We were brought up, enculturated, taught, related to, from the idea that our authentic, subjective experience (thoughts, emotions, moods, feelings, etc.) has a causative relationship with our actions. That whole idea is really pervasive, tough to counter, hard to get beyond because it’s so palpably clear to us subjectively. When we are excited (or bored, sad, or angry, etc.), we don’t say “I’m being excited, being angry, etc.,” we say “I’m excited” (vs. I “have” excitement). Similarly, we know we’re not our thoughts—rather, we “have” thoughts. The “I” is never going to go away, but the way we take for granted that what we are feeling, thinking, etc. inside of us is what produces our
actions dramatically limits our world.
If we track down the false division between “act” and “world,” a whole other way of living becomes possible. We don’t act on the world, or act out of what’s there or how it’s always been—we act out of how it “occurs” for us.
We are correlated with the world. “A dancer is locked into an environment, responsive to music, responsive to a partner. The idea that the dance is a state of us, inside of us, or something that happens in us is crazy. Our ability to dance depends on all sorts of things going on inside of us, but that we are dancing is fundamentally an attunement to the world around us.
It often seems like our past experience is calling the shots. Here’s how it works: When we’ve had a bad day, or a bad experience, we put that past experience into our “future,” as something we’re afraid might happen again, and something we want to make sure doesn’t happen again. Or if we’ve had a great day and something we did worked well, we store that past experience in the future, too. So essentially, we take our experiences and circumstances, which are behind us, and put our decisions about them—how we feel and think about them—in front of us. In doing so, we lock ourselves into relating to the past (or some facsimile thereof) as if it were going to happen again in the future. That’s the wiring.
At one time, fail was simply a verb that denoted being unsuccessful or falling short of expectations. Since then phrases like überfail, massive fail, or, most popular of all, epic fail have made occasional forays into noun hood.
Hundreds of flavors of ice cream, countless selections of movie channels, an infinite choice of mates, our daily round of work and play, our incessant getting and spending—the world of “more, better, different” is the air we breathe and its pull is ubiquitous.
It looks a lot like this: we search around and move around and do things and act and keep expanding and going for more or better and sometimes we get kind of stuck. But then we break out and we find a new place in life and we are off again expanding and growing and we keep on doing things and often get more from or better at doing that. And that’s what life’s like. Growing and expanding and
learning and getting more, experimenting, trying things out differently. We might avoid the question “is this it” or “is this all there is” for a while, especially when we don’t have enough of what we’re after—like money, status, or comfort. But after we’ve got “enough,” the odds are we’ll visit those questions yet again.
We take the notion of failure for granted. We don’t really even think about it. When we set out to handle something in a particular way, and don’t succeed, the notion of “failure” has a way of popping up. If we identify ourselves with achievement and accomplishment and success, it can be difficult to tolerate anything that’s inconsistent with that, leaving us no powerful way to be. What happens then is our motivation comes from dealing with how we think (and think that others think) about failure. When we don’t separate out what we were out to accomplish from our attitudes and feelings about it not turning out, the disparity between what happened and what the possibility was is often interpreted as a “failure in being.” This adds even more mass to the experience and reduces being able “to be” at all.
The “being” part of being human is where the infinite possibility of living lies—where we are able to connect dots we never even knew were dots, go in directions that previously couldn’t have been considered, stand in a place from ere we are able to see clearly for ourselves.
When we compromise, even in the tiniest of matters, it’s easier for those compromises to become more and more commonplace. Over time, bit by bit, this erodes our sense of self. It’s like stirring one drop of red paint into a can of white. The paint may turn only the palest shade of pink, and while that
might seem barely noticeable—no matter what we say about it—the paint is no longer what it was. Similarly, when the wholeness and completeness of who we are is jeopardized in some way, albeit imperceptible at first, our sense of ourselves gets obscured, making it harder to return to who we are. When that begins, there’s really no starting point to become ourselves—it’s all flailing around.
We're all familiar with the old imperative “To thine own self be true,” and clear that much would be resolved if we only operated consistently with it, although we pull for getting approval from others and the need to fit in is a strong one.
Even when we’re fully aware that we’re being inauthentic, and know that we don’t really believe in what we’re doing or saying, we still
act as if we do—because we’re afraid we might risk losing approval of some kind. Even though we know the standards we’ve set for ourselves are impossible to realize, we still keep trying—we hide our perceived shortcomings, or pretend they don’t
exist. In doing so, we unwittingly add yet another layer of in authenticity.
