Kindness: Authentic Living Exercises to Stop Abandoning Yourself and Start Showing Up Fully
Respect • Ownership • Connection • Kindness
By Lee Havenga | August 8, 2025
The best authentic living exercises begin with acknowledging your need to be genuine and identifying when you aren’t fully being yourself. That’s where the ROCK thru principle of Kindness to Self comes in.
At its core, self-Kindness means recognizing your needs and meeting them generously. One of the most vital is your need to live in alignment with your values and joys. Ignoring those is self-abandonment. Like when you stay quiet to avoid conflict or dismiss your instincts to gain approval. These subtle betrayals slowly add up, leaving you disconnected and resentful. Reclaiming your authenticity starts by spotting self-alienating habits—so you can stop them.
APPLY IT IN 15 MINUTES
Technique: Self-Alienation Tracking
Track your moments of self-alienation across four core areas of inauthenticity for one week using a free downloadable tracker worksheet. This will help you build awareness around the subtle ways you’re disconnecting from your true self throughout the day.
Download the 7-Day Self-Alienation Tracker here.
1. Identify your self-alienation habits
Keep your tracker nearby. Throughout your day, jot down any moment you notice one of the following:
Ask yourself,
- Did I ignore my real thoughts, emotions, or needs? (Self-Unawareness)
- Did I distort or deny what I truly felt or experienced? (Biased Processing)
- Did I act to please others or avoid discomfort instead of being true to myself? (Inauthentic Behavior)
- Did I hide or filter parts of myself to fit in or avoid judgment? (Relational Editing)
2. Spot the Patterns
At the end of 7 days, look back. Which form of self-alienation is most common? When does it tend to happen? In what situations or relationships?
3. Choose One to Improve
Now that you’ve recognized where you are alienating yourself, choose the most prevalent behavior and intentionally focus on it. As you improve in that area, you may notice others begin to shift naturally, too.
DEEPEN THE IMPACT
Set a recurring reminder on your phone every 1–2 hours to check in with yourself. This gentle prompt helps you build real-time awareness and catch subtle moments of inauthenticity as they happen—making your tracker more accurate and your growth more impactful.
MORE RESOURCES
Book: Radical Acceptance – Tara Brach
Video: The 17 Traits of Truly Authentic People – Power of Positivity
Article: Authentic Living: How to Be Real According to Psychology – Positive Psychology
Technique Science Source
Kernis, Michael H., and Brian M. Goldman. “A Multicomponent Conceptualization of Authenticity: Theory and Research.” Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, vol. 38, 2006, pp. 283–357.
Lenton, Alison P., et al. “Authenticity and Well-Being: Testing a Multidimensional Model.” European Journal of Personality, vol. 27, no. 4, 2013, pp. 337–353. SAGE Journals.
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