The Empowering Yourself Podcast - More Power to You ! - Carlo Moschetta and Andre Rehse
How can we actually live an authentic and more fulfilling life? The Empowering Yourself Podcast series, aim at inspiring and discovering what authenticity and being true to oneself really mean in practical everyday life. Join us! More Power to You !
The Empowering Yourself Podcast - More Power to You ! - Carlo Moschetta and Andre Rehse
Unlocking Authentic Living – More Power To You – with Prof. Katherine Bruns, Andre Rehse, Carlo Moschetta
What does it mean to be authentic and would that be something of value to you? What if investing in your own self and in living a more authentic life was something that could empower you - and everything that you do? And how if you could start experimenting with it right away in your day-to-day activities?
Join us as we welcome the insightful Professor Katherine Bruns (FHM Psychology Dep. Hannover), affectionately known as Kay, who shares her journey from Jersey in the Channel Islands to her transformative experiences in Nepal.
Kay's background as a research psychologist provides a rich foundation for our dive into the realms of authenticity and of being oneself.
In this episode we explore how personal and societal influences can and do shape who we think we are and what we can do to check if we are being true to ourselves.
Through her expert lens, Kay introduces us to the two main psychological schools of thought on the true self, sparking a thoughtful discussion that encourages listeners to reflect on their own paths to personal fulfillment.
Inspired by Bronnie Ware's poignant book, "The Five Regrets of the Dying," we venture into the themes of authenticity and regret, examining how societal and familial pressures often lead to inauthentic living.
Kay's insights into cognitive dissonance illuminate the mental gymnastics we perform to justify staying in comfortable yet unfulfilling situations. This chapter underscores the vital importance of aligning our actions with our core values to avoid future regrets and achieve true fulfillment - inside yourself first!
As we wrap up our thought-provoking dialogue, we explore the balance between authenticity and social obligations, touching on the concept of well-being.
We also mention the idea of expressing authenticity in non-verbal mediums, such as music, and how recognizing internal signals we can feel on our bodies, can guide us toward a more genuine life.
This episode invites you to reconsider what it means to be truly authentic and offers food for thought for discovering that authenticity inside your own self and maintaining it throughout life's various stages.
Join us on this enlightening and spontaneous journey to start discovering the essence of living an authentic and fulfilling life!
Contacts: Prof. Katherine Bruns, Katherine.bruns@fh-mittelstand.de Fachhochschule des Mittelstands (FHM), Psychology Department, Hannover.
Send us a message and let us know your thoughts, we'd love to hear from you!
We will upload at least one new podcast episode per month. Should you wish to get in touch on Instagram: @carlo.coach.berlin.portugal
Thank you and see you soon!
Carlo & Andre
my name is Carlo, I'm in my life 4.0 and this is my podcast. It is about empowering people and authenticity, and I hope it will be entertaining too, because hopefully it will inspire you to be more yourself, so more power to you.
Andre:My name is André Rehse. I'm a filmmaker and science journalist. I got intrigued by Carla's idea and we joined forces to bring to you this humble podcast. Today we are talking with Professor Catherine Bruns, originally from Britain, a research psychologist on personal goals, motivation and well-being. She's a friend of ours and friends call her Kay.
Carlo :Welcome everybody to the second episode of this series of podcasts that I am so amazingly lucky to have and to experience. Today we have Kay. Welcome, Kay.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):Hi, thanks for having me. I'm very excited for this.
Carlo :I am super excited. Today, what we are trying to investigate the subject of authenticity, kay, tell us a little bit about yourself so that we can fit it right in with the subject of authenticity.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):Okay, so I've had quite an interesting, an interesting time in my life, I suppose. I I was born in jersey and I was brought up on this little island in jersey, in the channel islands, with my mom and dad and brother and sister, and I went to school and started music there and got interested in music and creativity in the arts, um, and I also got interested in psychology in A-level and then I decided to leave the island and go to university. So I went to Exeter in the south of England and studied psychology for three years, but before that I went and I did a year abroad and I went to Nepal to live in Nepal and to teach English which was really amazing. It was an amazing experience actually and I think that taught me so much about myself. Really, that was a real as a changing point in my life. I think about about how I saw things and what was important and what wasn't important, so it's been quite a so you're a professional psychologist yeah, I suppose so, but I'm not a practicing psychologist, so I I don't give therapy.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):I'm not a therapist. I'm a research psychologist. I do, research into education mainly, and, my PhD was about, personal goals and motivation, which I find really interesting, and which actually personal goals does link to authenticity quite a lot, because the goals we choose is what we end up doing and becoming and putting out, investing our time and effort into. So, depending on your goals, you can really structure your life, or your, or the way your life will go, depending on which goals you choose and and want to focus on.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):But one of the things that I came across was that people tend to say they are being more authentic when they have activities which are socially more accepted, like if they're working in a, in an area which is helping people. They tend to feel more fulfilled and whether that is because they're actually doing something that is their authentic self or it's plugged in and told you that that's your authentic self, they're still happier, their well-being is still higher. So, at the end of the day, the question is maybe whether, whether it, whether that's important where these, where these selves come from right. Who's to say that I would be happier if I lived in a different society which told me something else was important to be authentic? It's a funny concept, right, and actually I went a bit further looking, because in the psychological research there's two schools of thought basically about authenticity and the authentic self, and one is called the veridical account, and that means that, yes, there is a true self and that we believe that there's a true self.
