{"id":25978,"date":"2014-11-20T08:00:53","date_gmt":"2014-11-20T16:00:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.goodtherapy.org\/blog\/?p=25978"},"modified":"2018-03-12T13:05:08","modified_gmt":"2018-03-12T20:05:08","slug":"why-hiding-who-we-are-hurts-us","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.goodtherapy.org\/blog\/why-hiding-who-we-are-hurts-us-1120145","title":{"rendered":"Why Hiding Who We Are Hurts Us"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"PersonIn my first meeting with Nora and Jeff, Nora told me (actually, she was yelling and crying): \u201cHe\u2019s so passive, he\u2019s driving me crazy. Jeff never lets me know what he\u2019s thinking. He doesn\u2019t make clear what he wants; when we disagree, he doesn\u2019t explain what he thinks or feels.\u201d As I got to know Nora and Jeff, I could imagine that most people would describe Jeff as a passive person\u2014not actively taking part, compliant, meek. But I have come to understand that, more accurately, Jeff is a person in hiding.<\/p>\n

While both Nora and Jeff contributed to the difficulties in their relationship<\/a>, I am going to focus on Jeff.<\/p>\n

Passivity as Protective Hiding<\/h2>\n

Several months into my work with the couple, this particular session was not the typical discussion of the vicious circle where Jeff\u2019s passivity evokes Nora\u2019s anger<\/a> which makes Jeff more passive and around they go. Instead, Jeff started the session. Looking frightened but sounding more filled with feelings than usual, he told Nora: \u201cI\u2019m tired of this fighting. I\u2019ve tried so hard to give you what you want, to be the good guy. All you do is criticize me and make me feel like the bad guy. You\u2019re always screaming, but now I do feel like the bad one. This isn\u2019t me. I\u2019m always the good guy. I can\u2019t stand that you don\u2019t see me that way anymore. I don\u2019t know what to do.\u201d<\/p>\n

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In my work with Jeff and Nora, I learned a lot about Jeff\u2019s need to hide and came to understand his passivity as his way of hiding himself to stay safe. Jeff projected a self to the world that was easygoing, undemanding, and kind. In our sessions, Jeff slowly revealed how this was not how he felt about himself: \u201cI can\u2019t say I like myself very much or think very highly of myself. I don\u2019t know. Maybe it has to do with having such critical parents. They were horrible. They always laughed about my appearance: look at his big ears; his voice is so squeaky; ooh, he\u2019s so hairy. They made me feel ashamed. They didn\u2019t like my friends, complained about how I ate, dressed, ugh, everything. I finally learned to tune them out. From the time I was, I guess, about 8 or 9, I stopped reacting. I suppose I do that with everyone now.\u201d<\/p>\n

Nora started to cry softly in response to Jeff: \u201cI had no idea; you never told me any of this. I\u2019m so sorry your parents were so mean to you.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jeff looked shocked by Nora\u2019s tears and words: \u201cI don\u2019t want you to feel sorry for me. I hate that! I can\u2019t stand it. Now you both are going to think there is something wrong with me. I never should have said anything.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jeff\u2019s \u201csaying something\u201d was the start of expressing his \u201ctrue self,\u201d which his false self had kept hidden and safe from harm. His false self had been engaging with a world that could be emotionally destructive and dangerous. Consequently, Jeff wasn\u2019t totally familiar with the Jeff who had been kept in hiding. He had done a good job of protecting his young self from intolerable feelings of shame<\/a>, hurt, and rage. Unfortunately, with the \u201ctrue self\u201d in hiding, there was little opportunity for Jeff to grow and develop through relationships in the real world.<\/p>\n

False-Self Interference with Good, \u2018True-Self\u2019 Feelings<\/h2>\n

The false self develops as an adaptation that protects the individual and makes it possible for the \u201ctrue self\u201d to go into hiding. Often, the development of the false self is unconscious, and the individual may not be aware that this defense is protecting him (or her) from intolerable feelings. Over time, awareness may develop that the \u201cme\u201d who is acting in the world is \u201cnot me.\u201d As these \u201cnot me\u201d feelings get stronger, the feelings of being loved, being successful, deserving of recognition, etc., cannot be felt as me, or as the \u201ctrue self.\u201d It is, after all, \u201cnot me\u201d who is loved, admired, or successful. This leaves no room for good self-feelings and frequently results in increased hiding to diminish the risks of being seen and known.<\/p>\n

