The Hidden Tradeoff Between Being Yourself And Belonging

“Just be yourself” sounds empowering until you remember the real stakes: acceptance, safety, community, and the fear of being rejected. We dig into the tension between authenticity and belonging, and why that tension gets sharper in classrooms, workplaces, and any space where you feel like the only one. If you have ever left a conversation replaying what you should have said, or felt yourself code switch to keep the peace, this one will land.

We talk about belongingness as a basic human need, not a phase you grow out of, and how it shows up across cultures and generations. We also unpack what authenticity actually means beyond clothes or aesthetics: staying congruent with your thoughts, values, and words so your nervous system is not stuck in that low-grade stress of “that wasn’t really me.” Along the way, we share examples of navigating group dynamics, microaggressions, and the subtle ways people get treated like a spokesperson for an entire identity.

You will leave with practical self-awareness prompts to help you map where you feel most like yourself, where you shrink, and how to choose honesty without turning it into harshness. If this conversation resonates, subscribe, share it with a friend who is tired of performing, and leave a review telling us where you feel true belonging.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:57

Hi everyone. Today we're starting a conversation that sounds simple on the surface, but it's actually very deep. We're talking about being yourself. And more importantly, we're talking about what it costs you to be yourself and what it costs not to be yourself. What do you think, Sam?

SPEAKER_00 1:17

Yeah, I think that is really important, right? We are social creatures. And when we are not in connection with other people, it can it can be life-threatening.

SPEAKER_02 1:29

Yeah. And I think we forget sometimes that being yourself is not always safe. And it's all it's not simple too, right? And many times you do hear people saying, just be yourself. And but I think the more honest question is like, how do you be yourself and still stay connected?

SPEAKER_00 1:49

Yeah, you're on a balancing board, right? Of like, I want to show up authentically, but I also want to connect with other people. And because you have a unique experience, not everybody, right, is going to align exactly with you. And so how do you navigate that?

SPEAKER_02 2:11

And I think what is missing truly is the complex understanding of human experience, right? Um I mean, at the core of it is that human beings have the need to feel like they belong, right? They need to feel accepted, included, and part of something. Yeah at the same time, that requires the people you're interacting with to be able to hold complexity and see you in you know how you present yourself, not necessarily like feel that is threatening to them, right? I think most of the time that's where things go wrong, right? People feel like, oh, you being yourself and you can show up in this way or that way, and then their own feelings get reflected onto you, and somehow you end up suppressing yourself.

Belonging As A Survival Need

SPEAKER_00 3:10

It's a risk, right? It's a risk of reaching out and showing up with kind of your true self, because if that person doesn't accept you, right, that that's painful. You know what's interesting? I was doing a study and like multi-generational Somali refugee families, and one of the questions I was asking was about belongingness. And my assumption was like, well, the parents are monocultural, you know, they kind of don't really care to belong to greater society here, and so that was my bias. And after interviewing these parents, I realized that they also wanted, they also had the same desire to belong as their their children, right? They wanted to be able to go out into society and kind of be safe, be accepted. And that was, I don't know why that was surprising to me, but you know, hearing, you know, people in their you know later stages of life kind of still talking about this need of like belonging and being part of you know a community, a culture, and still having that desire. I was like, wow, there's you know, that desire will never go away, right? And it's almost like you know, in the research, this talks about how like we're wired for connection, like biologically. And so it having a community, having people that you can depend on is connected directly to our survival from an emotional and psychological level.

SPEAKER_02 4:50

Yeah, I mean, that's crazy to think that you know it is throughout the life course, right? Yeah, there is a need for belonging. It's not just it's I think most of the time associated with young people.

SPEAKER_00 5:06

Yeah, yeah, young adults, adolescents.

SPEAKER_02 5:09

Yeah, as they figure out themselves and they figure out the world around them, and then you know, they're trying to find their place in the world. I guess that's how it's the sentiment is expressed, I would say.

SPEAKER_03 5:22

Yeah.