Andre:We believe that there's a true self. Okay, let's explain this. Veridicality is a term from philosophy. If we believe in the veridical concept or account of perception, we believe that there is no difference between the real world and its representation in our brain. This is also called naive realism. A naive realist would say what I see is true. We won't discuss here the many concepts of truth and philosophy, because that would be another podcast. But going back to psychology, we could say if we are believing in the veridical account of authenticity, we believe in the existence of a true self.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):But then there's a non-veridical account which says true self is a fictional entity and we just want to believe ourselves that there is this true self, that that we can embody because, it makes us feel good about ourselves right okay so.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):so, but either way, you can still strive for it, because even if it doesn't, even if it's not, even if it's a fictional thing, we can still enjoy fictional things. So it's quite an interesting section, because the research differs depending on whether the researchers themselves believe that there is this true self, that everybody's got a core identity or a core self which makes them themselves in every situation, or if it's just a thing which we enjoy, believing about ourselves that we could reach that, or that that's a thing that we can do or have.
Andre:Is identity something which is formed in the youth and then it's made like a rock-like identity for the whole life? Or is it constantly changing because it's a construction that depends on the environment and the thoughts and beliefs we are living and the contacts we have in our environment?
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):Yeah, I mean there's lots of different theories. I mean Erickson is one of the main people with child development and he says that identity is one of these key stages like phases of life, like trying to find your own identity, or like trying to find your true self or your identity and how you fit into sociological norms and psychological norms. But whether that's fixed for life I don't know right. I don't know how much we've changed. I said at the beginning, when I introduced myself, that I went to Nepal when I was 17. I think that was a turning point for me and I think that really things I learned there are still relevant to me today and I think I live by the things that I found out then. But I'm sure I'm not the same person as I was then. I'm wiser, I've grown, I've gone through all of these experiences, I've become a mother. If you do have a true self, I mean it must change and develop with you as time goes on. So this idea of having a core that never changes is quite a static view, I think.
Carlo :Yes, let me reframe this. Okay, these are all very valid points. But to go back to the, to the point of authenticity, so all this is great, but, for example, in my experience, when I was doing my bachelor in london, um, I did it in finance. Um, I actually realized late I I loved that, but I realized that I actually had studied something, because my father loved finance and it was his love and he had a vision of myself to, you know, create some sort of a wealthy life or whatever his vision was, and somehow there was something within myself that wanted to please him. His vision was and somehow there was something within myself that wanted to please him. And you know, the usual relationship father and son are not always the easiest. And what happened to me is that at one point, once I've done my studies which I loved, and I mentioned this in the first episode I really loved the experience, but I realized that once I actually done it and I got the paper right, I got it, I'd done it.
Carlo :I realized that it was empty, there was none of myself in there, because I realized that actually I was more of an artist than I was more of a person, a people person. In fact. I ended up being a coach and a trainer and I love it to bits and I love to talk to people and I'm loving what we are doing right now, exchanging ideas, growing together. So when I realized that there was like the little voice inside, the more authentic voice of Carlo, that came out and says you're not really happy, are you? You've got to face that and it was very hard for me because can you imagine, with the environment of everybody saying, hey, yes, now you're going to do this, you're going to do that, and you're actually feeling like I'm going to disappoint everybody?
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):What I tell my students. I don't know if it's great advice, but if one of them comes and is unhappy on their degree which happens very rarely, but if one of them comes and is unhappy on their degree which happens very rarely um, or gets a bad grade, or isn't happy with the way they're going, I say to them great, now you know, now you know it's not what you want, right. Then you, you've, you've crossed one other thing off the list. So, great, find something else that you really enjoy, right. So it's kind of freeing in a way as well to be able to know okay, I've done that. It didn't work out, I tried it, I gave it my best, it's not for me. Okay, now I've got other things that I could do or try.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):And you must have been at a time in your life where it's possible to change past. Not everybody can do that, right. Not everybody can finance a different, a different way of, uh, doing a coach, outieling or coach training, or whatever you had to do to become a coach. It's not possible for everybody. So it might be then that they're stuck in this cycle, this hedonistic cycle of having to follow through on what they've done, and then I think it's very difficult for people who are stuck in a situation that they're not happy with, but obviously you were able to choose a more authentic path for you.
Carlo :Yes, I was saying that this is my life 4.0, in fact, yeah, we will. During the future episodes we'll explore more. But one thing it's a question, because outside in the world I see I feel that it's a lot, that it's a lot of people that I sense that they don't connect together, even in the work that I do as a coach, because they try to be someone that they are not because of the environment that they are in, that they are not because of the environment that they are in, and the environment maybe requires sort of pushes you gently or advises you to be a certain kind of person. And what I notice is that the best people that I meet and they do the best job, best work and also they're great to hang around and to learn with and share are people that are unapologetically themselves. They're just who they are, whatever you know tall, skinny, fat, big, you know, big voice or super gentle, whatever way they're just who they are and it's like a song, right, it's like composing a song, and it's not right or wrong, it's just that creation and they create themselves just by being themselves.
