What’s Real Not Fake?

Vishal: We’ve been talking a lot about fakers and what’s fake. I’m now feeling unclear what’s real instead of fake. What is real?

Bill: What’s real is that we’re human beings. We’re biological, social, emotional, and rational beings who are striving to survive and to thrive. What it takes for us to survive and thrive isn’t up to us, any more than it’s up to a plant that it needs water, soil, and sunlight to survive and thrive. We have to understand the things it takes for us to thrive—what kinds of activities compose human flourishing—and dedicate ourselves to those activities. 

Vishal: What are those activities?

Bill: Any activities that use the virtues. They’re activities, for instance, that require us to be patient, or humble, or to manage hardship, or to exercise self-moderation. There are many activities like this: playing an instrument, playing sports, running a business, learning new things, writing—the list goes on. 

Vishal: Can you say more about how these activities can involve the virtues?

Bill: Suppose you decide you’re going to learn to play the violin. So you start taking lessons. It turns out you’re not very good. In fact, it turns out you’ll never be very good. Do you quit? A faker might. A faker doesn’t want to get better. A faker instead wants social status. Once the faker recognizes that he’s not going to gain status as a great violinist, the activity has nothing to offer him. So he quits.

But someone who’s being real isn’t concerned with social status. Someone who’s real is concerned with living well. Someone who’s real sees that learning how to play violin is worthwhile even if he’s never going to be good at it. He knows that if something is worth doing it’s worth doing badly.

Vishal: It sounds like the difference between someone who lip syncs something as opposed to someone who sings in their real voice.

Bill: That’s a nice analogy. 

Vishal: Do you have a concrete example of someone you’ve known who’s been real in learning something?

Bill: I remember when I was in college, there was a guy in one of my Latin classes who was in his mid-50s. He wasn’t going to class for a degree, he was going just because he wanted to learn Latin. He wasn't the best student. He struggled to master morphology. He was never going to be a star Latinist. It didn't matter to him. All that mattered was learning how to read Latin—or on a deeper level, all that mattered was growth. He wanted to extend himself and his abilities. Doing that meant humble, patient dedication to something he thought was worth doing even if it would never earn him social status. What it promised to earn him instead was a better life. 

Fakers think about gaining recognition or admiration or other indicators of social status. People who are real think about doing something worthwhile with their lives. They think, “Getting better at this activity is worth my time and effort. I’d rather invest my time and effort and be a mediocre chess player or a mediocre pianist, than be somebody who doesn’t play chess or piano. I’d rather work at writing, or singing, or math, or basketball, and be dedicated to growing in whatever ways I can grow than simply consuming other people’s output.”

Vishal: Can I ask you a personal question?

Bill: You can ask.

Vishal: Do you apply this to your life?

Bill: I try to find opportunities to push myself beyond my comfort zone to learn new things, sure.

Vishal: What’s an example?

Bill: A couple years ago, I thought I’d try a new martial art. My background was in Taekwondo—a hard, striking art—so I thought I’d try something really different: aikido. The experience was utterly humiliating. I thought, “I have no idea what the fuck I’m doing.” It took me a while to understand what I was doing wrong, and how to do better. But that kind of learning experience is good. It teaches the virtues of humility, patience, and hard work. A few months ago I had a similar itch to try something new. This time, instead of trying a new martial art, I decided to go off script and learn salsa dancing instead. Once again, the experience was utterly humiliating. But again, that kind of experience is healthy: it teaches humility, patience, and hard work. That's the kind of experience that enables you to grow. It builds and uses the virtues.

Vishal: I think it also teaches you empathy.

Bill: How so?

Vishal: When you practice new activities you practice humility, patience, and hard work yourself. So when you teach someone like me who doesn’t know as much about writing or thinking, you’re able to tap into some of the humility and patience you learned when you were in my shoes. You’re like, “Oh, I've been a beginner. I've been there.” So you end up having empathy for somebody who’s working hard at learning a new activity that's worthwhile. 

Bill: I get what you’re saying. Yes, I think that’s right. You’re able to be more patient with someone who’s struggling to learn new stuff because you’re keenly aware of what's involved in that struggle.

