Chapter 5: The Roles We Hide Behind

"There Is Nothing I Can Do"

Sami is forty-four and supervises the customer service desk in a large furniture shop. On a busy Saturday, a woman in her seventies comes to the desk. She bought a bed frame three weeks ago. It was delivered with a broken part, and she has called four times and been promised a replacement four times. Nothing has arrived. She has been sleeping on a mattress on the floor, and her back is painful. She has taken two buses to come to the shop in person.

Sami looks at the computer. He sees that the replacement part has been ordered and is "in progress". He knows what the rules say: replacements are handled by the warehouse, and the desk cannot speed them up. He puts on his professional face and says, kindly but firmly, "I am very sorry, madam. I can see that it is in progress. There is nothing I can do. You will have to wait for the warehouse to contact you."

The woman looks at him for a long moment. Then she says quietly, "Young man, there is always something you can do. You are choosing not to." She turns and walks slowly away toward the bus stop.

Her words stay with Sami all afternoon. At first he feels defensive. He was following the rules. It is not his job. He is just the person at the desk. But slowly, he admits to himself that she was right. He could have called the warehouse manager, whom he knows. He could have asked whether the part could be taken from a display model. He could have arranged for a delivery driver to bring it on Monday. He did not do these things, not because they were impossible, but because "There is nothing I can do" was easier. He had hidden behind his role. Sartre had a name for this. He called it bad faith.

The Waiter in the Café

In Being and Nothingness, Sartre's long philosophical work published in 1943, there is a famous description of a waiter in a café. It is one of the most vivid passages in the book, and here is my own retelling of it.

Sartre asks us to watch a waiter at work. Everything he does is just slightly overdone. He moves quickly and precisely, almost too quickly. His bow to the guests is a fraction deeper than it needs to be, and his interest in each order seems a little more eager than is natural. He balances his tray with a showy, risky skill, as if it might tip over at any moment, yet it never does. The whole thing looks less like a man working than like an actor playing a waiter on a stage.

What is he doing? Sartre suggests that he is acting out the part of a waiter. He is trying to make himself into a waiter in the way that a chair is a chair or a table is a table: something fixed, defined entirely by its role. He acts as if he were nothing but a waiter, as if being a waiter were his whole nature, rather than something he does and could stop doing.

Sartre does not say that being a waiter is bad, or that the waiter should be rude to customers. The point is subtler. The waiter is a free human being who has chosen, for now, to work as a waiter. He could, in principle, put down the tray and walk out. He could choose to be a different kind of waiter, or not a waiter at all. But by playing the role so perfectly, as if he had no choice, he is hiding this freedom from himself. He is pretending to be a thing rather than a person.

Sartre's description has been interpreted in many ways, and some readers have found it unfair to waiters, who may simply be doing their job well. That is a reasonable criticism, and Sartre's example is perhaps best read not as a judgment of any real waiter, but as a picture of a way of being that all of us fall into at times: losing ourselves in a role so completely that we forget we are choosing it.

Bad Faith: Lying to Ourselves

Sartre used the term bad faith for this kind of self-deception. It is not quite the same as ordinary lying. When I lie to someone else, I know the truth and hide it from them. In bad faith, I hide a truth from myself. Specifically, I hide from myself the truth that I am free.

Why would anyone do this? As we saw in the third chapter, freedom brings anxiety and responsibility. It can be uncomfortable to know that we are always choosing and always responsible. Bad faith offers an escape. If I can convince myself that I had no choice, that my role, my nature or my circumstances made me do it, then I am not responsible. The weight is lifted.

When Sami said "There is nothing I can do", he was not exactly lying to the woman. He believed it, in a way. But he believed it because it was convenient to believe it. It protected him from the discomfort of making an effort, of breaking his routine, of taking responsibility for her situation. He had turned himself, for a moment, into nothing but "the desk", a thing that follows rules, rather than a person who could choose to help.

Bad faith is something everyone does at times. It is not a sign of a bad person. It is a very human way of escaping the weight of freedom. But Sartre believed that recognizing it is important, because it is a way of living less than fully, of giving up our freedom without noticing.

