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Step 7 of 7~8 min read
Reflection: Your Bad Faith
Locate the forms of bad faith operating in your own life.
Prompts to consider
- Sartre describes two directions of bad faith: collapsing into your facticity ('I can't help it, that's just who I am') and inflating your transcendence ('I'm not really tied to any of this'). Which direction do you more often go, and can you give a concrete example from your own life?
- Sartre says the Look, being caught in another's gaze, generates shame by making you suddenly an object rather than a subject. Think of a moment when someone's perception of you felt like it reduced you to less than you are. What did that experience reveal about the relationship between your self-image and how others see you?
- Sartre says sincerity is bad faith, even honest self-description treats a free choice as a fixed property. What would it actually mean to introduce yourself to someone with full Sartrean honesty about your freedom? What would you have to stop saying about yourself?
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