As the individual becomes increasingly aware of the false self adaptation, he (or she) is also aware that he (or she) may not know what will appear when the \u201ctrue self\u201d begins to emerge. It feels risky to be vulnerable and speak one\u2019s feelings. How the person will be responded to is an unknown. The false self emerged early in development and was successful in protecting the person from intolerable feelings. Now that the false self no longer protects so well, it takes courage to begin to allow the true self to emerge. There are no assurances that the old shaming ways that required the adaptation to a false self won\u2019t be repeated. Jeff\u2019s relating of his early experiences with his parents, his shame, and his negative self-feelings were a brave expression of his \u201ctrue self.\u201d<\/p>\n

Interference with Intimacy<\/h2>\n

To be intimate<\/a> with another assumes a personal closeness, familiarity, and a knowing of the other. Jeff and Nora had difficulty being intimate because Jeff was in hiding and Nora had no sense of a real other self to relate to. In one session, Nora turned to Jeff and described her struggle: \u201cI think I love you, I want to love you, but sometimes I don\u2019t know who you are. I want this to work, but I rarely feel I know what you want.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sadly, no matter what loving or affectionate feelings Nora might have been able to feel for Jeff, he felt it was \u201cnot me\u201d who was being loved. As a false self, he had no way to experience that Nora\u2019s loving feelings had anything to do with what was true or real about him. As Jeff became more interested in shedding his false self and developing his \u201ctrue self,\u201d he was handicapped in his ability to be intimate since he didn\u2019t feel he was a person of substance with thoughts, feelings, needs, and desires with which he could relate to Nora. It takes a strong desire and a good deal of courage<\/a> to overcome the anxiety of risking a repeat of the shame and hurt as one begins to let oneself know what they are feeling and then allow the vulnerability to share oneself with significant others and then ultimately the world. Jeff is working on this with Nora and is making slow but steady progress.<\/p>\n

Interference with Self-Knowledge<\/h2>\n

Who am I? What do I want, think, need, believe? What do I like, hate, fear, love? These are only some of the basic questions we wrestle with as we grow and develop our identities. When we grow up in an environment that feels dangerous or destructive, we need to find a safe way to protect ourselves from mistreatment and intolerable feelings. But when we adapt to a false self, we frequently miss the opportunity to develop the answers to these questions.<\/p>\n

Who we know ourselves to be is based on the accumulation of our continuing experiences of the interactions between ourselves and others. This relational dialogue\u2014all these back-and-forth responses\u2014are the building blocks of self-knowledge. We develop the ability to self-reflect and think about self and other. We discover what we want and don\u2019t want. We learn how to get what we want and from whom. But we can\u2019t do this when we keep ourselves hidden from the world. The \u201ctrue self\u201d must participate in these interactions if we are to come to know who we are.<\/p>\n

The development of a sense of identity<\/a>\u2014this is who I am; this is what I know and feel about me\u2014helps us to locate ourselves in the world. The sense of self that we carry with us, including feelings of confidence<\/a> and self-esteem<\/a>, are constantly evolving as we engage in our relationships in the world. When we sequester our \u201ctrue self\u201d to keep it safe, it loses the opportunity to have \u201ctrue self\u201d experiences, which are the building blocks of identity. The false self may have kept Jeff safe from intolerable feelings, but it deprived him of becoming a person who could see himself and be seen as a person with a large number of positive and negative attributes (valuable, funny, smart, stubborn, courageous, mean, loving, etc.).<\/p>\n

Jeff and Nora have a lot of work to do individually and with each other if they are going to be able to develop a trusting, loving, intimate relationship. When our defenses no longer protect us, as when Jeff\u2019s false self no longer protected him from intolerable feelings of shame, badness, and anger, we become more motivated to make changes in the way we think about ourselves as individuals and in relationships. Jeff\u2019s growing awareness of how hiding himself was damaging not only to his relationship with Nora, but also to himself, became a driver of his openness to learning the ways in which hiding himself was having severe consequences in his life.<\/p>\n

Note:<\/strong>\u00a0To protect privacy, names in the preceding article have been changed and the dialogues described are a composite.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Shame, hurt, and other feelings may conspire to keep our “true selves” in hiding, where it seems safer but relationships\u2014with others and with ourselves\u2014suffer.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1777,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_crdt_document":"","_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[542],"tags":[31,434,25,41],"class_list":["post-25978","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-featured-articles","tag-psychotherapy-practice","tag-identity-issues","tag-psychotherapy-issues","tag-marriage-counseling-relationships"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goodtherapy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25978","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goodtherapy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goodtherapy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goodtherapy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1777"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goodtherapy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25978"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.goodtherapy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25978\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goodtherapy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25978"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goodtherapy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25978"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goodtherapy.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25978"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}