Carlo :And my question is this Do you think is there a way that we could look inside, look at ourselves and say am I really doing what I love? Am I being honest with myself? Because there is this woman from Australia. Her name is Broly Ware, I can't remember now exactly. She wrote a book called the Five Regrets of the Dying. Did you hear about that?
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):I've heard of this book.
Carlo :Yes.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):I haven't read it more money
Carlo :Yes, the number one regret of the dying is I wish would have been myself, that I wouldn't have followed anybody I more have actually done and said and been who I am. And then they died. You know, it was some of them successful, maybe very rich, some of them not. They were not all very successful, but they actually the biggest regret that they had, and it was too late, they couldn't change it anymore. It was too late and I learned that many of them were even young, not necessarily eight years old.
Carlo :They, um, they felt that their life haven't had been a little bit of a lie or, yeah, a little bit of fake. They haven't actually, they didn't come out and show the world. This is myself, um, doesn't mean you have to be boasting, but, and I'm just thinking, is there a way that, with your what do you think? Is there a way that people might be able to to, um, to understand if something is not so authentic within themselves?
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):I don't know, because the problem is is we're talking about people who have got opportunities to be able to follow what they want to, and not everybody does. Some people are really in rigid family situations where they have to basically do what their parents say. It's cultural as well. Some cultures it's a dishonor if you don't follow your parents' wishes or you don't provide for your family. There's quite a number of things and, if I think myself even even you're talking about being authentic and getting the right job for yourself and going in the right direction.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):But I mean I was thinking about a different job in when you were talking. I was thinking about different job interviews that I've done in my life and I even in a job interview, being authentic doesn't always work in that situation. There's a certain amount of impression management that you have to do. You can't just rock up in the clothes that you would wear every day. You have to be there looking smart, you have to answer the questions in the right way, you have to deliver in that moment to fit this mold or for the jobs I've gone for anyway, you have to fit the mold of what they're looking for and if you're clever enough or aware enough of what they're looking for. Then you can tailor your answers within your range of experiences to that right. So is that being authentic?
Carlo :No.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):Well, it is because it happened to me. These are the things that happened to me and I chose these particular things to talk about in the interview. I'm not lying.
Carlo :Sure.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):But there is a certain amount of impression management which we have to do in our daily lives to get on with people, to perform in specific situations, to get that job. So I didn't really answer your question, which was how do you know if you're in the right job?
Carlo :Not just the job, the job is just in general if you're living last time we were speaking if you're living in your own shoes, meaning if you're really respecting yourself, who you are.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):So I suppose it comes down to an overarching value system, and we find in psychology that if people are doing things which are very much against their value system, they get real problems and end up with something called cognitive dissonance, right, which is trying to explain their actions after it's happened. Why they did something, explain something away, right, oh, I did it because, right, that I had to do it in that situation. But, but there's this dissonance which means you're not happy with what's going on and to make yourself happy with it, you excuse it somehow. So how can I explain it? How can I get out of this situation? So we make excuses for ourselves, right, oh, but it can help the world, or we're going to need people to deal with the finance anyway, or you know, whatever reasons we find for doing it. We kind of explain away our behavior because it makes us feel better, right, because, yes, we can't. Dissonance is a difficult place to live we brainwash ourselves brainwashing is a little bit different.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):But yeah, yeah, we, we, we placate ourselves, we soothe ourselves and say it's okay, don't worry that you did that right. Because we have to, because otherwise we we can't tummy aches, we get stressed, we get headaches. You know, we don't.
Carlo :We're not in a nice place yes, because otherwise we cannot live with ourselves, because then we feel we're not so honest.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):And then back to authenticity and then so we have this cognitive dissonance. So what you do and you can solve it by stopping studying you can study something different, and then the cognitive dissonance will get go away, or you'll explain it away or you'll say oh, I didn't believe that. Anyway, that was a silly thing to believe in. Um, I don't. That's probably not the best example, but you said you studied finance, so I thought I'd bring no, no this is, this is, this is great, because, actually, um, it's uh, it's uh.
