Ever feel you need to act in a certain way around your boss, or say certain things to your colleagues, so that you'll be accepted? Instead of being yourself, are you constantly playing a role to fit in, or to impress others?

Instead of being genuine, we tell people what we think they want to hear, and act in ways that go against our true nature. In short, we feel like we’re wearing a mask.

Living and working this way is tiring, dispiriting, and confining. It can also hold us back from reaching our true potential. When we give ourselves permission to be ourselves and be authentic, we can live free from others' ideas and expectations.

Use these 10 Tips to develop your authenticity:

1. What is authenticity?

There are many different definitions of authenticity. However, a common definition is that being authentic is living your life according to your own values and goals – rather than those of other people.

Authenticity simply means being true to your own personality, values, and spirit, regardless of the pressure that you're under to act otherwise. You're honest with yourself and with others, and you take responsibility for your mistakes. Your values, ideals, and actions align.

As a result, you come across as genuine, and you're willing to accept the consequences of being true to what you consider to be right.

2. Why be authentic?

It isn't always easy to live authentically. At times, being true to what you know is right means that you go against the crowd. It may mean being unconventional, opening yourself up for the possibility of others hurting you, and taking the longer route.

On one hand, it does mean missing some opportunities – you do have to accept this. However, in the longer term, it's likely to open up many more opportunities – things that simply wouldn't be available to someone who has been seen to be shifty, conflicted, indecisive, or inauthentic.

Living an authentic life is also vastly more rewarding than hiding your true self. When you live authentically, you don't have to worry about what you said (or didn't say), how you acted, or whether you did the right thing. Living authentically means you can trust yourself and your motivations.

3. Benefits of being authentic

There are several other benefits of being authentic:

• Trust & respect: When you're true to yourself, you not only trust the judgments and decisions that you make, but others trust you as well. They'll respect you for standing by your values and beliefs.
• Integrity: When you're authentic, you also have integrity. You don't hesitate to do the right thing, so you never have to second-guess yourself. Who you are, what you do, and what you believe in – all of these align perfectly.
• Ability to deal with problems: When you're honest with yourself and others, you have the strength and openness to deal with problems quickly, instead of procrastinating, or ignoring them altogether.
• Realising potential: When you trust yourself and do what you know is right, you can realise your full potential. Instead of letting others dictate what's best for you, you take control of your life.
• Confidence & self-esteem: You can trust yourself to make the right decisions when you're being genuine and doing the right thing. In turn, this leads to higher self-confidence and self-esteem; greater optimism; and more life satisfaction.
• Less stress: How would you feel if, every day, you said what you meant, stayed true to yourself, and behaved in accordance with this? Imagine the happiness, and self-respect you'd feel! Being authentic to yourself is far less stressful than being someone you are not.

4.  Live by your values

Living authentically means that you live according to the values and beliefs that you hold most dear –

and that the personal goals that you pursue emerge from these.

Your first step is to identify your core values, and then to commit to living and working according to them. You then need to set personal goals and career goals that align with these.

Sometimes you might have to make an ethically challenging decision; this is when knowing your core values will help you do the right thing.

5. Identify the gap

Is there a gap between who you are now, and the person you know you could be?

For example,

• Do you put on a mask when you're at work? Perhaps you're more abrasive with your team than you'd like to be, because you think that's how a leader gets things done.
• Maybe you adopt a flippant attitude, because you don't want others to think that you're boring, because you take a serious attitude towards your job.
• Or, maybe you're brimming with ideas that you never share, because you're afraid that your team will shoot them down, and this leaves you feeling stifled and unhappy.

Try to identify these gaps by creating a list of words that describe the qualities of the person you know YOU can be, and by thinking about how closely these reflect how you actually ARE.

Choose just one personal quality from this list that you want to start working on – perhaps you want to be more "open." Set a personal goal and commit to work on developing this quality every day.

It's far more realistic to set small goals and work on one trait at a time, than it is to try to transform your entire life, all at once.