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Authenticity
The Problem With Authority
What rules your life?
Posted July 5, 2023 Reviewed by Tyler Woods
Key points
- We tend to think of authority as only an external demand.
- Some of us are so complicit with authority that we can hardly breathe.
- Others of us spend our short time on earth rebelling against authority.
- But what if internal authority is the only real authority?
Most of us think of authority as something similar to a necessary evil. We sigh and do what it says even if we don’t like it. Taxes, stop signs, and red lights are all examples of the kinds of authority we feel that we have to obey. But, of course, we have those individuals who have such a “problem with authority” that they don’t comply with these or other of authority’s rules. And then we have those individuals who are such rule-followers that they are fearful of ever slipping over any of the lines. Between those two extremes, we find the real problem with authority.
Most of us have been trained to believe that external authority has the way, the right way. Those authorities know what is true and know what is best and though we grumble and huff about it, we just must obey. Our parents were the first of these external authorities, and without knowing it, most of us project that model onto other external authorities. This means that those with roles such as teacher and religious leader in our early upbringing will seem to have a similar way of demonstrating their authority as our parents did. We thought that, whether or not they actually did do it like our parents did it.
So, if our parents had very big, scary personas, who demonstrated their power through threats, verbal, emotional, or physical abuse, we seem to expect some kind of similar treatment from other authorities. In this case, we might be surprised and feel unworthy of their fair treatment if these other authorities didn’t behave as our parents did. Or, our surprise might lead us to feel safe and nurtured by these other authorities. If our parents tended to the laissez-faire approach, we might expect the same of other, different authorities and might be surprised as a consequence.
The biggest problem with all of this is that it assumes that the only real authorities are those outside of us. It does not allow room for the fact—central to our mental health—that we are the final authority over our lives. Whether we handle that authority well or not, nevertheless, we are the final authority. The truth is that the more we believe only in external authority, the less we are making effective choices based on our own internal authority.
If you find that your answer to many of the questions of life is: “Well—fill in the blank—says…” then you might have a hard time getting in touch with your own internal authority. If you find that your answer is something like: “Expletive them! I don’t care what they want!” then you may have overidentified with the rebel role so that you are no more in control of your own choices than someone who is led around by the nose by rules.
It is only when we begin to look inward for more authentic answers to the questions of life and daily living that we begin to access an internal authority. Of course, this doesn’t mean that we can now ignore external authority. But it does mean that our lives are not oppressed by the noise and power of external authority. Nor does it mean that we are spending our short time here on earth trying to get around the rules. Both ends of that polarity—between being oppressed by or rebelling against authority—are ruled by external authority with little to no reference to one's internal authority.
Internal authority tells us how to choose, and choice is the final arbitrator. Believing that we actually have a choice is huge in its power to determine both our quality of life and our mental health. I can choose who I hang out with. I can choose what I say, what I do, and how I live. I can choose to leave an unhealthy relationship. I can choose to go to therapy and/or take medications as needed. I can choose to self-reflect and get in touch with difficult emotions. And, of course, I can choose to neglect and betray myself by not choosing any of these things.
Are there limits to my capacity to choose? Certainly, and we can learn to choose within those limits, rather than spending all of our time and energy trying to get beyond them. For example, I often see addiction as a way of trying, not only to self-medicate, but to fly above the vicissitudes of life, not knowing that we will ultimately crash and burn—because the limits are real.
Are there consequences to our choices? Yes, and rewards as well. Sometimes there is neither consequence nor reward—there is just the fact of the choice. But when there are consequences or rewards, they may be telling us how to create a pathway that works for us. We can receive that as guidance to choose further. Or we may choose to ignore it.
Either way, it’s our choice.