Vishal: Right. If I were to start teaching you Bhangra, the Punjabi dance, I would empathize with your situation: I’d know that you don't know the beat, or the basic moves, or the footwork. I’d know I’ve gotta teach you from the ground up, and can't expect you to just do it. That’s what I mean by “empathy.” Or like when you’re a parent, empathy or compassion for your child becomes apparent when you’re helping them learn simple things like addition and subtraction. You take those skills for granted in your adult life, but if you think of it, you’re like, “Holy shit, that actually took me years to learn. I forgot how much work it takes.” 

You were just saying that fakers value social status whereas people who are real, value competence and growth. What are some of the other values that distinguish fakers from people who are real?

Bill: Most of the behaviors that characterize fakers flow from that one desire for social status. 

Vishal: Is there a simple way of encapsulating the difference between faker behavior and the behavior of people who are being real?

Bill: Hmm. I’m not sure what I’m about to say will encapsulate every difference between the two, but one thing I’ve noticed is that fakers generally value things that are easy over things that are hard.

Vishal: What do you mean?

Bill: Fakers are fond of things like talking, imagining, speculating, naysaying, mocking, complaining, and criticizing. These things are much easier than the alternatives. For example, talking is easier than acting, or committing to action, or following through on that commitment. Acting, committing, and following through are much harder than simply moving your mouth. They require making changes in the real world.

Likewise, imagining and speculating are easy. Fakers can imagine and speculate all day. But evaluating claims for truth or falsity, solving real problems, understanding a domain—these are all much harder. 

So fakers will talk all day, imagine all day, bullshit all day. But they won't act, or commit, or follow through. Likewise, fakers won’t evaluate claims for truth or falsity, or won’t solve real problems. But they’ll complain a lot and criticize a lot. 

Vishal: I’m reminded again of sports pundits. 

Bill: Exactly right. They’re like the guy in the stands who’s constantly booing players and whining about his team. Easy for him to talk, complain, and criticize. He’s not the one out on the field.

Vishal: You said before I want to go back to: fakers imitate without understanding. 

Bill: Fakers do pretty much everything they do without understanding. 

Vishal: Can you say more? 

Bill: Understanding is hard work. Not only do you have to know something, you also have to know the reasons for it—the Why or the How that explains it. It’s one thing to know that the sky is blue; it’s another to know why it’s blue, or how the atmosphere scatters light of different wavelengths. Understanding requires real knowledge, but gaining real knowledge requires humility, patience, and hard work. Generally, fakers aren’t up for these things. They instead default to easy substitutes for real understanding. 

Vishal: Like what?

Bill: Naysaying and mockery are common ones. Naysaying something—rejecting it without understanding—is easy. You don’t have to know or understand anything to simply say, “No!” Similarly, there’s something about everyone that’s ridiculous, so mocking people is easy. But reflecting on your own shortcomings and other people’s talents—that’s hard. So fakers default to mockery instead of praise, and self-aggrandizement instead of humble self-acceptance. 

Vishal: So what I’m hearing is that fakers don’t want to do hard things like learning. They’re not up for the effort it takes. They just want to pretend they already have knowledge or skill. 

Bill: Correct: they want to look as though they have the knowledge or skills they never had the humility, patience, and work ethic to gain in reality. That’s why fakers are often poor learners. 

Learning requires humility. Humble people can admit there are things they don’t know or can’t do, or rules of conduct they can’t violate. They can acknowledge that there are standards of knowledge, or skill, or conduct independent of them, and they allow those standards to make demands on their time, effort, and attention. They make an earnest effort to meet those standards, and work harder to meet them if they initially fall short. Learning can’t happen without this kind of humility. It can’t happen without hard work and patience too, but it starts with humility. If you can’t admit that you don’t know something, you’re not going to take steps to learn it. The same is true if you admit you don’t know something, but reject the value of knowing it. Fakers often fail in both ways: they’ll both fail to admit they don’t know something and dismiss the value of the things they don’t know. 

As a result, fakers are often poor learners. It’s not that they lack the potential to learn. It’s that they don’t tap the well of potential they have. Fakers want to appear as if they’re supremely knowledgeable or competent. But maintaining that appearance is incompatible with admitting they don’t know or can’t do something. 

So fakers often avoid situations in which they’ll be required to learn new things. They're afraid of losing the status they cherish. They realize that entering a domain in which they’ll have to learn new things will likely bruise their ego. It’ll require them to occupy a lower rung on the social ladder: not an esteemed expert, but a novice.