This troper went on a very long journey, realizing who he truly is.

After several betrayals, he grew a beard, lost weight, became DarkerAndEdgier overall. Mistrust, anger, despise - those feelings became a major point of his personality, even so much as comparing himself to fictional characters like Rorschach. Well, one day, he received a text message from his aunt, saying she loved him. The following day, a woman smiled at him and thanked him just for helping her with her baby buggy. That {{Brain Bleach}}ed this troper, converting him into his former and true self. An upbeat altruist who thinks that saving one person is worth as much as saving the world.

I'm a subversion: I used to be incredibly unpopular and irritating. About four years ago, I realised that, actually, being a nerd isn't such a problem, started to accept it... and have now ended up ''exaggerating'' my nerdiness for social reasons. I'm actually slightly less nerdy than I pretend with a lot of my friends (still nerdy, just not quite so extreme)- I've just started using a different persona...

Being myself only earned me friends ''after'' High School. But then again, being in a country where only nerds manage to get into good Universities by extremely difficult tests... It surely helps a lot.

I gotta know, what country is that?

This troper has trouble truly being herself around anyone; she's nicer to strangers than to her friends (therefore her friends think of her as an uncaring jerkass tomboy with a sadistic streak and weird anime obession), she doesn't really confide in anyone for anything and doesn't really tell the truth in regards to herself most of the time. Upon reading the LonersAreFreaks Troper Tales page, she found that this could be attributed to Avoidant Personality Disorder. Which would explain why she has troubles being herself.

You. Are. Me. Wanna be friends?

Julia? Is that you?

This troper is a subversion in that she can't ''not'' be herself, because she's the world's worst liar and sees no point in trying to be something she's not, anyway. She has tried to imagine what it would be like to let people's insults affect her self-esteem, just for curiosity's sake, and come up blank every time. Overall, this has not earned her anything but seething hatred, compounded by the fact that she thinks the people who attack her for no reason are all idiots. Ironically, she's very nonconfrontational.

Tropers/RedWren is similar...except that the insults do sometimes get to her. She just has no idea how to be someone else. When people say she 'marches to the beat of her own drummer,' her reply is generally something along the lines of, 'Actually, I can't hear your drum...' or 'No, I'm/you're just listening to (an) iPod(s).'

I could've written that.

It's ironic how many of us there are, isn't it?

This troper's parents regret daily that they ever told him to "just be himself", since "being himself" involves being a cynical, selfish, vengeful, mercenary, and sarcastic ''bastard'', an incorrigible bookworm, an atheist, an anarchist, a techie, and a longhaired metalhead who butchers guitar solos on an electric violin. It also involves making tons of bad jokes involving obscure references, viciously mocking fundies who knock on his door, and engaging telemarketers of every gender in phone sex. He does, however, love his wife, and loves kittens.

This positive, altruistic, turn-the-other-cheek, loyalist, naive moron who also is a bookworm, though a Christian, socialistic, longhaired aestheticslover who couldn't play an instrument if he was threatened with death STILL thinks you're doing the right thing! THAT'S how much this troper believes in "being yourself"!

This troper is a lot like the troper above and agrees that you should be yourself. (Well, this troper is a negative Republican but still, similar every other way.)

Partially subverted with this troper. He occasionally, by accident, slips memes into his speech. His friends, instead of just getting used to it, want him to stop using memes. What makes this a bit hypocritical is that one of his friends plays this trope straight, telling him to be himself and not let what others think of him bug him...yet wants him to stop using memes!

This Troper is more then happy to be himself and thankfully has plenty of friends online and at home who share in various aspects of my hobbies and as a result I am more than comfortable with who I am. The only downside is that at my University I have no friends and no-one with anything in common with me up there, which means I have little choice but to stay in my room playing video games, reading comics, listening to rock/metal and coming on here. My Uni is full of narrow minded, conformist, arrogant and stuck up people and there is no variety in it at all. I have been ostracized as a result. But it has helped my appreciate my home much more and makes coming home much much sweeter. As I know that's where I belong.

Awwwwwwww! CrowningMomentOfHeartwarming!

This troper picked up one of Strider Hiryu's ''Marvel vs Capcom'' win quotes fairly early on in life. The quote in question? "Living a false life is equal to death!" I have lived that quote ever since, no matter the consequences. My watching TengenToppaGurrenLagann has only served to make me more hotblooded about it.

This troper has the minor problem of being seriously screwed up inside. I'm vegetarian, which means I have to explain why I'm vegetarian, and I like ethics, and I often fantasize about going around killing mentally disabled people, babies, and black people. Oh yeah, also this girl at my school who once shocked me into silence and tears from her sheer stupidity and inability to understand cultural relativism. So being not myself works far better. Those who know me are kinda scared.

