According to Osho, be absolutely sincere within—know your real intent and never betray it—while acting outwardly with sensitivity to others and the rules of the game. Wear social masks when helpful but never become the mask: act without inner identification. Don’t use “truth” to wound; sometimes a kind lie serves love better. Life is complex: be a flexible, conscious player, authentic inside, compassionate and skillful outside.
Keep your real self clear inside, but be kind and play by the situation outside—don’t hurt with honesty, and use roles wisely without forgetting who you are.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
Beloved Osho, we can practice right behavior, and behavior according to duty, but then we will be wearing false faces, as we are inwardly, as you say, a madhouse. So should we act as we feel, or act as we ought?
The first thing to be understood: you have to be authentic to yourself -- sincere, honest. But that doesn't mean that you have to hurt others through your honesty and sincerity, that doesn't mean that you have to disturb others, that doesn't mean that you have to disturb the rules of the game. All relationships are just rules of the game, and many times you will have to act and wear masks, false faces. The only thing to remember is: don't become the mask. Use it if it is good, and keep the rules, but don't become the mask, don't get identified. Act it, don't get identified with it. This is a great problem, particularly in the West for the new generation. They have heard too much; they have already been seduced by this idea: be sincere and be honest. This is good, but you don't know how cunning and…
To be authentic does not mean that you have to be rude to people. To be authentic does not mean that you have to be ugly and nude in the marketplace. To be authentic simply means that you know what is acting and what is real... that you are not deceived by your acting, that's all. So don't be deceived by your acting. Do it deliberately -- don't do it unconsciously. Up to now you have been doing it unconsciously because you were thinking this is life. Now you know that this is not life. So live your life in your inner world and for the outside.... For example when you are talking to children, you talk in their language. It is not inauthentic. It is simply a consideration -- that they are children and they will not understand any other language.
Why are people so fake?
Shortly afterwards, he received from his devoted musicians a luxurious, velvet lined box containing two watches -- one a beautiful gold timepiece, the other a cheap one on which was inscribed: For rehearsals only. So keep that in mind. When you are moving in the world, moving with people, there is no need to carry your cross. There is no need to go on shouting loudly that you are a martyr or a Jesus or a Mansoor, there is no need. Follow the rules of the game. It is just a game. But remember always that the game should not become your whole life. That's all I would like my sannyasins to remember. That's why I don't take you out of society. Never has it been done before. For a single reason it has never been done before -- the reason was that Buddha would not allow his sannyasins to…
Regard most earnestly your own heart. For through your own heart comes the one light which can illuminate life and make it clear to your eyes.
That is the reason why Shankara calls the world illusion. The more you move away from yourself, the more you are moving into illusion; and the more you go inward, the more you are moving into reality. Your personality is the gateway toward illusion, toward an unreal dream world. Throw that gate, throw that bridge completely. At least in meditation. I am not saying for you to go and move in society and be authentic. You will be in difficulty. If you feel happy to do it you can do it, but I'm not saying that; don't put the blame on me. The society will create troubles for you. It doesn't want your real faces, it wants your unreal faces. And it is okay as far as the society is concerned. Use an unreal face when you go out, but when you go within, throw that face completely. Don't get…
Osho, how will authenticity be preserved in acting, which you always speak about? We false and dishonest people are already skilled at acting; and if saints, too, begin to act, won’t falsehood enter through that as well? Whether one is a doer or a non-doer, acting seems to have falsehood built into it. Kindly untangle this confusion.
You did not understand what I said. Acting means only this: the doer is the Divine; I am not the doer. That is the truth. How can falsehood enter into that? The doer is God. As long as we think “I am the doer,” we are the lie. The moment He is known as the doer, the lie is gone. So there is no opposition between acting and authenticity. Only acting can be authentic. And you have imposed your own meaning on acting—that inside is one thing and outside another. Acting simply means: the deed is not mine. If a flute were to think that the song flowing through it is coming from it, that would be false. And if the flute understands that the song coming through me is only coming through me; the one who sings is someone else; the lips are someone else’s; the voice is someone…