For most of my life, “fake it till you make it” sounded like terrible advice.
It felt dishonest. Performative. Like pretending to be something I wasn’t yet.
And as a Five, the idea of summoning energy or emotion I didn’t genuinely feel always triggered resistance.
If it’s not real, don’t do it. If I don’t feel it, don’t express it.
Recently, I decided to test that belief.
The experiment I didn’t expect to love
Last month, I started running a small experiment with my wife.
Any time I see her, I run up with as much energy as I can muster, give her a big hug, and hold her for at least a full minute.
Especially when she’s feeling down or overwhelmed.
Normally, when someone is in strong emotions, my instinct is to give space. That’s what I would want. Space feels respectful. Safe. Non-intrusive.
But instead of defaulting to that, I tried something different.
I held her firmly. Not tensely, but intentionally. I focused on creating a steady container that communicated, “You’re safe. You can feel whatever you need to feel. I’m here.”
At first, there was a loud internal protest.
"This feels inauthentic."
"You’re summoning energy you don’t actually have."
"You’re expressing emotions you don’t really feel yet."
But, I did it anyway. Not because I was convinced it was right, but because I was curious what would happen.
What changed surprised me
It completely shifted our dynamic.
She loves it. She tells me how life-giving it feels and asks me to keep doing it. She feels supported instead of managed. Held instead of analyzed.
But here’s the part I didn’t expect...
I love it too.
What started as a conscious effort to generate warmth and presence quickly became something else. Within a few days, I noticed a kind of Pavlovian response.
Every time I saw her, my body started producing genuine positive energy on its own.
I wasn’t forcing it anymore. It just showed up. That’s when I realized something important:
I wasn’t actually “faking it till I make it.”
What I was actually doing
I've always been very good at suppressing emotions. Especially subtle, positive ones.
Big emotions are easier to notice.
Joy, tenderness, delight, those are quieter. Easier to miss. Easier to bypass.
By practicing the physical expression of connection before I could clearly feel it, I wasn’t pretending. I was training my nervous system.
I was using my body as a conduit.
Instead of waiting to feel something and then expressing it, I reversed the order. I let my body lead, and my emotional awareness followed. And once that channel opened, it started showing up elsewhere.
Yesterday, I was walking through a park and spotted a couple of eastern bluebirds.
Something fluttered in my chest. A small wave of joy moved through me.
That hasn’t been common for me.
It’s strange. And honestly, I’m loving it.
Why this matters for Fives
Many of us believe that authenticity requires full internal clarity first.
Understand it, then act.
Feel it, then express it.
Be certain, then move.
But for embodied experiences, that order often doesn’t work.
Emotions live in the body. And bodies learn through repetition, not reasoning.
Sometimes the fastest way back to genuine feeling is through intentional action. Not as a performance, but as a practice.
This isn’t about lying to yourself.
It’s about recognizing that suppressed or underdeveloped emotional pathways often need activation, not analysis.
Your experiment this week
Try this as a data-gathering exercise, not a self-improvement mandate.
Pick one place where you’ve been waiting to feel something before expressing it.
Affection. Appreciation. Enthusiasm. Presence.
Then gently flip the order.
Let your body go first.
A longer hug. A warmer tone. A more engaged posture. A few extra seconds of eye contact.
Don’t force emotion, just allow expression.
Notice what happens over a few days. Not just in others, but in you. You might find that what felt “inauthentic” at first was actually the missing on-ramp to something real.
Sometimes, the body remembers before the mind does.
And for Fives, that can be the beginning of coming back to life.