I attempted to follow this, very stubbornly. Being both incredibly weird and very proud of it (I still am; Nerd Pride!) and a complete CloudCuckoolander (I lost some of that trait, to my relief actually - changes can be good sometimes) I therefore attracted so much hatred I became something of a witch out of self-defense. Which I like to think is ''not'', in fact, 'myself'. So yeah, that backfired. I'm still working on fixing that. Nonetheless if I got a second chance, I'd do the same thing if I couldn't TakeAThirdOption.

This troper did this after high school and managed in the process to take a level in badass as a result. Kids, remember, there's a lesson in this.

This troper believes firmly in this trope, but realizes how idealistic it can be and that it can actually be ''harmful''. Being yourself is a wonderful, excellent thing, but there's a dark side to it too. Sometimes being yourself winds up with your life being better. Sometimes being yourself means alienating everyone around you.

Politeness does wonders... even if you don't mean it. It's one of those "it's the thought that counts" kind of things.

"Nerd pride" is another example of this. Sometimes being proud of who you are is a fine thing, but then there's the people who insist that nerds deserve to be rich and rule the world's technology just because they got picked on in high school. This Troper is a self-proclaimed nerd and those kinds of people are just annoying!

I always try to be myself. The problem is, my personality ranges everywhere from Simon to Yugi. This is very important to me, almost as important as friends. I was really quite shocked to learn that not all of my friends follow this philosophy. Fortunately, the ones that do far outweigh the ones that don't.

This Troper has not known any other way of living. She is the ''only'' girl in her school who wears Tripp pants on a regular basis (some of the boys do, but not very many), goggles on her head, headphones in the halls (otherwise around her neck in conversation or in class), and uses a lot of {{Farscape}} curse-words on a regular basis. She also does stage combat for the heck of it, and has been since the seventh grade. This Troper is now a junior in high school, has a ''huge'' number of friends and acquaintances, and those in her {{Nakama}} know her to be a ''serious'' empath by nature. She's also grown up a total {{Gamer Chick}}. An old friend of hers that has known her since she was a toddler has said that she is a total {{Badass}} because of this trope. She ''still'' isn't sure about when she started taking levels, but the effect is there: her parents trust her to stay out of trouble (heck, they know her to be more of the type to get in someone's face and tell them to ''quit doing something stupid''), her friends know her to be reliable when the going gets tough, and more people know her name than she does theirs.

Oh man. If this troper wasn't already in a commited relationship with the love of his life, he'd have one thing to say: MARRY ME. PLEASE?

For ''years,'' this troper felt guilty for being reclusive and not socializing with his peers, prefering to curl up with a book rather than go hang out, and crying during movies, among other things, simply because those were things normal boys did not do. My siblings and friends tried to help, but I always just ended up feeling awkward when I tried to be "normal." When I was about thirteen, I read a book about spiritual gifts. (I'm a Christian, by the way.) Long story short, it said that these "abnormalities" were signs of my spiritual gifts. (Not like miraculous healing, but things like teaching, giving, compassion, etc.) The three categories I scored the highest in were those most likely to be loners and emotional. It was like a weight fell off my shoulders. All my life I had thought I had to conform to a particular mold, when all along, God had made me a special way so that being myself was the best way to serve him.

Please! What is the title of this book!

This troper finds that being himself outside of his home just causes people to call him out on his severe wangsting, then leave him alone when they realise it's never going to change him. When he arives at a new school, he will tend to avoid everyone, leading to people assuming he's a freak. He might occasionally try to act normally in this period, but it always fails, because he's severely out of touch with his own generation. But this never lasts more then a year or so, because he has a huge desire to be seen as special. So he acts very oddly, generally earning the repuation of being extremily weird.