When Authenticity Becomes Exhausting

SPEAKER_02 5:22

But at the same time, the need to be authentic, the need to be yourself, and feel like you yourself can be in those places that you happen to see yourself in. Um that's just human nature. And feeling like you don't fit in, I think it increases anxiety, yeah, you know, emotional exhaustion, and also trying to navigate like how much of myself can I show and still be accepted, right? Can I be in this space and be myself? And especially I struggled a lot with that in grad school because I'm a very open person. I like to talk and say, you know, say what you mean, mean what you say, type of person. Like just it's all out there, like yeah, but then you find yourself in spaces where that is not okay to do just say what you're thinking.

SPEAKER_00 6:20

You have to you have to maneuver, right? Indirect speech, like kind of you know, emotional suppression, filtering what you're saying, like that's part of the culture, and it's exhausting, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 6:34

It is really tiring, right? And it and the sad thing is it's felt by the individual, by themselves.

SPEAKER_00 6:45

It's an internal experience, right? It's like a it's like a tension of like of like, do I choose to belong and be uh you know, like buddy buddy with everybody else, or do I choose to be myself, right? And maybe ruffle a lot of some some feathers.

SPEAKER_02 7:03

And then over time, I feel like you can feel like you're disappearing, you're losing your sense of self, right? If you are constantly making yourself stay quiet, yeah, adjusting yourself to avoid conflict, be what people need you to be. Yes, those things work in the moment, yeah, but I feel like in the long run, yeah, are those friendships real?

SPEAKER_01 7:32

Yeah, right.

SPEAKER_02 7:33

Are those connections real? Yeah, and then how about your own sense of self? Like, who am I? I mean, you can almost not recognize yourself over time.

SPEAKER_00 7:44

I've had clients that our sole purpose of working together is trying to promote having authentic interactions with people, right? Because they were conditioned from a young age that you have to be presentable, don't embarrass the family name, right? Like you have to kind of show up in a way that is procured, right? And so or constructed. And at later, you know, later life stages, it's like I don't have any authentic friends, I don't have people that I share a deep connection with. I I know I have a lot of acquaintances, right? I can move throughout crowds very easily, but do I have somebody I can truly depend on? No, it's kind of just me. In some ways.

What Self Expression Really Means

SPEAKER_02 8:36

So the tension I experienced, and I think I continue to experience now in how I see the world. I've never seen the physical world as a representation of who I am, right? Like a thinking about, you know, how in America people are like fashion is how I express myself. I was like, really? I can wear a rag, no one cares. That's not self-expression for me, right? It's not, it's not who I I like, I don't even wear things because of how I feel, yeah, right. Because I mean, I feel like I I have a sort of uniform, especially as a Muslim woman, right? And I simplified my life. Yeah, literally, I just have black bias.

SPEAKER_00 9:23

Yeah, no, 100%. I have a lot of clothes, but I have like four on rotation.

SPEAKER_02 9:30

Just that's it, like right. I go in, and then you can literally just see a bias, and I just pick one. It's literally what Trevor One is clean that day, and then you just wear there is no thinking about it, like how I dress, my yeah, if I put on makeup, I didn't get enough sleep, and I have bags under my eyes, and I'm like, let me just hide this. Um, but the true expression for me is yeah, being yourself in a room. And when people say that, it's really not censoring my thought process.

SPEAKER_00 10:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 10:07

Right. Like how I'm thinking, my normal original responses to things, um, how I see the world, right? Um, and I think that's really about how you're brought up, your cultural uh experiences, who you are, who's your specific family, not even just your own ethnic group, but every family has its own culture.

SPEAKER_03 10:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 10:33

Then you take that with you. You know, I think Paulo Ferrier says, we are never alone in the world. We carry our family, our history with us. So everywhere you go, you carry that with you. And then how do you express that? Can you express that? Right. Um, and I think I said that before is the it requires not just self-awareness from you, you know, knowing what you feel and what matters to you, yeah. And also, of course, being honest with yourself.

Speaking Up Without Being Harmful

SPEAKER_00 11:05

But I think the opposite, right, of like not being authentic, I think that is detrimental to your mental health, right? Like the outcome is just kind of you're living in this anxiety of like, you know, that interaction was not authentic, right?