It is worth noticing how strange bad faith is, when we look at it closely. To deceive ourselves, part of us must know the truth, or we would not know what to hide. And yet another part of us must not know it, or the deception would not work. Sartre spent many pages exploring this puzzle. For our purposes, the practical point is simpler: bad faith usually feels like a kind of comfortable fog. We half know that we are avoiding something, but we prefer not to look. Learning to recognize that fog is the first step out of it.

"I Had No Choice"

Bad faith often shows itself in certain phrases. Listening for them, in ourselves and others, can help us recognize it.

"I had no choice." Sometimes this is true: a person facing violence or extreme need may have very few real options. But often it means "I had a choice, but the other options were difficult, unpleasant or frightening." Saying "I had no choice" hides the fact that we chose the easier path.

"That is just my job." This phrase uses a role as a shield. It suggests that, because something is part of our job, we are not responsible for it. Sometimes jobs do require things we would not choose. But we still choose how to do them, whether to question them and, in the end, whether to stay in the job at all.

"That is just how I am." We met this phrase in the second chapter. It uses a supposed fixed nature as a shield. "I am an angry person, so I cannot help shouting." "I am lazy, so I cannot finish things." The phrase turns a pattern of choices into an unchangeable fact.

"Everyone does it." This phrase hides behind the crowd. If everyone does something, the reasoning goes, I cannot be blamed for doing it too. But each person in the crowd is still choosing.

"The rules say so." Rules are often wise and necessary. But following a rule is still a choice, and some situations call for questioning, bending or challenging a rule. Using rules to avoid ever thinking for ourselves is a form of bad faith. History offers many sad examples of people who caused great harm while saying they were only following rules or orders.

These phrases are not always bad faith. Sometimes we really do face very limited options, and sometimes rules really should be followed. The question to ask is: am I using this phrase to describe the truth, or to escape from a choice that I am actually making?

The Other Side: Pretending the Facts Do Not Exist

Sartre pointed out that bad faith can go in two directions. The first, which we have been discussing, is pretending that we are only our facts, only our role, our nature or our circumstances, and denying our freedom. The second is the opposite: pretending that we are only free, and denying our facts.

This second kind of bad faith says things like: "That was not really me. I am not the person who did that." "My past has nothing to do with who I am now." "I could change everything tomorrow if I wanted to." It refuses to take responsibility for what we have actually done, by pretending that our true self is always somewhere else, pure and untouched by our actions.

For example, a person who has treated a friend badly might say, "But deep down, I am a good friend. That was not the real me." Sartre would challenge this. In his view, we are what we do, as we saw in the second chapter. The person who treated the friend badly is the real person, at least in that action. Recognizing this does not mean we are condemned to be bad friends forever. We can change. But we cannot change by pretending the past did not happen.

Living honestly, then, means holding both truths together. We are free: we are not simply our roles, our nature or our past, and we can choose differently. And we have facts: our past actions, our body, our situation, our commitments, which are really ours and which we must take responsibility for. Bad faith is losing hold of one of these truths. Authenticity is keeping hold of both.

A simple test can help. When you describe something you did, ask whether your description leaves room for both your freedom and your facts. "I shouted at my son because I was exhausted, and I chose to shout instead of walking away; I can choose differently tomorrow" holds both. "I shouted because I am an angry person" denies freedom. "That was not really me; I am a calm person" denies the facts. The first description is less comfortable, but it is the one that makes change possible.

Roles Are Not the Problem

It is important not to misunderstand Sartre's point about roles. He was not saying that we should refuse to play any role, or that doing a job well is a form of self-deception. We all play many roles: worker, parent, child, friend, neighbour, citizen. Roles give structure to life, help us cooperate with others and often allow us to do great good.

A nurse who plays the role of nurse with skill and care is not in bad faith. A teacher who stands in front of a class and speaks with the authority of a teacher is not in bad faith. The difference between a role played honestly and a role used as a hiding place is not in the role itself, but in our relationship to it.

