Authenticity is a basic virtue

In recent years, “authenticity” has become a popular word describing special intimacy to be shared with people you care about very much. It is treated by modern people as some high moral virtue akin to sacrificing your life for a stranger. Authenticity is rare, but not because it is some supreme virtue, but because most people are dishonest.

Authenticity actually just means to be yourself. To be authentic is to be veritable—to be as described and perceived; not false, unreal, or imaginary. Authenticity is the integration of self through alignment of the inside and the outside. To be authentic is to be candid—to freely share and live according to what you really think and feel.

It ought to be easy to find someone who is authentic. Any decent person should be. It isn’t the case that being authentic makes you a virtuous person, it’s that being inauthentic makes you a terrible person. It is not acceptable to be inauthentic, because to be inauthentic is to be duplicitous, deceitful, misleading, fake, and false. Pretending to be who you are not, either by withholding what you really think and want, or by feigning that you want something you don’t, is a deplorable way to treat others.¹ If an accomplishment so basic ranks among your highest attainments—let alone aspirations—you stand in need of a serious retooling.