SPEAKER_02 11:24

And because you always know, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 11:27

And so that awareness, right? That insight is like, wow, like, and then you're like, what could I have said better? And you're like, you know, kind of looking at it from an outside perspective of like you're not really present with people, right? You're not connecting at a core level. And you know, it really kind of goes to show that like even in therapy, you know, there's this concept of like congruency, right? Of like that we that we support clients, and you want to be congruent in your thoughts and behavior, you want to be congruent in kind of your actions and your words, and so if you're not congruent in that, like that creates kind of dysregulation in you because your brain knows, right, that that this is not an authentic experience.

SPEAKER_02 12:17

Well, I think what I was getting at is that it requires authenticity, is I think of it as a two-way street, yeah, it requires openness on the other street. 100%, 100%, and a self-awareness of whom you're interacting with, right? So I think there is a mirror reflection of exactly what you're feeling, has to be present on the other side so that people can be, you know, in in relationship with one another and feel the tension and be okay with that, right?

SPEAKER_00 12:49

Yeah, it's like what we do with our clients, right? That attunement of like how do we hold space for you and how how are we completely present in this moment with you, right? That is kind of that true acceptance is what you know breeds this like true authenticity because the more rapport you have with your client, the more honest they are with you, right? Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 13:12

I mean, I I will tell you crazy experiences I've had as a very young adult. Um, you know, I happened to go to college when I was 15, and I'll be in these group discussions, and people just openly talked about having physical intimacy with people, and then this just like took me back, right? I'm like, what? Yeah, like you can imagine the shock of my you're having adult conversations. I'm too that this is too grown for me, yeah. Um, but at the same time, I didn't know if I could share my opinions, right? And you find who you can and cannot share those opinions with. I ended up having perfectly, I would say, good, well connected with relationship with one of my classmates, and people are like, How are you two friends? You know, just really complete opposites. Yeah, um, because she sees me. She knows those are things, you know, and and it's not that she didn't also have to censor herself around me, like she can tell me things, and we will talk about it. There's that openness of like she knew that's not how I did things, and that's not how I saw things, and she would actually seek my uh my advice sometimes because she knew I didn't think and do those things, right? So, really, you know, also feeling like respected and valued in that relationship, but then for that reason, reason which would be like, I'm gonna go and talk to so and so about this stuff, and I'm like, Yeah, that's really perfect, be fine with me. So we can have those conversations and be present with one another, but at the same time, I just wanted to drive home that you can't tell people be yourself and not expect to be uncomfortable yourself in that relationship.

SPEAKER_00 15:15

I love how you're talking about acceptance, but it's and it's also describing belongingness, yeah, right? Of it's like it's they're really two sides of the same coin. Whereas like it's like acceptance is you know, maybe at the micro level, and belongingness is at the macro level of like community level, but it's still the same thing, right? Of like, like somebody is, you know, willing to kind of listen to you, right? Non-judgmental, kind of accept who you are, and because of that acceptance, you let people see parts of the real you that maybe you don't often show others, right?

SPEAKER_02 15:57

It's yeah, I mean, I always do it anyways, which sucks. Yeah, I think it should come with a disclaimer, please don't do that. Um I think you just have to do always we go back to self-awareness, knowing yourself, doing the self-work, you know. And I think the best way to do that is yes, of course, in therapy, but go for a walk and just be with yourself. Yeah, think about what matters to you, like living your values. What does that look like in you know, small ways? Yeah, um, and then how do you let people see parts of the real you, right? Thinking about what are some things you know I feel safe doing, and then I can work that into my everyday interaction and eventually um make that work for you.

SPEAKER_00 16:48

Yeah. And authenticity doesn't mean like I'm gonna be like belligerent and I'm gonna, you know, like make people uncomfortable. And you know how people they'd be like, oh, I tell it how it is, but they're just being rude, right? Where you could just communicate in a better way and you and still be direct, but they use that as an excuse to just be a rude person. Being authentic is not that, right? Authenticity can be like the little things, right? Like calling out a microaggression was something that comes up for me, but like choosing not to laugh at something that doesn't sit right with you, like somebody made a bad joke, like, don't laugh along with it, right? Or like admitting that you're overwhelmed instead of pretending you're fine, like those are the authentic experiences that we just kind of want to not mask anymore.

