The Self
Part 13 - True self vs false self

A comment you sometimes hear when people are describing another person’s honesty is that they wear their heart on their sleeve. When people say this, it can sound as though the person they are talking about is a rare breed, while the remainder of us – who do not wear our hearts on our sleeves – are dishonest.

Do you think that being your true self is largely a private affair, shared only with your own self and those you are close to.

Surely, if there is so much falseness flying around our world, there is a good reason for it? Maybe part of that reason is that everyone else is doing it.

Donald Winnicott (a 20th-century psychoanalyst and paediatrician) saw being true as being alive and free and spontaneous, while being false was part of complying with other people’s demands or expectations. He saw falsehood as an important defence for a child to take against poor parenting. The false self protects the true self against being damaged by the craziness of parents.

Another angle to take on falseness is that sometimes it can be the only way to reach out and connect with another person. So we either have a choice to not connect with people (and stay true – but possibly also stay lonely and unloved) or connect with people (and be untrue).

There are probably a million and one good reasons for not being your true self. However, one of the troubles of being false, especially for long periods of time, is that you can lose your way. Your false self can become a larger and larger part of your life, and you stop knowing which bits are real and which are not real.

Sometimes people pretend that their false self is their real, true self.
Sometimes being false for long periods of time can cause a personality crisis (“I don’t know who I am anymore”).
Sometimes the burden of falsehood can create exhaustion and distress (“I don’t have the energy to live like this anymore”).

Splitting away from your true self can often happen in times of change:

• To fit into a new school
• To please your parents/partner
• Upon promotion, where it seems that to take on a different role you need to be different to your true self
• When you meet someone for the first time
• When you feel vulnerable or unsafe

The following questions may be of interest to you:

Q: When am I most true (to myself)?