Quotes About Authenticity

It's all devastatingly true — except the bits that are lies

One of the cruelest things you can do to another person is pretend you care about them more than you really do.

Beyond a certain age, sincerity ceases to feel pornographic.

Our conversations are never easy, but as I-we-get older, we are finding that our conversations must bespoken. A need burns inside us to share with others what we are feeling Beyond a certain age, sincerity ceases to feel pornographic. It is as though the coolness that marked out youth is itself a type of retrovirus that can only leave you feeling empty. Full of holes.

It's starts out young- you try not be different just to survive- you try to be just like everyone else- anonymity becomes reflexive- and then one day you wake up and you've become all those other people- the others- the something you aren't. And you wonder if you can ever be what it is you really are. Or you wonder if it's too late to find out.

Figure our what it is you don't do very well, and then don't do it. I'm not beating myself up about doing everything perfectly. The litmus test I always use for myself is: Okay, if you won 20 million tomorrow in the lottery would you still being doing the same thing you are doing now with your life, Dough? The answer is yes. I'm always very conscious of that.

At what point in our lives do we stop blurring? When do we become crisp individuals? What must we do in order to end these fuzzy identities - to clarify just who it is we really are? -Richard

You pretend to be more eccentric than you actually are because you worry you are an interchangeable cog.

What one moment from you defines what it's like to be alive on this planet. What's your takeaway?'' There is silence. Tobias doesn't get her point, and frankly, neither do I. She continues: ''Fake yuppie experiences that you had to spend money on, like white water rafting or elephant rides in Thailand don't count. I want to hear some small moment from your life that proves you're really alive.

Sometimes I think the people to feel the saddest for are people who are unable to connect with the profound—people such as my boring brother-in-law, a hearty type so concerned with normality and fitting in that he eliminates any possibility of uniqueness for himself and his own personality. I wonder if some day, when he is older, he will wake up and the deeper part of him will realize that he has never allowed himself to truly exist, and he will cry with regret and shame and grief.

I broke out into a sweat and the worlds of Rilke, the poet, entered my brain -- his notion that we are all of us born with a letter inside us, and that only if we are true to ourselves, may we be allowed to read it before we die.

Failure is authentic, and because it's authentic, it's real and genuine, and because of that, it's a pure state of being.

God, I wish he and I had been genuinely close as opposed to the Don't-they-look-nice-together-in-the-airbrushed-family-portrait close.

It starts out young - you try not to be different just to survive - you try to be just like everyone else - anonymity becomes reflexive - and then one day you wake up and you've *become* all those other people - the others - the something you aren't. And you wonder if you can ever be what you really *are*. Or you wonder if it's too late to find out.

What I notice is that everybody's kind of accusing everybody else of actingthese days. Know what I mean? Kind of, uh, not being genuine. Nobody believes the identities we've made for ourselves. I feel like everybody in the world is fake now - as though people had true cores once, but hucked them away and replaced them with something more attractive but also hollow.

Exposing hypocrisy doesn't make you a moral person

At what point in our lives do we stop blurring? When do we become crisp individuals? What must we do in order to end these fuzzy identities—to clarify just who it is we really are?

Nobody believes the identities we've made for ourselves. I feel like everybody in the world is fake now—as though people had true cores once, but hucked them away and replaced them with something more attractive but also hollow.

Unlike most fine writers, he wasn't in love with his own words.

watch an animal, and be reminded of what total integrity looks like.

Gideon," he said, "think for a minute about the qualities that a leader—even a co-leader—is required to have. He's a team player. He's good at inspiring others. He's able to hide his true feelings, put up a false front when necessary. He projects confidence at all times—even if he doesn't feel confident. He can't be a freelancer. And he's certainly not a loner. Now, tell me: do any of these qualities describe you?

Servandae vitae mendacium.

Our leaders are morally bankrupt, shameless hypocrites, feigning piety but devoid of real spirituality.

it was never too late for the truth.