Microaggressions And Performative Inclusion

SPEAKER_02 17:41

Yeah, yeah. And when we say like don't be stay silent, it doesn't mean throw tantrums, yeah. But like speak up when you would have chosen to just be silent, yeah. Right. And and when we say speak up again, you could just say that, you know, I I really don't agree with that, but I can see how you can think that, right? Like, or I can see where that's coming from. Uh, you know, I definitely don't agree with it. Yeah, so also you you don't have to, the aim isn't to disarm people or make them feel like they're wrong. Um, because I don't think in relationships it's not about right or wrong. It's right. Yeah, it's it's not about that. Relationships aren't like, oh, I get a point over you at that point, you know, you're not in a relationship.

SPEAKER_00 18:29

Yeah, if you're keeping score, we got a bigger problem.

SPEAKER_02 18:32

Right. So, what makes belonging feel complicated?

SPEAKER_00 18:37

I think it's like the way I understand it is the more people are around, the bigger the tension becomes of like being authentic versus belonging. Because let's say you're in a classroom and your professor says something, and this has happened to me in the past. Your professor says something offensive. In my authenticity, I want to speak up, yeah, but because I also want to be a part of the class, right? I want to belong, I may not, right? I may just stay silent or not along because there's a lot more people there. And I, and so the threat of like losing that belongingness is greater, right? Of like, oh, this is the girl that like challenged the professor, or like when people do challenge the professor, there's like anxiety in the room, like, oh my god, what's happening? Right. Versus if that same professor was in office hours and they said something and it's just me and them, I could probably maybe challenge them a little bit more, right? Like, or that tension is less. And so my desire for authenticity isn't in kind of direct, you know, contradiction to that. Does that make sense? I I just think the more people are added, the more the big the tension becomes.

SPEAKER_02 19:57

Yeah. I mean, I think we've all navigated being like I guess not all of us, especially, but if you're from marginalized community, like being the only one, yeah, or the other, or the other, and people have managed that differently, right? Some would try to like go out of their way and be welcoming, right? Yeah, but then at the same time, yes, man. At the same time, it feels weird because it's not authentic, yeah, and you can tell right, it's like performative, yeah. And but then there are places in which you do feel authentic connection where people don't try to make you feel like another, you know. Yes, they understand you have a different experience, you don't represent, right?

SPEAKER_00 20:53

But they're not gawking at your lunch, right? They're like, just treat my my food as like a burger, please.

SPEAKER_02 21:04

Like, don't even don't make any big deal, or or even uh try to get you to share opinions as if you are an expert in anything, just a child, you're just a 17-year-old child.

SPEAKER_00 21:16

Oh my god, I was at work one time, and some and one of my coworkers was like, Hey, could you recommend me some food spots? And so I was like, Oh, like I know a good like Mexican restaurant, you know, like that I go to all the time, and then she was like, Oh, I meant like you know, other foods. I was like, You want me to be your what East African representative? You asked me my favorite food, and I told you it's Mexican food, yeah. But she won, she wanted like I don't know, some like authentic Somali food or something, but she didn't want to say it directly, right? And I was like, Well, this is this is my authentic way of showing up right in my favorite food. Let me show you the the Mexican restaurants that I always go to because that's what's gonna happen here. And she was just so taken aback, like she was not expecting that. Like the only thing I eat is Somali food for some reason.

SPEAKER_01 22:15

Yeah, I know you eat that at home, you don't go outside.

SPEAKER_00 22:17

Yeah, yeah, I'm not gonna pay for it.

SPEAKER_02 22:22

No, I yeah, it's it's just I think that keeping in mind it's complicated, right? Belonging can feel uncertain and authentic experiences, right? They are what informs, I guess, like you said, your sense of belonging. Um and she should have rolled with it, right? Your colleague who asked and found out you like Mexican food, she would be like, okay, let's go. Yeah, like roll with it. That's that's the person in front of you, that's what they like. Yeah, um, you know, and I think. That's how you do that. But what is the quiet question like people have in the back of their mind? Is thinking about do I really belong here? Am I too different? And what happens if I show who I really am?