Carlo :In a way, it is bull's eyes, because sometimes, um, yes, we find ourselves, thank god, less and less uh for myself, but in the past, I would just justify a behavior or a situation that I knew was wrong, but I justified in my head so that I could, because it was comfortable enough for me to be in that situation anyway. So I would say yeah, but, but, but. And I didn't realize, though, that while I was doing that, that I wasn't actually respecting myself, because my intelligence myself, my experience, my own heart or soul, whatever you want to call it would say that's wrong, carlo, you shouldn't be in that environment, because that's not you. But I would just stay there. Why? Because the job was all right and I had the car and whatever else, right. But at one point, at one point, there was a day that I couldn't stand for that anymore. It was like an axe. It really was an axe.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):It was just chop and and this is like an aha moment and we do learn through aha moments. They happen very rarely in our lives when you can say that is the moment where I decided to do that. I know the moment I decided that I was going to be a vegetarian when I was 16. And I haven't wavered from it. There's very few moments in my life where I can say that's the moment I decided and that changed my life forever. And obviously for you, that was one of them, when you decided I can't do this anymore, I've got to leave, whatever it was that I'm doing.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):But so I think what I'm trying to say is that it's more about your value system and your interests and values on a higher level. And so this comes back again to what I was saying at the beginning about our personal goals, because there's a model of goals which is called the self-concordance model. Okay, and concordance, yeah. Concordance is is like when you're in in um, in flow with yourself, or you're agreeing with yourself. I suppose it's the opposite of dissonance concordance is when everything sounds lovely and it sounds like a beautiful chord.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):If you play it, everything's all perfect, and so self-concordance means I am concordant with my belief system and my value system and I'm doing what, for me, in that moment, is right. That we have optimal outcomes stem from being true to yourself and setting goals that represent the person's authentic interests and values, so we find that people are happier if their goals are in line with their values.
Carlo :Who they are.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):And they are more valuable to the person. The person will want to spend more time on them, they'll commit more time and energy to these goals and they'll be ultimately more fulfilling. So at the end, they won't have this moment where you had when you got your degree and you're like, yeah, you've got my degree, woohoo, I'll put it on the wall. What next? Right, because for you, obviously, that wasn't in the moment a self-concordant goal for you. That was that was prescribed to you by somebody else, right? So I would say that that would be a moment in your life that wasn't very self-concordant, right, we can have these achievement goals.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):Everybody likes to achieve something. So maybe at that moment you you just enjoyed having achieved something and finished. You finished your studies, and it's great and I managed something, but, but? But what it stood for wasn't concordant to your value system and your beliefs, right? So? And we get greater global well-being if our, if our goals and what we strive for and what we aim for are more concordant with our interests and values yes, yes, I actually to that point.
Carlo :Is that because I discovered myself that I wasn't being myself. So I discovered that I had actually done something and I had pursued something because it had been somehow inculcated in my head, because it was the right thing to do and somehow, and I went for it. But then I realized, with time, experiencing, learning more about myself. You know, life will grow, hopefully wiser, not just older. So I grew a little bit more wiser, not just older, and in the end I realized well, actually I've been studying a lot of things out there, outside outside of myself, there outside outside of myself, but I actually haven't spent not even 10% of that energy and passion and even using the same methods to look inside of myself, I haven't done it. I've done it to pass exams, I've done it to impress, maybe, girls. I wanted to date or whatever else, or to play drums, in my case, or to compose some music, or to do a concert, whatever else. It was out there to do my thesis and all the rest of it. But I hadn't done. I hadn't used that power that I had refined during the years to actually, instead of looking outside of myself, to look inside of myself.
Carlo :And that time was a time where I thought, damn, I actually never really truly asked myself am I happy about what I'm doing? Am I happy about my life? What do I really love? Do I really love this? Do I really love this thing or not? If not, what would I love? And the answer was I don't know. Damn, I don't know. And when I realized I didn't know, I realized, carlo, it's time to do some work, work outside, do your job, do your things, go to the interview, smile. Sometimes You've got to pay the rent. But I would never be a soldier, I would never do that kind of stuff. But a normal job, you do that.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):Not hurting anybody, just making a bit of money. What?
Andre:about authenticity. You do that, but it's not hurting anybody, just making a bit of money. What about um authenticity? What is? What is authenticity in psychology right now, and do you do you have a, do you have an explanation for the concept of authenticity, or I?
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):I can't give you a definition offhand, but I mean it's this idea of having a true self, right? I mean it goes back even to Rogers, who said that we have an inner compass guiding people to find growth and fulfillment right. So what is this inner compass that?
Carlo :he's talking about and this would be.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):For me, this would be coming back to our moral values and our morals and what we believe is important in life and how we want to live our lives right. Some people would see that as a spirit. People who are religious might see that as a spiritual guidance or in a way to be one with the earth, or one with God, or one with Buddha or whoever they look up to as their deity.
Andre:But if we say we are not authentic, what do we mean with this? We mean we are not satisfied with our life. Maybe Well.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):I suppose, if you're not being authentic with the way you're feeling, you'd be in a really difficult situation, right?
Carlo :You would feel not well right.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):You would feel unwell.
Andre:Yeah, but what does this feeling come from?
Carlo :Okay, Rogers, it's very interesting. Because, Rogers does say exactly what you said. I had a look the other day and also, because I do like another not everything that he says, but part of what he says is this psychologist called Jordan Peterson, which is very famous now. He wrote this book, 12 Rules for Life, that he sold like millions, tens of millions around the world.