This Troper finds this trope to be '''A Lot''' more useful when others are dog-kicking Jerkasses. When working at the local supermarket, being genuinely interested/helpful to the customers got me special attention in the forms of tips, friendships, weed and losing my virginity compared to the ditzes, assholes and dumbasses that were simply there for a paycheck and quickly got booted in response. Being naturally sympathetic and more into one-on-one conversations than crowds also was (for the most part) effective romantically as the Abused Girlfriend cried on my shoulder (though too oblivious to potential romance after being smacked by '''three''' boyfriends in a row) and more recently, (12-11-09) got/gave phone numbers at a party for a JerkWithAHeartofGold old friend (literally since Kindergarten) who had been playing around so much that the girls ''quickly'' realized that he was more Jerkass than Heart of Gold. Girl #1 who believed there was a relationship between them and only came to the party knowing him and nobody else (like me) and upon hearing then ''seeing'' the truth, became disgusted enough that after just talking to me, she (hopefully) will avoid him and emotionally recover (though I didn't get the chance for her number.) Girl #2 already knew he was a party boy, but '''really''' learned his depths when she took his advice to get more wasted than ever before and immediately felt embarrassed after doing the Drunk Girl Dance. I watched over/talked to her while she recovered and eventually got a hug and gaver her my number. Girl #3 (STACKED SouthernBelle) ''sorta'' knew what the friend was like and stayed in the crowd until party's end where like Girl #2 we mutually expressed wanted to get to know each other on better terms than after shots and Beer/Mountain Dew Pong and '''definitely''' exchanged numbers. All of this progress came from NOT pretending to be Party Boy Douche and it doesn't hurt to be lampshaded as the Token Black Guy either.

To this troper, being myself is socially awkward, bookish, quiet, snarky on occasion, and insulting to people that deserve it.

This troper had it instilled in him from a very young age to always be honest with people and not be afraid to well... BeYourself. Therefore I always voice my opinion about things I like/hate, and will defend my love/hatred of something no matter how much others may hate/love the subject in question (music, movies, TV shows, people, etc). Just as an example an ex-coworker of mine, after I made a joke about Nascar told me I have to respect what the drivers do, because it's not just "A bunch of Rednecks making a long lefthand turn." To which I replied "No I don't have to respect it because ''I don't care''. I was just making a joke." Fortunately it has never come to blows. I am instilling the same virtues in my son, also reminding him to make sure it never comes to blows if he's defending something he likes or hates.

This troper is becoming tired of this trope due to how cliche it has become. If television has to teach kids to be themselves, then society is in some deep shit.

This troper has to avert this, '''hard'''. People tend not to like you when you are horrifically blunt with little to no sense of decorum and a profound lack of empathy. Instead I just retreat from most social situations in order to avoid all the unnecessary faux pas.

This troper has always tried and usually succeeded in this trope; occasionally, she has failed due to trying too hard and/or due to the fact that herself has low self-esteem and was raised in a home town and by a family that had vastly different values than herself. It strikes her, however, that when it comes to rapists, serial killers, child abusers, people who are naturally evil (unfortunately, yes, they do exist), and so on, the rest of the world would probably appreciate it if they were not true to themselves. She's also really curious how adults reconcile telling children this trope, and then, punishing them due to how they act. Some kids are naturally rude, bouncy, willful, bored with school, don't see why they should clean their room, and so on. As a former kid and a current adult, this troper thinks parents, teachers, and other guardians of children should either be honest and say, 'Be who I want you to be, do what I want you to do, and don't do what I don't want you to or be punished,' or actually let the kids be who they are without turning around and saying, 'Yeah, I only meant it if your true self is someone I find acceptable.' Either way, this troper thinks children would grow up much more psychologically healthy if they didn't have to deal with that cognitive dissonance.

I have very much decided to be against me being myself, seeing as...

... my real self is even closer to the Moral Event Horizon

... not being myself earns more money

This is what this troper needed all his life, maybe. Since he was a kid, he had trouble socializing, he had to obey the group of not so good friends, he couldn't talk to others about his likes and dislikes, he couldn't talk to his parents or anyone out of fear of rejection, he is a typical nerd, good grades, likes videogames and other stuff but there was always something missing. At the end of last year and so far he thought he missed something, he realized he didn't want material stuff, he didn't want to learn anything out of someone else's desire or by pressure (his parents) or by typical teen rebelion, he wanted to do things, things that ''he really wanted to do'' but he doesn't know which those things are. He has been in his most important arc, in a fight to find himself, he thinks that finding himself and being himself will be like a magic solution that may solve most of his problems, it will give him a new way to see the world, it will give him a new chance to live like he should and pretty much, he thinks that it is exactly what he needs. After months of very slow development he thinks there's still a gigantic step to do... Talk with his parents, but not about that...

This troper knows that most of the time, being yourself is not a good idea. Should this troper be himself, he'll be a ChaoticNeutral NightmareFuelStationAttendant with {{Cloudcuckoolander}} tendencies that heighten the nightmare fuel. His mask is a more well-adjusted Cloudcuckoolander with an unhealthy obsession with tropes and is a ChivalrousPervert. Guess which personality society prefers? Now guess why this troper hates {{Anvilicious}} shows that screams at you to BeYourself?