When we play a role honestly, we remember that we are choosing it. We bring our own judgment, values and care to it. We are willing to step outside it when a situation calls for it: to bend a rule for someone in need, to question an instruction that seems wrong, to treat a customer as a person rather than a case. When we hide behind a role, we forget that we are choosing it. We use it to avoid thinking, feeling and taking responsibility.

The woman at the furniture shop did not ask Sami to stop being a customer service supervisor. She asked him, in effect, to be a person in that role, rather than letting the role be the whole of him. That is what authenticity in a role looks like.

Why Bad Faith Is So Tempting

If bad faith is a way of living less than fully, why is it so common? There are several reasons.

One is comfort. As we have seen, freedom brings anxiety and responsibility, and bad faith offers relief from both. It is much easier to say "There is nothing I can do" than to make an effort that might fail, or to say "That is just how I am" than to face the hard work of change.

Another is social pressure. Many workplaces, families and communities reward people for playing their roles without question. A worker who always follows the rules may be praised, while one who questions them may be seen as difficult. A family member who fits the expected pattern may be accepted, while one who breaks it may face conflict. Bad faith can feel like the price of belonging.

A third is that bad faith is often invisible to ourselves. Because it is a form of self-deception, we do not usually notice it while we are doing it. We genuinely believe that we had no choice, or that the role required it. Only later, sometimes when someone like the woman at the furniture shop challenges us, do we see what we were doing.

There is a further, quieter reason. Bad faith can protect us from the pain of disappointing ourselves. If I never really try, because "that is just how I am", then I can never really fail. If I tell myself that I had no choice, then I never have to face the possibility that I chose badly. In this sense, bad faith is often a kind of shield for our self-respect. Seeing this can make us more compassionate toward ourselves, and also more honest. The shield protects us, but it also keeps us small.

Recognizing these reasons can help us be gentle with ourselves and others. Bad faith is not usually a deliberate evil. It is a natural human tendency, born of the wish to avoid discomfort. But being gentle does not mean ignoring it. Each time we notice bad faith in ourselves, we have a chance to reclaim our freedom.

Four Lives Behind Roles

Fenna is thirty-three and has two young children. Since the birth of her second child, she has stopped doing almost everything she used to love: drawing, swimming, seeing friends. When people ask about it, she says, "I am a mother now. That is my life." Part of this is true: young children take enormous time and energy. But one evening, talking with an old friend, Fenna realizes that "I am a mother now" has become a way of not asking what she herself wants. She talks with her partner, and they agree that each of them will have one evening a week for themselves. Fenna starts swimming again. She is still a devoted mother. She is also, again, a person with her own life.

Rodrigo is twenty-nine. Whenever his partner tries to talk about difficult feelings, he says, "In my family, we just do not talk about these things." It is true that he grew up in a family where feelings were rarely discussed. But using this as a reason to avoid every difficult conversation is hurting his relationship. When his partner says she feels lonely, Rodrigo realizes that he has been hiding behind his family's habits. His upbringing is a fact. What he does with it now is his choice. He begins, awkwardly at first, to talk more openly, and he finds that it is less frightening than he expected.

Ingeborg is fifty-four and works in a government office that processes applications for housing support. She often tells unhappy applicants, "I just apply the rules." One day, an applicant's file is rejected for a technical reason that Ingeborg knows is unfair, because a form was filled in slightly wrong by another office. She could simply apply the rule. Instead, she remembers that she is a person, not just a part of the system. She writes a note to her supervisor explaining the situation and asks for the file to be reviewed. The decision is changed. Ingeborg reflects that the rules were never meant to stop her from thinking.

Sami, from the beginning of this chapter, calls the warehouse manager on Monday morning. He explains the woman's situation, and the manager agrees to send a part from a display bed. Sami arranges for a driver to deliver it that afternoon, and he phones the woman himself to tell her. She is surprised and grateful. Sami tells his team about the experience at their next meeting. He does not want them to break every rule, he says. He wants them to remember that, before they say "There is nothing I can do", they should ask themselves whether that is really true.