Carlo :It was translated in many languages, but anyway to the point. So, basically, peterson takes the point from Rogers and in a short video that's on YouTube, he says to find out whether you are honest with yourself. It's very simple when you're saying something, how do you feel? When you are pronouncing whatever words you're saying, how do you feel? Do you feel weak or do you feel strong? How do you feel inside yourself? Because if you're feeling not so strong, then maybe you're not so honest. So just stop there on your tracks and see what you're going to say next. Because, in my experience because he says try this for a couple of weeks Every time you say something that is not quite sitting with your heart, it's not quite you don't feel that something that inside in your chest area, in your body, it's a physical sensation.
Carlo :Side in your chest area, in your body, it's a physical sensation you feel something that is not quite right. Then stop there, don't keep speaking and try to say something that you really mean. Now, for example, last time I was mentioning this thing that let's say that you know I'm invited to a party and everybody goes to the party. And I meant you know I'm invited to a party and everybody goes to the party and I meant, you know, everybody goes, and if I don't go, it's like strange. And so I say, yes, yeah, sure, I want to come, I love it, but inside of myself I feel like actually I want to be at home, I want to read a book. I really, you know, kay just wrote a book and I bought it. She's my friend and I can't wait to put the hands of her book.
Carlo :Maybe one day yeah you never know, and I really can't wait, you know. But I don't respect myself, I don't go true to my internal voice, even physically, I feel something is not right. Yet I go against myself and I go outside of my shoes and I go to the party and I'm not going to enjoy it because I could be in between a thousand people and feeling completely alone because it's not my place, at least at that time. But if I go back home, if I instead would have said thank you so much, john or Andre, thank you for the invitation, but actually I've got something else to do, oh, yes, but come Thank you so much Next time, and I go home and I've respected myself, I've actually been honest with myself. I wanted to say no, thank you in a sweetest way, but I wanted to say no, thank you. It's empowering. You feel empowered, you respect your whatever that is we want to call inside your own self. And if you try that this is what Roger says Peterson's made it a little bit more palatable, a little bit easier If you do it for a number of days, actually it is empowering. You feel you're sitting. You know, as I said joking last time, you are really fitting into your shoes, you are sitting into yourself and um, there is also.
Carlo :There was a time of my life I was really into gurus and studying and uh, that zen, zen, buddhism, and um, and also, uh, listening to lots of satsangs, these spiritual people talking. That was the reason, actually, I visited india. I wanted to go to temples and experience there. I spent a few months there and, and there was this guy there is still alive. I haven't followed him for a while now many years and his name is Adyashanti and he was also, in a spiritual way, saying exactly the same thing. He was saying when you're saying something, how do you feel? Do you feel very energized? Because if you feel energized, you're being honest with yourself.
Carlo :But if you feel weak, if afterwards, once you said it game over, you finished, you said it, but you feel weak with yourself inside, maybe you have to look inside and check whether you are fully honest with yourself. It doesn't mean that this is the solution, but this is something that I've actually tested on the road, experienced myself, and I felt that sometimes I said something that didn't quite fit with myself, but it was the right thing to say, and I felt bad afterwards because I felt, no, that wasn't right, and sometimes I could repair it. I could just say, you know, call back or meet back the other day and say you know what I didn't actually mean that what I really mean is, and then I felt so much better, like, oh, thank you God. It might have been the smallest thing, but to me meant a lot, because actually I realized now at 50 something that actually meant respecting myself. It meant, okay, I felt I made a mistake, I can repair it. Yes, I can. I did repair it and now I feel better and that was empowering, an empowering exercise.
Carlo :What do you feel about this, andre? I don't know.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):Okay. So I think you're a lot further ahead than lots of people who can be so self-reflected. I think that's very difficult to learn to be so self-reflected. I think that's very difficult to learn to be so self-reflected and to be able to check yourself in a situation and be able to identify what you're feeling in a specific situation and how you would feel in a different situation. I also think the idea of something right or wrong happening in a situation is quite a lot of pressure for people.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):I remember a very, very good friend of mine, lucy she's my best friend. She gave me the best advice one day and I said this to her recently and she said I don't remember saying that, but I remember so clearly her saying you know, there's not just right or wrong, there's one path or another and you decide which path to take in that moment and if you look back on it and think it wasn't the right one at the time, it was the right one because you made the decision and it might be that the path goes back. So if you're thinking about somebody going to a party, you said John's invited you to a party and you're not sure if you want to go, I suppose where is the pull the greatest? Are you going to lose him as a friend if you don't go? Would he be upset? Is that more important at that point in time than being authentic to yourself? Because sometimes being authentic to yourself can also be quite selfish. Right? And this is where this disjunct happens, right? Especially if we've got children. I don't know.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):I don't, but my brother hasn't all people who you feel responsible for or good friends. You know you said I'm gonna go to your party, I'm gonna be the light and life of the party. You don't feel like it, but sometimes we just have to do it, right? Is that being not authentic to yourself? I don't know. I suppose if you look at your value system and one of your values is being a good friend, then that fits within the value system, yes, but if you do it all the time, then if you do it sometimes you know if there's a good for example, you know, I might feel like, oh yes, I really want to do that.
