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"We have to dare to be ourselves, however frightening or strange that self may prove to be."
— May Sarton

Authenticity is not a personality preference or a self-help slogan. It is the gateway to your natural energy, clarity, and effectiveness. When you are living from your authentic self, you tap into a deep internal reservoir of vitality and talent that was always meant to fuel a life of meaning and relevance. When you are not, life quietly becomes harder than it needs to be.

For many years, my own life felt like a constant uphill climb. No matter how much effort I applied or how committed I was to personal growth, something always felt strained. Over time—and with honest reflection—I came to understand why struggle had been such a consistent companion.

I wasn't living an authentic life.

Despite years of development work, I was still operating from a conditioned identity rather than my true one. Much of my decision-making, behavior, and self-image were shaped by an old story of who I believed I was supposed to be—particularly who my father wanted me to be—rather than who I actually was.

Before I met Dr. Sherry Buffington, I believed I had already identified the person I was here to be. But once I began working with the COREMAP—a powerful framework she developed—it became immediately clear that there was still more to uncover. Not because I was broken, but because conditioning runs deeper than most of us realize.

"The privilege of a lifetime is to become who you truly are."
— C. G. Jung

This is not a fringe issue or a rare phenomenon. Research conducted by Dr. Buffington indicates that as much as 75% of people are living primarily from a conditioned self rather than an authentic one. That lack of congruence doesn't just affect how people feel emotionally—it influences how they think, how they perform, and how much energy they have available to live their lives.

When we live outside our natural design for extended periods of time, the cost is real.

As early as 1999, Dr. Arlene Taylor and Dr. Katherine Benziger wrote about what they called the Falsification of Type and its associated condition, Prolonged Adaptation Stress Syndrome (PASS). Their work demonstrated that human beings are at their healthiest, happiest, and most effective when they are rewarded for using their innate strengths—what Carl Jung referred to as a person's natural lead function.

When people are required to operate outside of that natural efficiency for long periods, the brain is forced to work significantly harder just to maintain normal functioning. The result is not growth—it is strain.

In fact, when individuals are allowed to live and work from their natural strengths in supportive environments, the experience often mirrors what Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi described as flow—a state of optimal engagement where effort decreases while results increase. This is where energy replaces force.

By contrast, sustained inauthenticity produces the opposite effect. The brain expends enormous energy compensating for misalignment, which can lead to chronic stress, anxiety, exhaustion, and depression. This is not a failure of character—it is a physiological and neurological response to living out of alignment.

Dr. Benziger's research revealed that short-term falsification often shows up as irritability, headaches, and difficulty learning new tasks. Long-term falsification is far more serious, correlating with exhaustion, depression, loss of joy, cognitive decline, and increased vulnerability to illness.

Further supporting this, neuroscientist Dr. Richard Haier used PET scan research to demonstrate that the brain must work dramatically harder—sometimes up to 100 times harder—when operating outside a person's natural area of efficiency.

In simple terms: when you are not being yourself, life costs more energy.

This is why effort alone is not the answer. When people are aligned with their authentic self, energy flows and effort decreases. When they are not, even extraordinary effort yields diminishing returns. This distinction sits at the heart of what we explore on the Get Empowered Podcast.

"A lot of the conflict you have in your life exists simply because you're not living in alignment; you're not being true to yourself."
— Steve Maraboli

Once you reconnect with who you truly are—beneath conditioning, expectation, and inherited narratives—you gain access to a different quality of life. From that place, creating the life you desire is no longer an act of force. It becomes a process of alignment, clarity, and intentional choice.

Our work exists for one reason: to help people reclaim that alignment and rise into the highest version of themselves—not someday, but now….especially now.