This troper tried her damndest to fit in in elementary school and junior high, to no avail. On moving to a different high school (where she knew literally no one), she decided - quite consciously - that she didn't care anymore about trying to fit in. She credits most of her happiness in subsequent years (including extreme academic success, kickass friends, and the best girlfriend anyone could ever want) on this one decision. Maybe it doesn't work for everyone else, but for this troper, being herself was the best thing she ever did.

This troper has always been herself, and it never works! She's a sarcastic, antisocial loner who doesn't have friends because she doesn't want friends (and doesn't like people in general), but why is it that people won't leave her alone? It's like being herself doesn't work! They always try to be friends with her, as if they're immune to thinly veiled hostility and the fact that this troper avoids answering any and all question! Even though she acted nicer when she was younger, she only lost her friends because they preferred the more popular people. It's like her real self attracts people who feel sorry for the loner reading in a corner! Maybe if she acts nice and friendly, people will leave her alone again?

This Troper would rather be herself than what most girls are now.

Tried it. Bad idea. Sort of. You can either go the whole hog in being yourself and stay at the edge of the social circle or forget about it entirely and converge as close on the center as possible, because in-between the two there's a mile-wide zone of variable discomfort. The best place in that zone? The middle to the edges of the social circle. Happy with yourself, yet still vaguely in the swing of things. Friends you can abide by and vice-versa, no dealing with people you don't want to deal with. Enough support to deal with the abuse that flows from the center on out without being so distanced as to be easily pushed back or overwhelmed. Closer in the pressures get too much and you end up doing things you don't want to and without people who really get you or share your values. Here's to maintaining this equilibrium.

This troper has tried to fit in and be normal/popular, but at each turn has decided against it because it involves changing her personality - which, being a WideEyedIdealist (albeit with a sprinkle of cynicism and a tendency to overthink things), she won't do. Played straight, if more realistically than usual, in that she has very few friends but is admired for not caring what people think.

I am very shy and I hate talking to people, but when i was a kid I always tried to act normal cause I wanted to be popular. When I was in my last year of high school I gave up trying to be popular, acted like myself and actually found a friend who I did enjoy talking to.

This troppette has always had a great sense of self and always believed in being myself and gets really irritated when people do whatever they FEEL they have to do, to fit in and don't know who they are. Especially people who don't know who they are. They personally offend me. It's really beyond her the whole "Changing who you are to fit into a situation". She just doesn't get people's desire to erase what they are and themselves to fit in.

But I do get irritated when people "Be themselves" and just don't give a crap about anybody else in the room. That is negative being yourself and it doesn't help anybody. It's quite selfish, borderline sociopathic and just not right. I won't stand for it.

But as long as you think about people around you, be polite, don't crack stupid jokes and shut up when people tell you too and show you care. Be yourself, You can be yourself and still be socially accepted. They are not dissonant opposing polarising theories which have nothing to do with each other. Life is of cause all about balance!

This troper, spurred on by romantic notions of integrity, honour and the Valerie letter in V For Vendetta, was himself and suffered for it, culminating in a half-hearted attempt to walk into traffic when he was sixteen. Shaken out of his melancholy, he adopted the official position of "Fuck you, I'm fabulous".

This troper understands that he acts so differently in different situations -- quiet and obedient at work, laid-back but withdrawn at school, Deadpan Snarker and possible sexual deviant with his friends, and apparently catatonic around friends-of-friends who he doesn't know well -- that he just doesn't bother with trying to follow this trope at all. Instead he just wears each persona as it comes up and gets on with life.

This troper dislikes this trope, but not because it's cliche. It is, but sometimes that cliche piece of advice is necessary when someone is trying too hard (and failing) to be someone they're not, especially if its for the wrong reasons. No, he dislikes the trope because of all the people he's had to deal with who feel that it is basically carte blanche to be a complete asshole. He has been very infuriated by people who constantly spewed impolite, hurtful, even outright inappropriate comments (the latter being considered sexual harassment), and when called out on it said that -he- shouldn't be offended because "that's just how (they) are". Screw that! This troper believes that when you get to a certain age, especially if you're in the workforce, you should mature enough to know how to behave yourself around people. Or, as he's fond of saying, "You should know how to act like a human @#$% being." This troper believes that if he could make an effort to be respectful of his environment and the people in it at any given time, even if he doesn't like certain aspects or people in it all that much and -especially- if there are rules mandating that you should, anybody can at least try, at least when he's present. Is that really too much to ask?

This troper has never really understood how or why to be anyone besides herself. Which gave her the courage to laugh in the face of every bully she met, take pride in all her quirky hobbies and pursue her dreams, how unusual they ever may be. But more than not wanting to conform to others, she can't - whenever she tries it makes her so exhausted and confused she'll cry herself to sleep. It's like she was born atypical and now can't switch back to normal. All she's got left is finding the good things she has and being proud over them, no matter how tiring or difficult it may be.