Carlo :But actually, yes, I go to the party, and that is absolutely fine now and again. But you, of course, this friend that invited you must be a very meaningful person, otherwise you wouldn't take that choice. But if you do that, don't you think that doing that over and over again becomes a habit and it could be dangerous then?
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):Yeah, there's a difference between doing things because you've got fear of missing out, For example, FOMO. This is an interesting thing.
Carlo :Yes, I know this.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):Fear of missing out. You don't want to leave the party. You want to go just to see, in case people are talking about me when I was younger? Of course me too. I still do. You know, if I'm into something, I'll be the last person to leave. You know all right um which is not always a good place but you're a musician.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):There's something else there, so I maybe, but um, so what you're talking about? You were saying that you get a bad feeling and you feel a bit sick and you don't feel good in the situation, and so this is something called well being right and in psychology that we've got this concept about well-being and it's split into two parts. One is cognitive well-being and, like I said at the beginning about cognitive dissonance, that's the part of your that's, that's your brain telling you, that's the part of your thinking and and your processing of the situation and what you actually think about it. So you could ask a question like are you feeling well in yourself? Are you happy with the situation? Are you, are you satisfied with how life is at the moment? And these are, these are items which we use when we're collecting information about cognitive well-being.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):But the other part is an affective part. It's called affect, and affect is split into two things. It's negative affect and positive affect, and this is the feelings that we have in this moment. Right, and this is normally. We measure this by a series of adjectives, so it's something like, you know, be like um scared or afraid, or um activated or uh motivated, and you'd you'd say how much of these things am I feeling at this present moment in time. So the feeling that you're talking about is affect, right, which is this feeling of not being happy with the situation, having negative moods. Moods isn't exactly the right word.
Carlo :It's a stomach sensation, it's in the stomach.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):It's in the solar plexus.
Carlo :It's an emotional reaction that I wouldn't even be able to put into words. It's just like you know. It's just like you know something inside says you know. It's like you walk in and there's a road on the left and a road on the right and you don't know which one to take and you just take one. You take the one on the right and then you feel something like ah no, maybe it's to do with intuition, to feeling it. You go like, no, I might just go back. I might just go back, it's too dark, whatever else. So what I meant is that I started to notice these things when I was saying something that didn't sit well with me.
Carlo :it wouldn't leave me alone. In the past I would say something that it wouldn't sit right with me and it would be okay, but as I grew older it wouldn't leave me alone. I had to look inside why I was feeling that way.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):Well, I suppose you're feeling something called dis-ease, not disease.
Carlo :No dis-ease yes, Dis-ease right.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):It's not at ease.
Carlo :It's something that's not right about the situation. That's a good way to put it.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):But dis-ease is also an affective feeling, right, it's like a feeling that you get right, and it can manifest itself. Obviously, we know that our feelings can manifest in our physicality, like if you're angry, you'll go red in the face and you'll start sweating right and you'll have a rush of adrenaline. So we have these stress responses also, and something like disease will make you feel uneasy in yourself and in your body as well. So this feeling of well-being is quite complex and we're still trying to unravel what it is. You know how we can even measure it or talk about it. Right, we're still trying to find the vocabulary. But that in psychology at the moment, that that's, that's how we we measure well-being is through a cognitive aspect of how you can say how you feel and how you think about your life. And then we have the section about affect, which is negative affect, and positive affect, which is this emotional mood, momentary mood which we feel, which doesn't last very long.
Andre:We find it.
Carlo :You know, if you feel one thing affect affect. Okay, or feelings Moves, this is super important, I think, what you're just saying right now. Carry on, please.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):Whereas the cognitive side will stay a bit longer. Right, you would feel uneasy about being satisfaction with life, and well-being tends to be quite stable in a situation and you can change it. Surely you can change it. But our affective experiences are these mood swings we get and these moods which, like, build over the day, right, and then they kind of reset and then they build again and they reset right, and then there's moods which is separate, which come and go like waves. You know, If you've ever sat with an uncomfortable emotion, it doesn't take long for it to go away, you know.
Carlo :But going back to what you were saying before and relating the authenticity to the feeling that we have inside with confidence. So because when we feel confident about something, it's a feeling, it's not a mental, like, it's not just that, oh, I know how to pass the exam. Yeah, you might know how to pass exam, but it's a feeling you have, like I know it, you know it's with you, it's in your body, it's in your muscles, it's, especially if it's something physical. Or, yeah, play music. But imagine if you do a sport, you go for a run or you know Olympic Games or whatever else. So that self-confidence, you feel it, you sense it, it's with you. Now, the authenticity feeling, if there is an authenticity with that, this is a question I don't know. Self-confidence and authenticity, how would these two things sort of mix, combine, because there is something that pulls them both.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):So this is interesting because I suppose I've just thought about a quote which my friend, a fellow psychologist, said, and she said don't believe everything you think.