Fenna, Rodrigo, Ingeborg and Sami each hid, for a while, behind something: a role as a mother, a family habit, the rules of an office, the limits of a job. In each case, the thing they hid behind was real and important. But it was not the whole truth. Each of them was also free, and recognizing that freedom allowed them to act more fully and more humanly.

Practical Steps

First, listen for the phrases. Notice when you say "I had no choice", "That is just my job", "That is how I am", "Everyone does it" or "The rules say so". Each time, ask whether it is true or whether it is hiding a choice.

Second, look for the hidden options. When you feel trapped, list every possible action you could take, even ones that seem difficult or unlikely. You may find more options than you thought.

Third, play your roles as a person. In your work and other roles, bring your own judgment and care. Ask, "What would a thoughtful person do here, not just someone in my role?"

Fourth, own your past. When you have done something you regret, do not say "That was not really me". Say, "I did that. I am responsible. And I can choose differently now."

Fifth, respect real limits. Not every "I had no choice" is bad faith. Some situations truly offer very few options. Be honest about the difference.

Sixth, be gentle and honest. When you notice bad faith in yourself, do not punish yourself. Simply reclaim your freedom, and act.

A Short Exercise: The "Had To" Audit

This exercise takes about twenty minutes. It helps you notice where you may be hiding a choice from yourself.

Take a page and write at the top: "Things I had to do this week." Then list everything you can think of that you did because you felt you had to: going to work, attending a meeting, cooking dinner, answering a message, agreeing to a request, saying something you did not mean. Do not judge; just list.

Now go through the list and, for each item, rewrite "I had to" as "I chose to... because...". For example, "I had to go to my cousin's party" becomes "I chose to go to my cousin's party because I did not want to upset my aunt." "I had to stay late at work" becomes "I chose to stay late because I was worried about what my manager would think."

Read the rewritten list. Notice how it feels. Some items will still feel necessary, because the reasons are strong and important. That is fine. Others may reveal choices you would like to make differently. Some may show that you are acting out of fear or habit rather than real values.

Choose one item from the list that you would like to change. Write down what you would choose next time, and why. Then, when the situation comes again, try making the new choice.

This exercise is not about deciding that you never have to do anything. Life involves real obligations. It is about seeing your obligations clearly, as choices made for reasons, so that you can own them or change them.

Questions People Often Ask

"Is it bad faith to keep a job I dislike because I need the money?" Not necessarily. If you recognize that you are choosing to stay because you need the income, and you own that choice, you are not in bad faith. Bad faith would be pretending that you have no choice at all, or using the job as an excuse to stop thinking and caring. Many people stay in difficult jobs for good reasons, such as supporting their families, while still bringing their own values to their work and staying alert to other possibilities.

"Does this mean I should break rules whenever I think they are wrong?" No. Rules often exist for good reasons, and breaking them can cause harm or unfairness. The point is not to ignore rules, but to remember that following them is a choice, and to stay willing to question, discuss or challenge rules through appropriate means when they lead to clear harm. Ingeborg did not ignore the rule. She raised the problem with her supervisor.

"Can I be in bad faith about good things?" Interestingly, yes. Sartre noted that even sincerity can become a form of bad faith, if we use it to fix ourselves into a role, such as "I am a completely honest person", and stop questioning our actions. Any role, even a good one, can become a hiding place if we forget that we are choosing it each day.

Chapter Summary

In Being and Nothingness (1943), Sartre described a café waiter whose movements are slightly too perfect, as if he were trying to be nothing but a waiter. He used this image to illustrate bad faith: the self-deception by which we hide our freedom from ourselves, pretending that our role, nature or circumstances leave us no choice. Phrases such as "I had no choice", "That is just my job" and "That is how I am" can be signs of bad faith, though sometimes they are simply true.

Bad faith can also go the other way: pretending that we are only free and denying our facts, such as our past actions. Authenticity means holding both truths together. Roles themselves are not the problem; the problem is forgetting that we choose them. Bad faith is tempting because it offers comfort and belonging, and because it is often invisible to us.

In the next chapter, we turn to time, and to a short sentence from Kierkegaard's journal about understanding our lives backwards and living them forwards.