Inauthenticity

What is "inauthenticity"? The assignment is to find it. In myself. And to name it.

For two weeks I have walked with this unanswered question, let it tumble around inside me.

Group leaders in the Effectiveness Seminar teleconference once a week. Here's what I know about "inauthenticity" now, after this week's meeting. The Seminar Leader's discussion -- prompted by excellent questions from the Group Leaders -- was clear and dynamic and the light went on for me. I "got it".

Inauthenticity is self-generated. It is born and lives through me. It is estrangement: from God. From myself. From the heart of the world.

Ultimately, I can only come to know God through living out out out in in in
and out out in again
my consciousness breathing
God without and God within
God without and God within
Hallelujah

Whenever Inauthenticity occurs, I experience diminished vitality, diminished joy, loss of connection to...everything. I float alone in a mute universe, with only inner voices chattering, yammering, wailing...inside me. It is a cold place. Dying.

I found a feeling memory of my inauthenticity during the teleconference. How many times in how many years have I approached a new moment full of prejudging, peering at the world through the tight screen mesh of my fear?

Inauthenticity is not sin.

It is powered by human will. It is not as basic as breathing but is similarly automatic and happens in the blink of an eye: that woman walks into the room and I don't like her. It's immediate. And I immediately begin to build the case against her.

We almost can't help ourselves.

And, yet

we can.

It begins with the willingness to see. Then a commitment to seeing. Even when we're afraid. Especially when we're afraid; when we're afraid, we know that a self-preserving psychic instinct is very likely to kick in and we will respond from a primitive rather than an evolved awareness.

We find a still, clear space in the stifling wind of our fear and ... well, what do we do?

I can only speak for myself. I take a few very deep breaths to calm the psychic trembling. Something swirls white and cool/hot in my solar plexus and the crown of my head; it is my Will, reaching toward knowing. Saying "yes" to life. Saying "yes, I am here. I am not hiding. I want to play."


The flip side of every inauthenticity is possibility. That's why the assignment to identify and name every inauthenticity is so important. Inauthenticity is me choosing a cage instead of Possibility.

I'm still uncertain how to name particular occurrences of inauthenticity or whether the task is valuable. Finally apprehending the concept on both sensual and intellectual levels is a breakthrough for me. In the moment I understood the term, I was also aware of the impact of inauthenticity.

To recognize it is to immediately appreciate as well what Possibility means. The flip side of fear, bondage, smothering

is freedom, breath

Song.