Carlo :It's a good one. It's a very good one.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):Right, because our thoughts are just another part of information in this moment, and this is where emotions play a role as well. So, I said, emotions come and go. It's just one possible scenario that that emotion is the right or a legitimate reaction at that time. It doesn't mean it has to dictate what you do after that. Just because you're uncomfortable in the situation doesn't mean you have to run away. Just because you're scared doesn't mean you have to not do well, it's just another piece of information and our thoughts are the same. We don't have to believe everything we think, and it's difficult if you're a person who has negative thoughts or negative feelings about yourself. It's quite hard to find that confidence to say, no, I know who I am, I know what I want to be, I know and have that self-confidence to say no, that's who I am. But I suppose it goes back again to this overarching level of our value system. Right? Because if you have a value system that's in place that you know is important, you can base everything back on that, can't you?
Andre:You can take the steps back and think okay, well, if I think this, then how does that work for my value, which is that I don't know that family is really important, or that I'm a really good friend, or I'm a good professional, or I'm somebody that you can count on right that's exactly what I was thinking about when I was thinking about authenticity, which it could reveal the, the concepts, the cultural concepts where somebody was raised in, uh, it's, it's an unconscious concept and uh, maybe in this, maybe in the case of I, I was really thinking about Patterson. Jordan Patterson, oh, joseph Peterson, yeah, he's against feminism, he's against wokeness and everything, so he's criticized a lot.
Carlo :Oh a lot. He's very controversial. And then I was thinking about.
Andre:He's true about what he says about authenticity, but then I was thinking about that authenticity is something that, if you is something you feel satisfied, you feel right. That's the emotional part. We were talking a lot about that. But if you feel like in concordance, self-concordance or satisfaction with yourself, um, then then maybe, maybe it's it's just that you feel right with, with your cultural concepts and in that case these are definitely not my concepts and and that but but it reveals so authenticity could, could, really could could be is not not necessarily a very good thing. It's just a sign that you feel right, and not more. Maybe you can feel right with being a feminist, or you can feel right with being a person who likes chauvinism or nationalism or whatever.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):Yeah, and this actually comes back to something that I said right at the beginning, that in in psychological literature there's two types, there's these two models of of authenticity that the veridial account and the non-veridical account. And the non-veridical account is is that true self is a fictional entity. And actually that's a bit more comforting when, when you think about it, that if we think that this entity, this fictional entity of our true self, has come from our culture, from our upbringing, from our parents, from our value system, which is dictated or which is given to us from somewhere, we don't, just we're not born with a value system, right? And if you were born in another country, in another family, in another situation, in another religion, you'd have a different value system. So this constructivist account is actually, in a way it's quite comforting because it means that it's not set in stone what your true self is, and it's also changeable and manageable, right yeah, I mean very interesting points.
Carlo :I um, a while back in london I met this musician. Uh, he was scottish and uh, he was a bit of a crazy guy and he was living on the street. He was busking on the streets somewhere in Scotland and I was talking with him for a few hours and he told me this thing which, to this day and I'm talking about this is like 20 years ago or more. He said you know the most impressive things that I've seen, playing on the street and just living on the street. And I said what is it? And he said children. And I said what do you mean children? He said yeah, because when two mothers would pass with this little thing that, just a bunch of months old, they know nothing, they don't speak, they're just beings, but they don't know anything.
Carlo :And you can see that I could see many times, over and over and over again, that when these two little children would look at each other for a second and would want to meet, to stop, to touch each other, one of them would start crying and the mother would have to come back and make them meet and make them smile and make them touch their hands.
Carlo :And he said also, if one of them would be crying, another little kid would feel bad and would start crying too, because he would want to find out what's wrong with the other kid. Now, these kids that they don't have a value system as such, because nobody, they haven't been to school, but they have something inside, like whatever that is. They have something that says there's something wrong in that other little thing there and I want to try and fix it, or I don't know what, but he was so touched and he passed me this experience and to your point, so that, yes, the value system, yes, but I feel that there is something which runs way deeper than the value system. Value system happens afterwards. Maybe we can wrap it up into this what do you feel, kay, on this one?
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):That's a huge question.
Carlo :It means we'll meet again for more talks.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):Yeah, the thing you have to be careful with is is prescribing things that you don't know, that people think or feel like. You have no idea what those children were actually thinking. We can just look from the outside, you know. What we do know, though, is children explorers, they're experimenters, and that's how they find out about their world. So asking their mother to go back, or crying or kicking off and making their mother go back just to check out this other child might just be what's going on here, right?
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):they might not have this. Oh my god, this child is crying. There must be something wrong, so we've got to be so. You know, I'm a scientist, so I have to bring it back to to what we can actually observe and what we can measure, and and and. For your busker friend, I'm sure it was a pivotal moment, and for you as well, because you remember it from 20 years ago it's a really interesting concept, but we can't say that because we we don't know what the children were thinking or feeling, right that?