Frequently, after This Troper expresses a desire to do something particularly nerdy/weird, her mother will say, #QUOTE#Mother: "That's not helping your reputation any!" #QUOTE#TT: "What reputation?" #QUOTE#Mother: "That you're weird!" #QUOTE#TT: "Yes, it is. I want to be weird."

This troper is always herself, because her husband loves her as she is, and so she figures that means she's doing something right.

This troper tries his best to Be Himself. It mostly works, except when the obsessive, clingy, selfish, whiny, attention-seeking, irresponsible side of him with major anger, anxiety, abandonment and rejection issues starts shining through. The moral is not to ''always'' Be Yourself if you're a minor (or indeed major) bitch in sheep's clothing.

This trope can be a double-edged sword. When I was in high school I had a friend who was more than happy to be herself...the problem was that she had zero social skills and often came across as a royal JerkAss, and then wondered why people didn't want to hang out with her. She definitely had a superiority complex and wasn't shy about advertising it, and I never could get it through her head that thinking someone else was an idiot didn't mean she should ''tell them''. We're nearing 30 and she ''still'' hasn't realized that "be yourself =/= having a complete lack of tact", or that you can be proud of yourself without being arrogant. Watching her screw her life up made me so paranoid that I wouldn't acknowledge my own nerdy side in public until I was about 23, when I finally convinced myself that being a nerd wasn't going to get me the kind of backlash she continues to bring on herself. I've been much happier ever since.

This troper realised earlier on that his real self was, frankly, a jerk, and decided to change himself. The jerk is still there, but normally I'm just a bit of a cloudcockoolander nerd.

After spending most of her childhood trying to be someone she's not to please people (mostly adults), this troper has finally given up and is herself. She is a lazy, affectionate, smart, ditzy computer addict, cartoon lover and food eater and she's proud of it! Oddly enough, ''more'' people actually seem to like her, not less!

This Troper is constantly asking "Who am I?" or "Who is this Troper?" or "I have no idea what 'myself' is."

Aversion. When this troper went to his new school in the DeepSouth, he tried "being himself"–it got him bullied for a year and sent him into a deep depression. Now that he's changed to be more like the people around him, he's a much happier person!

This troper used to be, from grades K-6. But then she moved on to highschool, her nakama-like class split up into different groups, and her old friends started acting like teenage girls (dun-dun-DUN). Cut to Junior year. She has friends for being a bookworm, an anime fan, an old woman, and a risk-taker. Rarely do any of these 'masks' crossover, and it's scary not knowing where she ends and a 'mask' begins.

This troper has been told to be himself quite often in his life. It didn't take - to the point where he started to believe that, well, he has no sense of self as there's no way someone would get pushed around so much if they had even an infinitesimal sense of self. It's either that, or he's conflicted between two representations of himself that may very well be the same person. Either way, it's all crazy up in here. Still, and I suppose, it's the thought that counts. The problem may also be that being myself means zero possible relationships of either the friend or more variety.

This troper looked at the world and people as a whole for a long time and realize that the biggest problem of society is the existence of 'sheep' and 'shepherd' people. These 2 groups compliment each other to form an authoritarian influence on others to conform to their ideals and practices or be isolated , with them at top of the hierarchy . This leads to a society that becomes too materialistic , obsessive with celebrities and jocks , apathetic and rigid.The only solution? BE YOURSELF AT ALL COST!

This 24-year-old troper is still on the way of finding out who she is. Until 10th grade, she was a weird, socially retarded bookworm with no friends at all who was only interested in literature and writing and had no clue about anything else, be it fashion, movies or the ability to hold a conversation. After going abroad for half a year and switching schools afterwards, she reinvented herself as a goth girl, though a fairly harmless, friendly one with good grades. In her new school, she was still mostly an outsider, but she found a group of great friends, most of whom she has kept in touch with till this very day. When she moved 600km away to university, she reinvented herself again, brushing up her social skills, becoming hugely popular, known as a heavy partier and drinker, still with an affinity for the goth scene (but not limited to it). However, nowadays, after graduation, she feels like she had suppressed aspects of her personality for the last years and occasionally, she just wants to stay home and read on Friday night. She is sad that most of her friends would give her a blank stare if she told them about her intellectual pursuits and the happiness that they bring her. She feels stuck, which is why she has now accepted a job offer in another country, so she can reinvent herself again. She realizes that this is probably not a healthy pattern.

It's kind of hard to be yourself when you don't know who yourself is.