Authenticity: Becoming and Presenting Our True, Authentic Selves

Authenticity: Becoming and Presenting Our True, Authentic Selves

I read frequent posts from adults wishing they could present their authentic selves in public.

Here's the thing. It starts in Kindergarten.

We do not allow children to present their authentic selves in school. For 13 years most children, youth, and young adults must leave much of themselves and their identities at the schoolhouse door.

As they grow and develop, bit by bit, they learn to fake it, to wear a different face, to be more like others, or certain others, to ignore or hide things about themselves, their personalities, their interests, their families, their cultures, their religions, their wants, needs, and desires, to be someone else, to be what others wish to see. To please others. Teachers, administrators, other students. To not get into trouble. To earn praises. To succeed. To get ahead.

Kids can't just be. So they can't be themselves.

I suspect if we allowed kids to be authentic in school, we would become (be) more authentic adults.