Carlo :is true, but I, I, what I'm saying is, could that is anything, um, connect to that feeling that we are saying before of feeling, of feeling, um, uh, I am true to myself, yes, I want to do what I feel, even if I with the risk of being selfish. I'm not going to go to the party because I feel that I want to really go home and read that book and I, but but not because I'm thinking, I just feel right. For me, it just feels right. So, that feeling right, that thing inside, could that possibly and I don't know, it's a question could I possibly connect to this primordial thing that is already in a, in a little child of uh, having this sensation of wanting to check out another little kid that may be not feeling so well, because this guy, this busker, which unfortunately I don't remember the name now, it's such a long time ago he saw this again and again and again for years and that's why he was impressed.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):So I might put it down to this social connectivity, that the children are looking for some social connection with another person who is the same age and they recognize that this other being is around the same age as them and they want to connect socially with that person. But I'm not sure, I'm really not sure. But um, this idea of of um, a primordial, um, yeah, a primordial sense of self, you know, soul.
Carlo :You know how do you call it, this thing that you feel inside, yeah, so we've got to be careful, because we can be quite hedonistic, can't we?
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):Humors, I mean, if you leave them to it sex, drugs and rock and roll. Man, I mean, who doesn't want to feel great all the time? And this is a hedonistic view of well-being, right.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):But this would be a variation that would be like an adulteration right, yeah, an adulteration yeah, but this is different to the telek version of well-being, which I subscribe to, which is goal-setting, and how you're reaching your next goal will increase your well-being, rather than just being on a hedonistic treadmill, which means the more we have, the more we want, the more we get the more sex we want the more drugs. The more drink, the more things we buy right.
Carlo :Sure sure, we don't want that.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):So when we're talking about primordiality and what our your depends, what Well, six cents, what well-being means?
Carlo :to you? True, but how have you ever has itbeing means to you? True, but how have you ever it actually have happened to you that you said something and you felt like, oh uh, it doesn't say, or the other way around. You really feel, um, empowered about something that you said.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):They're not not because of your brain, it's a sensation, it's a yeah, normally it's something that you're passionate about, or or it really aligns with your values, with the place you're in at the moment, with what you can say, with how you feel about yourself, I think it all comes together. I think it's really quite a complex system.
Carlo :Yes, human beings, we are quite complex.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):Yeah, very. It's difficult to wrap up because I don't know it's searching, isn't it? We're all searching for our authentic selves. Some, I don't know it's searching, isn't it? We're all sort of searching for our authentic selves. Some people don't know who they are and and how they are and how they should be, and you know this. We all go through awkward stages in our lives when we're not 100 sure if we're in the right place at the right time, with the right people, or being authentic to ourselves, and that's something which which is to do with growing and learning, and children go through it in adolescence, and you know, I think people go through it in various stages of their lives, right? So I suppose the question is how to navigate these different authentic selves, or what we are, how to be authentic in different stages of our lives what we are, how to be authentic in different stages of our lives.
Andre:Well, we could say sometimes you won't be authentic because you are in a job interview, but in the job interview they ask you to be authentic and everybody is saying you have to be authentic to get that job. Yes, sure, but you say, as a psychologist, that's.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):That's a tricky question well, it is tricky because it's about impression management, right, and I mean, what are you gonna say? You're gonna say I need this job because I need the money. I don't care about it, I just need to do my nine to five and get as paid as much money as I possibly can, because that is the real reason for lots of people who go to work but you could, could get.
Carlo :But you, yes, that's true, but you could. You could grab that job and do whatever and say yeah, you love it to. You know you really love you, dream about that job. And then you, on the side, you said you work your backside off to get the job that you really want. So there was a very interesting conversation and definitely we cannot exhaust this subject. It's a massive subject, it cannot be exhausted in just an hour or whatever we've been talking to. I mean it could be part two, part three. It's a lifetime conversation, right, and it changes the more we grow, the more deep we become, the more we can see. So, kay, thank you so much for enlightening us with your research work. We really appreciate it and we welcome you in our studios and maybe in the future you'll come again, of course. Thank you so much. Any other things you want to leave us with?
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):Oh well, just thank you very much for having me. You you've made me think a lot about different things, and actually different things that I would like to study now especially. I'm interested now in um, in looking at authenticity in musicality and whether people think that they can show their authentic selves through a different medium.
Kay (Prof. Katherine Bruns):Because we were saying how difficult it is to express yourselves in words. I mean, we were struggling with words today. Yes, how to actually like find that core of what authenticity is. And if anybody out there would like to do any research with me, then contact, keep in touch. Okay, I'd love to hear from you.
Carlo :Yes, that's fantastic and it's wonderful. It that's fantastic and it's wonderful. It's wonderful, I mean, for me, guys, it's been wonderful, terrific, to have a chat with you both, and, of course, my mind is now thinking, pondering, and this is the nature of this podcast, it's actually to make us ponder. Now, I don't expect to listen to this podcast and you'll crack the nut and you'll understand about everything, about life or authenticity, no, but you might think, start thinking in a different view. You must start analyzing something else, so you might even see a different point of view and look at your life from a different point of view, which might opened up a completely new adventure for you. So, thank you, listeners out there. I hope this podcast was enjoyable and we'll see you next time for another episode. Ciao, ciao.
Andre:That's it for now. We hope you enjoyed it and if so, please share it with friends, give us comments and subscribe. Expect at least one podcast per month. See you soon.
