the idea of being an authentic self is a key driver for me, yet sometimes i struggle to comprehend how we can be authentic in a world that is heavily curated and actively encourages us to be the ‘best version’ of ourselves. on the surface, there isn’t anything inherently wrong with wanting to be the best you you can be, it’s when we fall short of that, but don’t want the rest of the world to know we are lacking, so we only post the “good” stuff that makes it look like we are living our best life as the best version of ourselves.

and if you’re in the game that I’m in as a personal development coach, Instagram would have you believe that a prerequisite to being a good coach is that you’re life is picture-perfect, not a hair out of place (which is easy to do when you’re bald like me, hehe), but seriously, coaches are human and with that comes all of the fallibility of being human, all too human.

i like what Jung had to say about having a dark side:

and that to me is the crux of being authentic, embracing one’s dark side as a source of strength, for without it, how can we obtain grace and greatness?