Can being “fully authentic” do damage to your relationship?

 Privileging authenticity and honesty is not a license to do, be or say whatever you want in your relationship. Good boundaries can help.

When we think of authenticity, we associate it with being our true selves: open, vulnerable, real and honest with each other.  Brene Brown defines authenticity as “a collection of choices that we have to make every day. It’s about the choice to show up and be real. The choice to be honest. The choice to let our true selves be seen.”

And ideally, you should feel like you can be authentic without fear of judgement in an intimate, loving relationship.  Being accepted for who you are is essential to feeling secure.  Yet this isn’t easy to find.  Many of us have been in relationships where we have had to become smaller, diminished versions of ourselves in order to keep the peace. It also takes tremendous effort to reclaim and recapture the lost or devalued parts of ourselves that had no space in those constricting relationships to exist.

The challenge is that there is an inherent tension between trying to “fully” be ourselves while navigating intimate relationships, which require some degree of compromise, forgiveness, and the ability to regulate our emotions. There’s no getting around this fact if we want to be in any kind of long term relationship.  

Social media and the self help world are rife with exhortations to live as fully and authentically as possible, to never compromise, to speak your truth --because to do any less would mean abandoning yourself.  But that isn’t necessarily true.  Relationships are far more subtle and nuanced than that.  (However, if you’re in an abusive or controlling relationship, that's an entirely different situation, where the conflict is based on a toxic power differential.)

So where does honesty figure into the equation? Honesty is essential in fostering secure, intimate relationships.  Honesty infers that you and your partner are truthful and transparent in your communication and both value integrity in the relationship. 

Yet it’s easy to run into trouble if your primary definition of honesty means an entitlement to express yourself (honestly) and your truth or your subjective experience without any filters or any consideration for how you might affect your partner negatively. If you’ve ever been on the receiving end of someone being “brutally honest,” you know how that feels. 

Honesty can be destructive without boundaries.  Initially, we tend to think of boundaries as a shield from others. But when we have no personal filters or boundaries, we can do harm to others by unleashing our emotional reactivity like anger, insecurity, fear or anxiety onto our partners.Boundaries exist as much to protect others from our worst instincts and impulses as they do to keep the world and others at bay. 

Whether you think you’re being honest or authentic, it doesn't mean carte blanche to dump on your partner simply because they should love and accept you unconditionally, no matter how justified you feel. Without boundaries, relationships aren't safe and intimacy isn’t possible.  Sometimes that means walking a delicate line between advocating for honesty and authenticity and also taking into consideration the receptivity of your partner.

As a couples therapist and relationship expert, I see the question as more of a tension, an evolving conversation between valuing yourself and your experience, and at the same time understanding that you are in a fluid dance with another person who may struggle with the same questions but in a different way. That tension may never fully resolve as no relationship can substitute for the validation that we need from the outside world.

A first step is becoming mindful of this tension and  how you communicate and language your experience and your needs. Bringing curiosity and compassion to your partner’s imperfections and limitations as well as your own can soften the righteous anger that often attends explosive bursts of  “honest” criticism.  

It’s counterintuitive to think that boundaries enable the closeness that make vulnerability, honesty and authenticity possible.  Ultimately, the give and take is in the service of relating to others as consciously as possible. 

There will absolutely be moments when you feel that you are not heard or valued. Your partner will fail to empathize with you at times despite your attempts at being authentic and vulnerable, as you will fail them. It is the risk we take every time we are vulnerable. But in healthy relationships, we can trust that our partners will be responsive to us most of the time. If that’s not the case, then it may be time to consider couples therapy or some other way to improve your connection and communication with each other. 

But keeping your finger on the pulse of this essential tension, and staying in conversation with it, will serve as a constant barometer of the health of your relationship. Good boundaries create the optimal conditions for authenticity, honesty and intimacy to thrive in.