Authenticity
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The Human Being Is Not the Source of Meaning: Heidegger and Sartre
For Sartre, authenticity is bound up with self-creation. The authentic person accepts the burden of freedom and refuses bad faith. They do not pretend that their choices are dictated by some fixed essence or external authority. They own their freedom and act. But for Heidegger, authenticity is not primarily self-creation. It is a more truthful… Continue reading
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Consumerism, or Consumption, of Self
I still think about an encounter I once had with Rosie, a young woman who appeared at my door in the middle of the night. What stayed with me was not merely the strangeness of the situation, but the unmediated quality of it. There was no audience, no profile, no performance, no curated identity. There… Continue reading
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The Most Important Educational Technology: The Small Group
What if the most powerful educational technology available to us right now is not artificial intelligence, adaptive software, predictive analytics, or the next digital learning platform? What if the most powerful educational technology is still the human small group? Continue reading
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Desire: Curated Before Noticed
A person begins forgetting what it feels like to encounter reality without immediately filtering it through visibility, aspiration, anxiety, or comparison. Silence becomes difficult. Boredom becomes intolerable. Ordinary life begins to feel insufficient unless it can be translated into something shareable, admirable, or meaningful to others. Continue reading
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Fragmented Identity
Looking back, I realize continuity rarely survived through dramatic moments of self-discovery. More often, it persisted through ordinary practices repeated quietly across time. Continue reading
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The Immediate Life and the Formation of Authenticity
A child is suffering. A relationship fractures. A conversation suddenly turns tense. Fear, anger, exhaustion, embarrassment, or grief emerges before thought has time to organize itself. We speak quickly. We defend ourselves instinctively. We search for relief before we search for meaning. Continue reading
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Secular and Sacred Social Imaginaries
Most of us live between these two imaginaries. We have inherited a secular way of thinking, but we have not lost the sense that meaning might be given rather than made. Continue reading
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A Preview of “The Architecture of Authenticity”
What follows is a preview of the book I am writing. I will be spending much of the summer of 2026. Sooo… a request: I am dying to hear if you would like to read a book like this. Would you? Continue reading
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Value Beyond Money: 5 Places to Find It
The question is not whether we believe in value beyond money. It is whether we are willing to take it seriously. Continue reading
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A Changing Feminist Question
“How are you living with your partner that empowers the freedom of the woman in your relationship?” This was the question of the boomer age, and my boomer siblings had put this question to my parents. But now, I feel no need to address this question. What I have come to realize is that this… Continue reading
About me: I am a career educator and traveler at heart. My written work includes academic writing in philosophy and linguistics, English acquisition, and most intently in the areas of spiritual engagement with reality and what that means for our public lives.
My education is a mixture of formal study in philosophy, political theory, Biblical studies, and history, along with professional teaching certification in TESOL and in cognitive testing, and international teaching.
My travel experiences include a range of countries in Asia, Europe, Africa and North America. I have lived in Canada, the United States, Germany, Saudi Arabia, South Korea and Thailand. From those places I have traveled to many others besides.
I am a child of the 70’s and a “family man.” That means I have two wonderful kids who have been round the world with me.
Lastly, I am married to a wonderful woman since 2004. She is my partner, my friend, and my muse.
Thanks again for stopping by,
Raymond Klassen - Ideals and Identities 