{"id":29815,"date":"2019-08-07T15:41:00","date_gmt":"2019-08-07T20:41:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/?p=29815"},"modified":"2019-08-07T15:41:00","modified_gmt":"2019-08-07T20:41:00","slug":"briefly-authenticity-matters-far-more-than-being-impressive","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/?p=29815","title":{"rendered":"Briefly: Authenticity matters far more than being \u2018impressive\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/Hiding-behind-disguise.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-29816\" src=\"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/Hiding-behind-disguise.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"460\" height=\"245\" srcset=\"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/Hiding-behind-disguise.jpg 460w, https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/Hiding-behind-disguise-300x160.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 460px) 100vw, 460px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>When I was younger, I cared a lot about other people thinking I was impressive. I hate to admit that, but it\u2019s true. I had already started making inner changes before I saw her talk in 2012, but watching\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=X4Qm9cGRub0\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Bren\u00e9 Brown&#8217;s TEDx presentation<\/a>\u00a0about vulnerability was a profound turning point for me (<a href=\"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/?p=10580\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">I wrote about this<\/a> in 2012.) A friend shared a link today which reinforced the idea that it\u2019s far <a href=\"https:\/\/tinybuddha.com\/blog\/its-more-important-to-be-authentic-than-impressive\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">more important to be authentic<\/a> than it is to be \u201cimpressive.\u201d That would have made me nervous 10 years ago, but I\u2019m able to live it now. I\u2019ve made a conscious effort to unmask myself as much as is reasonably possible and that has had one positive effect I didn\u2019t anticipate. Since my father was a narcissist, I\u2019m vulnerable to falling into some of his patterns if I\u2019m not careful. But being very open about such fears about my failings helps inoculate me against doing that, because it&#8217;s hard to have a sense of grandiosity if you&#8217;re vulnerable about your faults and struggles. Being authentic, open and honest with each other can be transformative. It can save your soul.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>When I was younger, I cared a lot about other people thinking I was impressive. I hate to admit that, but it\u2019s true. I had already started making inner changes before I saw her talk in 2012, but watching\u00a0Bren\u00e9 Brown&#8217;s TEDx presentation\u00a0about vulnerability was a profound turning point for me (I wrote about this in <a href=\"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/?p=29815\" class=\"more-link\">Keep Reading<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[556],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-29815","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-briefly","7":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1x9iR-7KT","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29815","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=29815"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29815\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29817,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29815\/revisions\/29817"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=29815"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=29815"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=29815"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}