I hardly ever see movies in the theater, anymore. Part of the reason for that is because by the time I have an opportunity to think about going to the movies, whatever I wanted to see isn’t playing anymore. But in any event, I usually see movies later, on an airplane, or on TV. So I only recently got around to seeing the newest Toy Story movie—and discovered that one of its themes was surprisingly relevant to my work on authentic self and voice.
Among the many laugh and story lines in Toy Story 4 is a witty bit of comedy that makes fun of the exhortation for people to turn to their “inner voice” for life guidance. Not understanding what his buddy Woody (a toy cowboy sheriff) means by listening to his “inner voice,” Buzz Lightyear (a toy flying spaceman) takes the instruction literally. The only inner voice he knows are the pre-programmed phrases that play from his mechanical “voicebox” when the button on the front of his spacesuit is pressed. In desperate search of guidance, Buzz keeps punching the button, saying, “Thanks, Inner Voice!” when the suit responds with inane recorded phrases like, “The slingshot maneuver is all we got! Full speed ahead!” and “There is a secret mission in uncharted space! Let’s go!”
It’s funny because it lampoons a very real phenomenon: the oversimplification and overuse of the terms inner or authentic voice, especially in self-help circles. But even as I laughed, I felt a pang. Yes, “inner voice” and “authentic voice” have become overused cliché phrases. That’s why the movie joke is funny. But that overuse and “cliché” label may also make it harder to get people to think seriously about what a true “authentic” or inner voice means, what it takes to develop it, and why that struggle matters.
What makes something a cliché? According to the dictionary, a cliché is an idea that is overused to the point of being seen as boring or unoriginal. But I think it also has to do with how an idea is presented. Some 20-odd years ago, when I was studying screenwriting in Hollywood, one of my instructors devoted one whole seminar section to avoiding clichés. And I’ve never forgotten what he said. He explained that scenes or stories become cliché when you oversimplify or don’t adequately support what your characters are doing or saying with sufficient backstory, emotional growth, complexity, or depth. If an audience travels on a rich, emotional journey with a character, and the journey resonates as “authentic,” the resulting dialogue or action will feel authentic, organic, resonant, and satisfying, as well. If, on the other hand, you slap the same dialogue or action into a script without that deeper, supporting material and exposition, it will strike audiences as a shallow, eye-roll-inducing cliché.
I think the same is true with concepts like authentic or inner voice. Think, for a minute, about topics like death or theology. Nobody rolls their eyes and says, “Oh, THAT, again! That’s been so done!” when people bring up those terms, because most people recognize them as extraordinarily complex subjects. Few people throw those terms around lightly, or as easy fixes to anything. (Aspects of certain religions may be over-simplified and over-promised as solutions in the hopes of recruiting followers, and there are certainly people who crave versions of a religion that offer clear and easy answers and prescriptive formulas to follow, but the topic of religion itself is different.) Anyone engaging in a discussion of death or theology expects to have their mind challenged with serious, complex and deep questions—the kind of backstory and depth that keeps the discussion from becoming or sounding cliché.
People don’t have that same agreed-upon understanding when it comes to the concept of authentic or inner voice, however. Most of us know that there is such a thing, because we’ve experienced thoughts that feel as if they’re coming from our gut or heart. And that “voice” feels important, as well. Ditto for the idea of “being ourselves.” But as for what that really is or means, and what distinguishes false voices from authentic voice, not to mention what it takes to “find” or follow that voice—that’s another matter. Even the best-selling author Malcolm Gladwell, in his book Blink, essentially shrugged and concluded that we should listen to our “gut”—except when we shouldn’t. Not very helpful, in terms of deep understanding.
And because most of us agree that an inner voice exists and is an important and good thing to be able to access, but don’t have an innate sense of it as a deeply complex, layered and always-changing truth within ourselves that takes hard work to find and follow, it’s a subject that’s primed for oversimplification. Just like love, dieting, fitness, and other important and desirable goals. We want to believe that finding something good and important within ourselves is easy, and that it will be transformative. And there are always people willing to promise us that they can show us that easy, formulaic road to success.
There is, in fact, overwhelming market pressure to produce simple, easy solutions for people. “5 secrets…” “3 foolproof steps …” “7 essential habits….” Even if there’s not a set number of steps to an easy-follow-recipe, the idea is to make is sound relatively easy or painless to change one’s life. That’s what sells. Whether you’re advocating for fitness, weight loss, psychological health or career improvement, if you tell people that it’s a complex, challenging, and long process in order to effect real change, many of them will go buy someone else’s easier-sounding method.
The problem with all that, of course, is that real change—and the essential elements of human psychology and experience involved in any important life change—are never easy or simple. And yet, once the market is flooded with books about a subject that make it sound easy, the term itself begins to sound cliché. Overused. Boring. “Done.”
A mature “inner” or “authentic” voice, and the development of the mature, authentic self that gives rise to it, is, in fact, a very real and important element in a person’s psychological make-up. But to develop it—let alone maintain it over a lifetime of personal evolution and change—takes a lot of self-honesty, questioning, courage, exploration, and effort. It’s a journey and challenge that’s anything but simple or easy, no matter how much we might wish it otherwise. And each person’s journey, challenges, and burdens to overcome along the way are different. That’s what makes the subject so fascinating.
The subject, in other words, is still complex—and essential—even if it isn’t always portrayed as such. Just like love, marriage, passion, anger, happiness and other important aspects of the human experience. But what to do about the overuse and over-simplification that numbs people to hearing anything more?
I’m not sure, but I have a theory. I, for example, have never liked simple, prescriptive, self-help-solution books. I throw them against the walls of rooms when I’m forced to read them, because I know life isn’t that simple. I want to read books, and listen to speakers, who acknowledge that fact. And I suspect I’m not alone. I suspect that in part because almost every single woman I talked to in the course of researching a book on women’s authentic voice reacted with some version of raised eyebrows, wide eyes, and a comment like, ‘Oh, that is SO important!”… often followed by questions or comments about some of the complex difficulties and challenges involved. They knew it wasn’t simple.
So perhaps there are those who crave simpler answers (or mass market appeal), who think the subject of inner or authentic voice is now a cliché that has been “done.” Certainly there are a lot of simple-answer books for sale on the subject. But I think there are also those who don’t pay those books much attention, any more than they race to see a cliché movie about love or life, because what they crave is something more resonant with what they know to be true: that life isn’t simple, humans are astoundingly complex creatures, and change is really hard.
Movies and books that acknowledge and explore depth and complexity may not sell as well as simple, easy answers. But as my screenwriting teacher said, the cliché never lies in the subject itself. It’s in how deeply, or superficially, we approach it.
