Welcome and Introduction

Welcome to the Radical Authenticity website. Quite simply, the site is intended to be a source of support for anyone wishing to live more authentically . . . live more aligned with who they really are in the world. For the vast majority of us, very often this is far more easier said than lived out.   

The support is offered through various means: information about the practice and dynamics of authenticity, data on what often results from being authentic, available personal support via in-person or phone sessions, and related workshops or ongoing groups offered.

The site is an outgrowth of my doctoral dissertation, The Practice and Dynamics of Authenticity (completed 2004, Institute of Transpersonal Psychology, Palo Alto, CA). As such, the site is also a way to make more generally available the rich material resulting from the research. It is hoped that not only individuals but also organizations will benefit.

First, a note about the phrase radical authenticity as I very consciously employ it. The word 'authenticity' comes from two Greek words, "autos," meaning self, and "entea," meaning tool or instrument. The word 'radical' comes from the Latin word "radix," meaning root that goes to the source or center of something’s life (Webster’s New Twentieth Century Dictionary Unabridged, 1979.). Consequently, used together, the phrase connotes that a person is the very best tool or instrument one can be in the world to the extent that one’s actions and very mode of being flow from one’s center, or Source of being. In this context, I tend to write source with a capital "S", i.e., Source.

Additionally, for me there is another key implication in the phrase: Assuming that we all come from the one same Source—and that this is a benevolent and congruent Source—it follows that to the extent that one is radically authentic, i.e., whose actions flow from the very Source of who one is, then the result of those actions serve not only the individual but also all those impacted by those actions . . . at least in the long term, if not the short. [For one perspective on what "long term" can mean in terms of radical authenticity, see The Long Now Foundation.]