What it is to be authentic has become muddied by over-simplified, New Age thought. It's just not that light and fluffy.
Authenticity = Transparency + Congruence x Wholeheartedness...
Authenticity is fairly easy to define and terrifically difficult to live into. To be authentic means first, to be astonishingly transparent and congruent.
To do that, you need to do the inner excavation to discover what you've tucked away in the Shadow of your own Self. What have you disowned? And most often, these pieces of your whole self that you've disowned are what makes you utterly YOU. Authentic. It's messy work. There are many twists and turns. Paradox is afoot. And yet, like death and birth, this path of soul, of authenticity gives way to new life.
When you are transparent, you will stand out as you are truly seen. When you are transparent, others can "see through" you into you as your heart and true essence shines. You are clear, direct and kind. You are not an enigma; you don't leave people scratching their heads wondering what you just said and did. You do not hide. You are honest to the bone. You are courage in the flesh. You tell the TRUTH. You are an adult.
When you are congruent, what you think, say, feel in your heart, feel in your body and the actions you take are aligned. Congruent. Authenticity happens in the guts and bowels of your life. Being authentic is the grunt-work of the soul. Being half here, half there, half-hearted, faking it, strategizing to make things easier for your self -- that's the common way of the unconscious clotted middle. The way that lacks wholeheartedness. Being soul-centered costs you your membership to all that. And opens the door to your bloody, alive wholeheart -- reveals to you the magic of this honeyed life. And leaves you and those you touch, feeling radically free. Solid and light. Authenticity strips away all that is NOT Love. All that is of soul remains as you are returned to your Original Innocence.
Not exactly sure where this came from...