BE UNIQUE | EXISTENTIALISM

Are You Living Authentically?

The famous philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre would likely say no, you aren’t.

There is a particular way that human-beings choose to live. We decide that we barely have any say in what happens to us. We claim to be forced to make certain choices like staying in a job or lying to a friend. We decide that we have no control.

Notice how I have described this way of living with words like “choose” and “decide” — because this way of living is still a choice we make every day. At least that’s what Jean-Paul Sartre claimed in his influential texts ‘Being and Nothingness and The Humanism of Existentialism’.

Sartre views the mindset that we lack the freedom to make choices as inauthentic. He even refers to humans as being radically free, in a profound and deep sense, to guide their own lives toward certain goals.

He recognized that certain facts about us were out of our control such as our environment, culture, race, gender, social status, and time period. He called these brute facts of existence our facticity. Yes, we are bound in a fundamental way to our facticity, but we aren’t merely the sum of these facts.

We are still free to choose.

Yet, Sartre claims that people don’t like to think that they have as much freedom as they truly do. Instead, he views the masses as living an inauthentic life in bad faith. Acting in bad faith is described as an act of self-deception that many have grown accustomed to by succumbing to societal pressures and denying their own free will. People don’t want everything to be up to them.

This unwillingness to confront one’s own autonomy and radical freedom leads to the two main conditions for bad faith, namely:

(1) Falsely convincing oneself that they are not radically free in the decisions they make.

(2) Actively viewing oneself as an object in the world such as being identical to a job or social role.

The first condition can be easily understood, but the second may not be immediately clear. By viewing oneself as an object, Sartre means to say that people too often equate themselves as whatever social role or personality trait they are carrying out at any given time.

People say, “I am honest.” However, you can’t be honest-in-itself. No one is an honest person; some people simply choose to be honest. Notice the difference? In contrast, a person lies because they choose to lie — not because they are a liar-in-itself.

Sartre expands upon this with another famous example of the café waiter. He writes about observing a waiter in his favorite café and takes note of what he sees: The waiter’s unnatural movements as he greets and serves his guests. The waiter moves more rapidly and precisely than what would be considered normal. His demeanor toward his patrons is overly concerned and friendly, and the entirety of the waiter’s behavior seems to be more theatrical performance than genuine living.

The waiter is objectifying himself. He is conforming to the standards of what it is to be a waiter and consciously decides to continue personifying the concept of a waiter that is pushed upon him by society.

Sartre writes, “the waiter in the café cannot be immediately a café waiter in the sense that this inkwell is an inkwell, or the glass is a glass.”

The waiter example showcases both conditions of inauthenticity because he denies his own freedom to choose not to be a waiter and internally believes himself to be identical to the job he holds (an object).

The waiter is free to quit the performance and leave the cafe, yet he continually works at becoming a waiter. Although he chooses to continue playing the game of being a waiter, he is conscious of the fact that it is all a performance. He convinces himself he is not free to leave or free to stop gesturing as a waiter, yet he is radically free to do so if he chooses.

There is a way to avoid the charge of bad faith altogether. To do so, one must recognize that they can choose the trajectory of their lives. One must recognize that they are not identical to any job or social role and come to terms with their innate subjectivity.

Unfortunately, living an authentic life necessarily brings with it an intense feeling of anguish.

When humans understand that they are free to dictate who they are and what decisions they make wholly and absolutely, people become increasingly anxious. There isn’t anyone to blame for anything that happens other than yourself. It’s really all up to you.

“Freedom is what we do with what is done to us.” — Sartre

For many, this anguish is too uncomfortable to bear, and instead, they decide to hide from the realization of responsibility altogether. But for Sartre, anguish is the vessel that brings humans into true consciousness. When one flees from this anxiety, one flees from the consciousness of freedom entirely.

You need this anguish to realize your potential. If you want to be honest, act honestly. If you want to be moral, act morally. As Sartre states, existence precedes essence. We first exist and then manifest our essence through the choices we make every day.

We are thrown into the world without any say in the matter, but whatever happens afterwards is up to you. Bad faith is a threat to the very core of what it is to be human. Don’t let the weight of responsibility keep you from being free.

[1] Sartre, Jean-Paul. Being And Nothingness: An Essay In Phenomenological Ontology. Secaucus, N.J. : Citadel Press, [1964], c1956.

[2] Sartre, Jean-Paul. The Humanism of Existentialism. Brooklyn: Haskell House, 1977.