How is “be yourself” a good advice ?

16 comments

1. Better to be good at being flawed version of yourself, than struggle at being someone you’re not

2. Be yourself doesn’t apply to if you are an asshole. I think being a dick and isn’t a personality trait. I think when most people say “be yourself” it’s more of a you are who you are don’t change things you like about yourself or pretend you are someone else so others will like you.

   I don’t think anyone says it and means be yourself never change anything good or bad this is you forever.

3. It’s an easier way of saying “don’t be fake” or “don’t mislead people about your personality”. It’s terrible advice on its face, but if you fake your way through life you’re either going to make yourself miserable or end up in a situation where someone discovers what you’re really like and you make them and yourself miserable.

   If you’re worried about your personality being abrasive to others, practice being less abrasive but don’t lose sight of what your own goals are. Be true to yourself, just work on not being an asshole about it.

4. Be yourself doesn’t mean don’t change and improve yourself. It means don’t act like you are someone you are not. Fake people fucking suck and are awful to be around. So be yourself, but also work on yourself.

5. I think you might be seeing it from the wrong perspective.

   When you look at the world and see people, yes, they will have overlapping personality traits.

   But it’s important to be yourself, internally, where you actually believe that you’re being yourself, inside your own mind, because you’re gonna be stuck with yourself 24 hours a day, seven days a week. you can’t escape it.

   be comfortable with yourself, be able to trust yourself because you’re being consistent and truthful, and when people come at you in different angles with different agendas, because you’ve gotten to know yourself and can be authentic, the opportunity to be exploited by others will be reduced.

   it’s a useful lifestyle to practice because it keeps you protected and safe from the world and it also keeps you from disliking yourself, because you keep changing it up in a way that’s not benefiting you.

6. If someone has a repelling personality they have basically three options:

   1. Staying true to themselves and live in solitude.

   2. Trying to fake it, wich can be possible for a while. With closer inspection and deepened interpersonal relationship this faking will be called out, because behaviour manifests subconsciously. So faking is just a good solution for short periods of time or shallow relationships with other people.

   3. Change, not in a conformist sense but with the goal of being a better (not bitter) person, and embrace their new self.

7. Being genuine is important

8. How is it not? You want to pretend to be something you’re not in order to achieve something? Say, what if you achieve it, how long are you gonna be able to keep the act? Be yourself, for better or worse.

   Not saying you can’t try to make yourself a better person.

9. Because being someone else to hold a relationship together is exhausting and eventually just impossible. If you’re fake to keep someone around, you’ll lose them the moment you can’t hold up that mask anymore. Be authentic at the start.

10. It’s a matter of being honest and genuine. You may not be the greatest, but you have the potential to improve. If you run around pretending to be something you’re not, not only will the real you stay the same, but most people will be able to sense that you’re full of shit.

    Focusing on being the best version of yourself is what works. Not pretending to be something you’re not, and not hitting everybody with every negative thought about yourself at once.

11. It’s great advice for properly socialized and emotionally healthy individuals. People often become insecure when it comes to dating so they put on a crowd pleasing boring persona or cringy fake one to hopefully increase their chances which rarely works. However, properly socialized people often don’t realize they have this valuable trait so they assume everyone else is working from the same baseline they are. “Be yourself” makes perfect sense to them because having a pleasant sociable personality comes naturally like breathing. It’s hard to imagine they’re people in the world that need to be taught how to breathe.

12. There’s only one “you”. Who else would you want to be?

13. “be yourself” is bad advice. “Don’t be fake, but change what you don’t like in yourself” is better advice.

14. It’s overly simplistic advice that sacrifices quality in exchange for brevity. The intent is to convey that you shouldn’t pretend to be someone you’re not. But what’s obvious is that some people have some shitty aspects about themselves, and a lot of people have less than desirable aspects about themselves. Those are aspects that are worth changing and improving upon.

15. It isn’t

16. Not really. If I don’t eat healthy foods should I stay that way? Nope.