Authenticity
In the viewpoint of metatheory, authenticity means that the internal experiencing and the external expression are congruent. Now, nobody knows their internal experiencing completely, nor can one express everything which is happening internally (otherwise there would be no difference between the external and the internal anymore). Therefore, all authenticity is selective. The self-expression just differentiates between revealing and concealing and is not determined by revealing. Equally, revealing is no better than concealing. Authenticity must be selectively and functionally expressed. If you hold back important things, then the difference between the part of the self-expression which you can control and the part which you cannot control, will become larger, and thus clearly perceivable inconsistencies are created for the environment. The main effect of inconsistencies is the reduction of willingness to trust. The more non-transparent someone seems, the more one has the impression of a ‘hidden agenda’, the more one has the feeling that something ‘completely different is at play’, the more burdened is the social and communicative situation. This, almost certainly, inhibits the effectiveness in roles (e.g. leadership, politics etc.) and stimulates mistrusting communication (becoming careful, withdrawing, accusations, critical questioning, investigating etc.). Therefore, particular importance is attached to a conscious handling of the necessity to select, particularly in situations in which authenticity is demanded, due to the need for trust.