It’s hard to be at ease when we have to keep up a pretence and not be true to ourselves in some way. Yet it’s not as if we woke up one morning and intentionally said, “Gee, I think I’m going to act in-authentically today. What my life’s going to be about is
looking good and avoiding looking bad.
To be authentic requires putting aspects of our present
ways-of-being on the line—letting go of pretenses, letting things show themselves in new ways, and acknowledging whatever in-authenticity
is at play.
The
possibility of fully being ourselves occurs in proportion to our being authentic; said another way, it occurs in proportion to the degree we
own our inauthentic ways of being. In not owning them, we essentially resign ourselves to in-authenticity staying around. Living with a pretense, or being afraid that some aspect of ourselves might be found out, precludes any real freedom. We live, rather, with a kind of fabricated freedom—a large price to pay.
Sartre said that facing one’s freedom can be terrifying and uncomfortable—because facing it makes one feel insecure, and inevitably produces some level of anguish. Hence, we are constantly tempted to live in-authentically, pretending to ourselves that we are not free. To maintain this pretense, we try to convince ourselves that our actions are determined—by our character, our circumstances, our nature, or whatever. The last thing we want to admit is that our actions are determined only by our free, unconstrained choices .” This way of being is just kind of automatically there. Every time we opt for
<p>looking</p>good or
avoiding looking bad over what’s actually true for us, in-authenticity
creeps in and we compromise who we are.
We don’t much like thinking of ourselves as being inauthentic, but we live in societies today in which the name of the game is to “make it,” to “fit in,” to “look good,” so a great deal of what we think and do becomes shaped by a kind of cultural commitment to that. That pull or gravitational force is an
ontological phenomenon, not a psychological one—it’s the
<p>already/always</p>condition of being human (a term which kind of speaks for itself). This condition is ubiquitous—it influences everything: How we see and respond to situations, what we’re concerned with, what’s important to us. While we might think we are responding in true, authentic ways, what is actually happening is
that our responses are essentially just a fallout of that already/always condition, And it is against that pull—the enormous gravitational force of that condition—that we attempt to be authentic.
Being authentic—stepping outside of the swirl of the
already/always condition—requires courage. Humorist Josh Billings said, “This undertaking is not only the most difficult thing to do, but the most inconvenient as well.” In being authentic, the
already/always condition becomes stripped of its power and is no longer the determining force in shaping who we are. Here, the context for the question “who am I?” shifts from flailing about, trying to find ourselves somewhere
out there, to a
context of creation. This is more difficult, because there is no zeitgeist to read, no template to follow, no
known path to success. It’s a blank slate. It’s a matter of courage—a matter of
creating possibility. It gets made up as we go along, and it is this shift that makes available to us the full possibility of being human.
Under many circumstances, we aren’t willing to stand up for living a transformed life. In some circumstances, we tell ourselves that’s not important to us, that it’s enough just to get by. We’re so wrapped up in our own concerns, particular positions or points of view that the idea of getting ourselves to a place where things can be resolved in the moment seems untenable. If somebody
had a magic powder to come and sprinkle on us, in those moments, and just through that, we could be transformed, we might say, “No, thanks—I don’t want any!”
We might hear ourselves saying, “Don’t let anything different or even great, happen to me. Let me stay just like I am.” And then we might spend a lot of time building up a justification for where we are—afraid to give up the leaky life boat that’s so familiar, to take a chance on getting in one with no leaks. And our justifications will be rational and intelligent—just like my initial response, and like all the thousands of reasons people use every day to justify staying where they are.
Living a transformed life takes courage. People often think of courage only as what is called for in a moment of crisis, but that’s not the case. Courage is called for on a day-to-day, moment-to-moment basis, even when there’s nothing urgent at stake. It is up to us to create our lives consistent with who we know ourselves to be—making what’s at stake that which we say is at stake. It’s the stand we take on ourselves. That stand then becomes who we are. Saying that something is at stake is always a purely existential act. This business about freedom, this business about power, is really a product of a place to stand—not something that is out in front of us, that we’re working on or measuring ourselves against. When we live consistent with what we say, we are being true to ourselves..
Transformation has the power to upset the status quo, to unseat us from business as usual—it gives us a platform for being all we can. To choose living a transformed life requires us to wrestle with our resistances, small and large, to come face to face with the angst of giving up our self-imposed limits, our mediocrity—but most important, to live consistent with what we know is possible.
