Welcome to the Black Girl Burnout podcast. Kelly here. And today we are going to be talking about masks. We're going to be talking about how to opt out of masks.

So I want to ask the question, what mask are you wearing?

Maybe you're not wearing one at all.

In which case, congratulations.

Please educate us some more on how we can be more authentic.

But I think a lot of people are more likely to have some part of their life that they keep hidden, that they pretend to be one thing but in fact may feel another.

This doesn't necessarily have to be a huge lie or some level of fakeness.

What I mean is oftentimes we talk a lot about authenticity.

You know this is something I'm hugely passionate about.

But the truth is, and I say this, even from myself and from my perspective,

authenticity is hard. And while we may think that we keep it real, I will speak for myself

and say that there are ways that I'm still discovering and have discovered in the past,

that the gap between, that the space between who I truly am and who I want to be is sometimes

further apart than I think.

And why does that happen?

Why do we opt into wearing masks when we should be opting out of it?

Well, because the world has taught us that from behind a mask, we are safe.

We have an unfortunate cultural legacy of authenticity being punished,

authenticity being feared by other people, and that making us a victim potentially.

We have a cultural legacy where authenticity wasn't even in the top 10 of things that were

important, that surviving was important. And when you are in survival mode, you will do whatever it takes to live.

And so sometimes that means us presenting a version of ourselves to the world that isn't authentic.

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