I meet people every day who say they wish to be authentic, they want their work to be authentic, their lives to be authentic. I want that also, it is a good thing to want, although there is no narrow definition or common understanding of what it means to be authentic.

I have been working hard for some years to be authentic, I believe it is hard and draining – and sometimes frightening – work. A lot of people who way they want to be authentic don’t really want to be authentic, I suspect, they would prefer to run and hide, but that is just a guess. There are no reliable figures on who is authentic and who isn’t, it seems creepy to me to even try and decide.

I can only speak for me. I work at being authentic every day of my life. To me, it means facing the truth about who I am. Finding perspective on my life. Telling the truth about it. Moving forward every day, looking ahead.  Writing things that are honest and real. Making my own decisions.  I have much faith but do not hide behind any God to tell me what to do. It is up to me to decide what to do.

I have been on the hero journey, I have faced the sometimes ugly truth about myself, it can be dispiriting to realize how much work I have yet ahead of me to come close to being the person I wish to be. Being authentic is standing in my truth, not in the truth of other people. I live a life of gratitude, I give thanks every day for what I have, I do not dwell on what I have lost. Like every human being,  I have a lot, and I have lost a lot.

Being authentic means understanding what it is I really need and what it is I do not really need. It means being creative every single day, it means saving rest for the afterlife, it means kissing the ground in thanks for every day that I have to be productive and meaningful. It means shedding much convention. I do not live my life to be wealthy and old, I would prefer to die poor and happy, and as young as I can figure out how to be. I wish to be stronger, and stronger every single day.

It does not matter who I am or what I believe for something wonderful to happen. Every day.

I seek a life with genuine love and connection, encouragement and support, trust and understanding. I open my heart and journey to the world, I do it as fearlessly as I can manage.  I want my work to matter, to have meaning, to touch lives and souls in one way or another. I do not live to be loved or agreed with, I want to be a fiery star blazing across the sky, I want people to shake their heads as they look up. What is that?, they will wonder. Some will run from the light, some will embrace it, some will laugh and roll their eyes as I sail through the night sky.

On my tombstone, I do not want to see the words “I always agreed with him,”  I would prefer to see “he made me think.” And he said what he thought. My triumphs and disasters are mine, and my alone. I want to be my own person, living in the joy of my own decisions and mistakes and wisdom. I wish to grow old gracefully, sharing every single thing I have learned with every poor soul who wishes to sort through the debris and learn something from it.

Being authentic means thinking for myself, I do not care for any of the labels – left or right – that people like to put on themselves so that they never need to bear the burden of thinking again. Being authentic means being real and honest, speaking from the heart, opening myself up to the good and bad in me, for others to see.

If I do not learn to love and respect me, then no one else can ever love me. The world is a mirror, I look into it and it looks back into me.