SPEAKER_03 23:10

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Holding Group Context And The Individual

SPEAKER_00 23:12

Yeah, those questions are, you know, the ones that kind of like they act as anchors, they kind of keep you stuck or even like push you to hesitate of like, do I really want to show up authentically because I don't know what the outcome is going to be? Right. And I think we also have to be mindful of like, you know, some people, like you said, some people maybe want to accept others, but because they don't have experience, right? They don't know how to do that. Right. Like, how do I communicate like this is a safe space if I just don't have such a different experience than that? So it's kind of a bi-directional thing.

SPEAKER_02 23:57

It is bi-directional, and it is also holding space for I think of two things, right? Intellectually, I uh I think um you can learn about different people.

SPEAKER_01 24:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 24:17

And that I I call that like academic study, right? You you do you do your own intellectual work and and at the same time recognizing that as a human being, you're definitely never gonna learn everything about every group, right? Like that's just impossible to do that. But then, surface level, you learn some things about a certain group of people, and then at the same time, when you are interacting with one individual, that is just that one individual, right? Keeping holding those two things separately, yeah, right. There is the black experience, and there is a person in front of me, yeah, yeah, right, and I think you have to do that for every group. There is that historical and contextual, everything that's happening right now, and then there is the individual. And then how do I make the individual feel welcome? How can I do that for individuals? I mean, one you start off by not making any assumptions, really.

SPEAKER_00 25:23

Yeah, don't paint people with the same brush, right? Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 25:27

Just you know, I mean, I've met many Somali folks who do not eat Somali food. I have had friends, you know, have made fun of them, which I should have done now that thinking about it, but you know, that's that's also growing. Yeah, all grow.

SPEAKER_00 25:45

I don't drink tea or eat anjera. I feel like uh my Somali car is gonna be re get out of here.

SPEAKER_02 25:51

How do you not drink tea?

SPEAKER_00 25:54

But I don't. I don't drink tea. Are you kidding? No, oh man, we're gonna have to this is me showing up authentically, Kodija. You gotta hold space for me. What the hell's going on here?

SPEAKER_02 26:09

I'm thinking, what happened in the family system? No one made you tea.

SPEAKER_00 26:17

No, actually, my mom was one of those people that didn't give tea to kids, right? So we just didn't grow up drinking tea because of the caffeine, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 26:28

I don't know, but I have a workaround with that. My kids love tea parties, like in the morning, we make tea, we sit around, we drink tea, we drink tea twice a day.

SPEAKER_00 26:42

Oh, mashallah.

SPEAKER_02 26:44

I uh I I mean also because I don't want them, you know, now that we are what do I say, Americanized and don't give caffeine to kids. Yeah, I do use rival tea, which is like the South African caffeine-free black tea. Okay, so I make tea with that. So these people are gonna grow up to be adults who drink tea.

SPEAKER_00 27:07

Okay, yeah, I think it was uh the caffeine thing because when my brother when she would give it to him, it would be a little bit of tea and a lot of milk, and it would just be like warm milk at that point. But yeah, I'm not a tea drinker, so ah, okay.

Self Awareness Questions To Take Home

SPEAKER_01 27:24

Well, that's all right, you don't have to drink tea exactly, right? Alrighty, thank you, everyone. I think how do we want to close this?

SPEAKER_00 27:38

Yeah, right. It's always kind of you know, going back to how do you bring that self-awareness into your like internal process, right? Asking yourself, when do I most feel like myself, right? When do I feel like I have to shrink or I have to, you know, code switch, right? Where do I feel safe and where do I not? Because that awareness needs to be there first so that you know, okay, this is a place where I could show up authentically. Or maybe I can't show up authentically, and then now that's not on me, that's on the environment, right? And so like that burden kind of gets gets released because we don't want you to kind of show up in risky environments and and then get harmed, right? Because that's that's also not beneficial to you know, connecting with others. So always be mindful of like, is this the right space for me to do that? And how how do I show up in a way that is comfortable with me?

SPEAKER_02 28:41

Yeah, yeah, because we're not doing like the crazy thing of just telling you just be yourself. We're not asking you to just be yourself, yeah, right?

SPEAKER_00 28:49

We are more complex than that.

SPEAKER_02 28:51

It is more complex than that, and we're asking you to just sit with these questions that were asked earlier, right? Where in your life do you feel like you belong and still get to be yourself? Just build your awareness, like Sam said, and thank you for being here with us.

SPEAKER_00 29:08

Yeah, thank you for listening.