Masking personality is a part of learned psychological behavior. It is basically a mask put on by individuals due to social pressure, harassment or abuse. There are various examples of masking personality done by an individual which include various types of behavior, various temperaments under various situations and the list goes on and on.
Nowadays this psychological condition has evolved such that one person tends to hide their real emotion and precast a fake emotion. They generally do this to substitute emotions like anger, sadness or frustration with a smile.
Certain studies prove that people who mask personalities are not at all aware of doing so and go on to continue the habit by others’ influence. Wearing a mask is someway related to consciousness and energy. It takes energy to wear a mask and in the near future, it may lead to the reduction of your energy.
Table of Contents
What exactly is masking personality?
Masking a personality generally means covering up one’s personality, behavior, and mannerism from the society which may be judged as wrong by the individual. This generally occurs due to a lack of confidence, self-esteem and not being sure about themself. They are afraid about how society will judge them if they behave in a manner that is different from others. Be it in the conscious or subconscious mind everyone does this now and then but the problem comes when this habit grows on with the growing age.
Everyone tries to impress others. This leads to masking personality. For example, an employee might mask his original personality to impress his/her boss or a guy masks his original personality to impress his crush. In this way, they typically tend to lose their real personality and start faking things way too much. Adjusting behaviors are related to masking personality to impress society. “What others think about us” has been a major problem now and this sort of again leads to masking.
Causes
There can be several factors that can lead to the masking of personality. As I said before individuals following the path of impressing everyone leads to this habit. This can be regarded as the main cause of masking personality. Other causes of such personality development are as follows.
1. Cultures
Cultures play a major in masking personalities. The variation in cultures often leads to suppression or expression of one’s emotions.
2. Society
The society that you are surrounded by leads to such masking. What will others say, what will others say, how will others react are the various questions that lead to the development of this personality.
3. Various situations
People reacting to situations are quite common. Some try to show their real feelings and emotions while others tend to suppress their real personality and mask it with a fake personality.
4. Male vs Female
One of the major problems of society has been that a girl must act nice. This social pressure makes them suppress their real emotions and personality and makes them mask themselves. As a result, typically masking personality is found more in females than in males.
Symptoms
There are multiple symptoms of masking personality. You can yourself judge by knowing the symptoms whether you have it or not. The symptoms are as follows.
- Changes in accent, voice and vocabulary under certain situations
- Trying to copy the looks and style of others especially a celeb and try to dress yourselves like them
- Sudden change of taste and interest
- Rapid change of political views, be it influential or not
- Rapid change of religious views especially to impress someone
- Using different names ( depends on who is being spoken to )
How does masking feel?
Well, the obvious answer to this question is not at all good. When you are masking your personality you tend to develop this habit of doing it always. You may have certain mood swings or anger developing in you if things don’t go as you wish. Masking personalities take a lot of effort and time and if this doesn’t bring you results you start to feel broken and sad. This may even turn embarrassing for you when your near ones know about your habit and start mocking about it.
How to cope up with masking?
The mentality of people should change. Everyone has the right to express their real feelings and emotions. “How someone else would judge” and reacting to it by masking your real personality to impress the other person should never be followed by you. Your close ones love the real you and not the masked you. Instead, be focused on your real behavior and habits.
Well, if you are the real one and someone you know is masking will definitely affect you as well. If someone else is masking and that does not affect you be it mentally or physically, leave it as it is. But when situations get too extreme ( be it mentally or physically ) for you, you should always look for safety.
DONT’s
- Do not call the police or try to pull off the mask of the person. This might lead to further seriousness.
- Do not waste your energy on finding out the real personality of the person. It’s a waste of time for you.
- Always try to be polite and calm in front of a masker and just try to ignore it and move on to the next room.
DO’s
- Talk to a Personality Disorder specialist and explain the situation. They will properly handle the situation.
- Try to deal with the person by judging his everything. The fake masking and the real him/her and try calculating the sum of both. This will give you a clear result of his personality.
- Ignore them and focus on your behavior. Try to build healthy relationships with others.
The various masks we use to hide from various situations
The mask of being perfect
Although one’s life being a mess, he tries to mask his personality of having a perfect life and being a perfect human being. He tries too much in doing which sometimes gets out of control.
The mask of a funny guy
One tends to crack jokes and the other laughs at them. The mask of a funny guy is worn by the person who cracks the joke. They love the limelight and especially when the response is positive.
The mask of an intellectual person
This mask is generally worn to show others that they are so smart and intelligent. If overdone, the person who is masking gets extremely exhausted.
The mask of a loser
This is a masked personality that is now very common. They give out statuses and always try to claim that they are the core losers even when they try so hard. They think that this behavior leads to gaining attention. But unfortunately, nobody loves a loser.
The mask of a superhero
Who doesn’t like a superhero? Especially, when you are helping people financially or mentally. Helping others with asking for help is good but when people mask this personality into themselves and this becomes a habit they get to face a huge loss in their real life.
The mask of a rude person
“I am who I am, I am not bound to answer anyone”. “If you like me, stay with me or don’t”. This is the mask that some people love to wear as they feel it’s a protective shield against intense criticism and intimacy.
The mask of a dumb person
Another personality mask that is worn by a lot of people nowadays. The person is accused of several false accusations but plays dumb so that no one expects anything from him.
“Be what you are! Real personalities are appreciated by real people, Masked personalities attract fake people”
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