my dearest friends was once able to talk me off an existential ledge by comparing my decisions to Harry Potter and the sorting hat.  In the first book there is that scene where Harry gets sorted into his house—As he sits there beneath the sorting hat, the reader becomes privy to the hat’s apparent dilemma:  He is torn between sending Harry to Gryffindor, the house of heroes, or to Slytherin, the house of villains.

 

The hat emphasizes the merits of both houses, confident that Harry would succeed in either one and go on to be a great wizard, but Harry makes a clear choice and begins to repeat to himself: Not Slytherin, Not Slytherin… and the hat listened.

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I was unbelievably worried about whether the life I was trying to live was really the life I was meant to live.  

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My friend argued that the subtle curation I had been practicing was, like Harry, an affirmative decision about the kind of person I wanted to be and what I wanted my future to look like.  

This reasoning seemed, and still seems, sound.

 

Humans are weak and flawed, and our first instinct is often not the one that will lead us to become more fully-formed individuals.  I’m not talking about animal instincts like eating and sex and survival. I’m talking about the instincts to self-protect, to follow the road we know, and to do things we like. It is important to have a goal in mind and continually nudge yourself toward it, even when it's hard.   

 

Especially when it's hard.  Duh.

But where is the balance between taking affirmative action in your future and just being a phony?  If every decision you make is 100% based on an image in your head rather than reality, then who even are you?  

 

There has to be a distinction between the present and future self, otherwise we risk becoming a less-great version of what we envision.  In making decisions based on the person I want to be, but clearly am not, I am counting my chickens before they hatch.  

My future self depends on my present self being authentic.  

 

My future self also depends on my present self not being a lazy bum.  

 

So, when making a decision, ANY decision, how much of the outcome should be dictated by what is good for me and how much should come from just plain desire?  If I lean too heavily on the “follow your bliss” mantra, I risk complacency. I am all too happy doing absolutely nothing. I am not one of those people who simply must to be doing something.  

 

That’s why I do things like force myself to read War and Peace.  Was is fun?  No. It was a slog.  But the fact that I finished it was satisfying. I had challenged myself and completed that challenge.  That I enjoyed.

On the other hand, if I only do things because I should—that is, because I will learn something, or because it’s healthy, or because the people I want to be like would do this thing—if that is the strongest force behind my “self-curation”I will surely run out of steam or crumble under the self-imposed expectations.  

 

In his essay, In Praise of Idleness, Bertrand Russell writes:

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                                          “...a great deal of harm is being done in the modern world by belief in the virtuousness of work,

                                                     and that the road to happiness and prosperity lies in an organised diminution of work.”

 

That is to say, do less.  He goes on to make many more points about how we should allow ourselves, as a society, more “idle” time to just think.  Because when we are go-go-going there is not room for good humored self-exploration, “good humor” being a key element.

 

Corny as it is, I know that just by being me, a person, apart from any success or esteem, I have already contributed something to the world that no one else can.  Simply existing as truest myself is my most valuable asset. If I forsake that in the name of a growth dictated by society, then the life I create ain’t worth shit.  But, you know... balance.

© MacKenzie Covington - The Champagne of People - September 2018

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