Don't Be Like Others. Be Like You.

I don’t know if it’s just me, but my X feed is showing me people that are far too similar. I know that’s how the alghorhythms work: if you like something, it serves you more of the same stuff.

But I’m pretty much done with this vanilla stream of nothingness on X.

99% of my feed consists of people that look the same, feel the same, sound the same, post the same. It’s just bland.

It’s uninteresting.

So that made me wonder: why is that?

Part of it has to do with template posts.

Common advice for new people on the platform is this: Look at some great accounts. See how they structure their posts and copy that. Plot your own posts onto those templates.

But the result is that everything looks, feels and sounds the same and it’s really boring.

Just look at the amount of posts in which people state their age first. Or looking to connect with other accounts under xxxx followers.

None of it feels truly authentic. Nobody really talks like that, do they?

That begs the question:

What is authenticity?

The Oxford dictionary is really useless if you want to know what authenticity is: “The quality of being authentic”.

What does that even mean? What does it really mean to exhibit authentic behavior?

One thing I like to do, is look at what a word means in Latin. This is often a better way to figure things out. Here’s what I found:

mid-14c., autentik, “authoritative, duly authorized” (a sense now obsolete), from Old French autentique “authentic; canonical” (13c., Modern French authentique) and directly from Medieval Latin authenticus, from Greek authentikos “original, genuine, principal,” from authentes “one acting on one’s own authority,” from autos “self” (see auto-) + hentes “doer, being” (from PIE root *sene- (2) “to accomplish, achieve”). The sense of “real, entitled to acceptance as factual” is recorded from mid-14c.

Freely interpreted, that means that you are authentic as long as you act in ways that are true to values, believes and principles instead of those imposed upon us by others. By society for example.

So simply said: do you show expected behavior or are you acting like yourself?

That means that you can only be authentic if you know yourself.

That seems like a really difficult thing to grasp but it might be more simple than you think.

You Can Only Be Authentic If You Know Who You Are

The easiest way to know who you are, is to look at your reaction to things. I’ve always struggled to “know who I am”. At least, I find it extremely difficult to describe “who I am” properly. That has to do with the fact that we are immensely complex beings. It’s really difficult to capture a persons personality in one sentence.

But its easier if you look at reactions you have.

When in conversation for example, you have your opinion. You don’t always express it, but you do have it. You do know it when you don’t agree with something that’s said. You know it very well.

Now if you don’t express your own opinion, you’re likely not authentic.

The contra intuitive thing is that you are likely more interesting when you do express your opinions, even if they’re different to others.

Especially when they’re different to others.

Expressing Your Own Opinions Makes You Stand Out

Seth Godin said something about it in a great way.

How to be remarkable

Be remarkable. Behave in such a way that it’s likely for others to make a remark about your behavior.

That’s really easy nowadays. Some people do it in a way that doens’t align with my values but it is very effective: they polarize. A lot. Some of the larger accounts are extremely polarizing. And it works. Social media is notorious for it.

But personally, I don’t like it. Nothing is “either or” in real life. There’s nuance to everything.

Granted, it’s far more difficult to write a compelling piece in a non-polarizing way. But it is possible. You can do so by expressing your opinions instead of parroting the popular thing on X right now.

What do you think about a particular topic? That’s what’s interesting to others. That’s what makes people make remarks about your stuff.

To do it in a non-polarizing way, you can add context. Emphasize the nuance in your work. In A Counter Intuitive Way to Have Unlimited Content Ideas we’ve discussed a way to broaden your perspective, use that.