Transformation carries with it a wisdom and a knowing that we have a choice about who we are and the full range that is available to us in being human. With transformation comes big shoes.
We sometimes think that the circumstances in our relationships keep our relationships from being great. (If only she fill in the blank, if only he fill in the blank, etc.) But it’s not the content that determines the quality and power of our relationships—it’s the way we hold the content, the conversations we engage in, the conversation we are, the stand we take for workability.
Power, fulfillment, satisfaction, and aliveness in our relationships happen if we take our various complaints, or things we think don’t work, and promise to produce what’s missing (not as an insufficiency, but a possibility for something). To promise to produce what’s missing leaves us at risk.
Being related is a grand conversation—it’s living in a possibility, and if it’s a possibility, it’s inherently risky. If it’s not risky, if it’s a sure thing, if it’s predictable, then what we’ll be left with is something trivial.
Our closest relationships then become a place of explanation rather than exploration, of resignation rather than declaration. In those moments, courage is required to set aside our judgments, characterizations, options and create our own relationships in being powerful again—being related is a conversation, and with that comes an infinite malleability. Love, genuinely and openly expressed, is enormously powerful. And it’s in risking ourselves, in revealing ourselves to one another and to those closest to us, that we become ourselves.
Three interview questions which are important
1. Have you got the skills, expertise and experience to perform the job?
Think about the key skills you might need for the job you have applied for and assess your own level of expertise and experience in that context. It makes sense to identify the more specific or technical skills that your potential employer might expect as well as some more generic skills such as being a good communicator, having good IT skills, being a team player, etc. Once you have prepared for this question it will help you answer many different interview questions without getting side-tracked into talking about things that are not relevant. Remember that you want to demonstrate that you are aware of the key skills, expertise and experience required to do the job and that you have what it takes to perform it. Always go back to the key skills, expertise and experience when answering scary (and sometimes silly) questions like:
- Tell me about yourself?
- What are your greatest strengths / weaknesses?
- What can you do for us that other candidates can’t?
- Why do you think you are right for this job?
- What do you think the main challenges will be?
- Etc.
2. Are you enthusiastic and interested in the job and the company?
Any potential employer wants to know that you are interested in the company and excited about the prospect of working there. You therefore want to demonstrate that you have researched the company, understand its strategy, current performance, structure, market position and products and that you can’t wait to join them. For most, you will have done your homework before you even applied for the job, but if you haven’t then check out the ‘about us’ section on their website and search for the latest strategy documents, annual reports, key statistics as well as the company history. Show that you know them and demonstrate your enthusiasm for the job and company. Here you might also want to think about your ambitions and how they fit into the company you have applied for. You can then use the insights for answering questions such as:
- What do you know about our company?
- What do you think our company is aiming to achieve?
- What do you know about our products and services?
- Why do you want to work for this company?
- Why do you think this job is right for you?
- What motivates you?
- Etc.
3. Will you fit into the team, culture and company?
This final key question is about your personality and your style and how you as a person fit into the team and culture of the company. Companies have different cultures, which translate into different ways of behaving and working. It is important to make sure you fit in and don’t feel like a fish out of water. In fact, it is important for the company as well as for you. Again, hopefully you will have done some research prior to applying for the job. Sometimes, it can be tricky to find detailed knowledge about the company culture, in which case you simply talk about your assumptions and why you feel you fit in. One relatively new website that offers a glance inside companies is Glassdoor. The site is still in its infancy but provides a growing amount of data and information about what it is like to work for different companies. You want to map the culture of the company or the team you are planning to join and compare this to your personality traits, style and behaviors. Again, once you have done this you can use it to answer questions such as:
- How would you describe your work style?
- How would you describe yourself?
- How would your colleagues describe you?
- What makes you fit into our company?
- What makes you a good team member?
- If you were an animal, what animal would you be?
- Etc.
Of course, any interview is a two-way process. In the same way the interviewer wants to find out that you are right for the company, you need to assess whether the company is right for you. Each of the questions can be turned around so that you can assess:
- By joining this company, will I make best use of my skills and expertise and will they help me to grow them further?
- Is the company excited about having me work for them and will they give me the necessary support?
- Is the company culture the right fit for me so that I can flourish and be myself?
If you ask relevant questions from your point of view then this will make the interview more balanced and create a more natural conversation.
I hope this is useful? Please let me know your thoughts and share any comments you might have on the topic
