We’re often drawn to people who appear to be true to themselves. Yet showing our authentic selves to the world can be terrifying. This week, we kick off 2025 with a new series, “Wellness 2.0.” We’ll go beyond New Year’s resolutions to take a deep look at how we can approach our lives with a sense of meaning and purpose. Today on the show, we begin our series with researcher Erica Bailey, who studies authenticity and what it means to truly be ourselves.
Duration
56m
Broadcast on
30 Dec 2024
Audio Format
other
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We’re often drawn to people who appear to be true to themselves. Yet showing our authentic selves to the world can be terrifying. This week, we kick off 2025 with a new series, “Wellness 2.0.” We’ll go beyond New Year’s resolutions to take a deep look at how we can approach our lives with a sense of meaning and purpose. Today on the show, we begin our series with researcher Erica Bailey, who studies authenticity and what it means to truly be ourselves.
Happy New Year from all of us at Hidden Brain! If you liked today's episode, please check out our companion Hidden Brain+ conversation with Erica Bailey. We've extended our free trial period to 30 days for listeners who sign up via Apple Podcasts during the month of January. To try Hidden Brain+ on Apple Podcasts, click the "try free" button on our show page in the app, or go to apple.co/hiddenbrain.
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This is Hidden Brain, I'm Shankar Vedanta. Dance like no one is watching. Sing like you are alone in the shower. Be yourself. Everyone else is already taken. Countless aphorisms remind us that as we move through life, we have a choice. We can pretend in disguise who we are, or we can be true to ourselves. What does it mean to be ourselves no matter what they say as the musician Gordon Sumner, better known as Sting, once instructed us? Don't we all contain multitudes? Is there really only one true self? And even if there is, how wise is it to always reveal ourselves? As social creatures, heavily dependent on the people around us, does it really make sense to ignore how others see us and march to our own drummers? The evidence about authenticity seems clearer when the shoe is on the other foot. When we are evaluating other people, most of us are extremely suspicious of people who may not be what they see. When we discover someone has lied to us, either implicitly or explicitly, we read this as betrayal. We distrust those who say one thing in public, and do something else in private. This is why politicians learn to look you in the eye as they speak to you, why they master the art of the firm handshake and the steady voice. This is really me, they are trying to say. What you see is what you get. Today on the show, and in a companion episode on our subscription feed Hidden Brain Plus, we explore new psychological research into what happens when we are true to ourselves and when we are not. It's the kickoff episode to our new series we are calling Wellness 2.0. We'll go beyond the angst surrounding New Year's resolutions and answer a deeper question. What does it mean to live well? Over the next few weeks, we'll talk about how to keep your cool during stressful times and how to rise to the occasion during moments of crisis. We'll also help you figure out what you actually want in life and how to embrace the role that chance plays in shaping who you are. We begin with what it means and what it takes to live an authentic life. How to be yourself this week on Hidden Brain. ♪ Support for Hidden Brain comes from Instagram. Instagram teen accounts automatic protections limit who can contact teens, the content they can see and the time they spend on the app. Teens are automatically placed into teen accounts. Teens under 16 will need a parent's permission to change any of those settings to be less strict. Learn more about teen accounts and Instagram's ongoing work to protect teens online at instagram.com/teenaccounts. Support for Hidden Brain comes from Land Rover. Even the boldest journey starts small with a single decision to go somewhere new. Purpose built and courage driven, the Defender 110 combines on-road presence with off-road capability. It looks tough because it is with a raised hood and an exterior engineered for durability. Inside, capability meets comfort with seating for five and the option for seven
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We’re often drawn to people who appear to be true to themselves. Yet showing our authentic selves to the world can be terrifying. This week, we kick off 2025 with a new series, “Wellness 2.0.” We’ll go beyond New Year’s resolutions to take a deep look at how we can approach our lives with a sense of meaning and purpose. Today on the show, we begin our series with researcher Erica Bailey, who studies authenticity and what it means to truly be ourselves.
