I can't define true self, but I know it when I see it. It emerges from a tangle of connected concepts:
Belonging is a prerequisite need for safety. Belonging not only means to a group, or in a place, but also in the path of your life, or to the identity you find yourself inhabiting. It lies somewhere between connection and resonance. That resonant note when you belong, the feeling that where you see yourself aligns with you, is the ringing out of authenticity. Authenticity is something you feel in your bones, a mystical experience. It is something in you recognizing itself out there in your expression. Allowing authenticity to manifest requires vulnerability, because it exposes you to be seen and reacted to. Most of the time we reserve vulnerability for situations with high safety levels, but sometimes we summon courage and show it anyway.
Belonging, authenticity, vulnerability, safety: these live in feedback with our social and physical environments.
The world we are in tells us we are one thing; how does it align with what feels authentic to us? It offers us belonging conditionally, or not at all, and more likely shame or persecution. Being vulnerable gets us hurt more deeply, and our emotional scars can distance us from our own abilities to feel ouresleves authentically.
Or, sometimes we find that bubble within which we feel belonging. Where we are seen, even cherished, for what we are. Where our ability to be vulnerable is coaxed out safely. We experience the possibility of liberating secure attachment. The hallmarks of such a space are curiosity, play, and discovery.
By default, there are no promises that we are in conditions that align with our true selves, and we are considered lucky if we can find them. We can improve our living in this situation if we learn to make contact with these core experiences for ourselves. We clear a space within us where we will treat ourselves safely. We open up to vulnerability in this most protected place. We call forth what is authentic within us. And we offer it belonging. While I won't say that this will change the fact of your being trapped in a world that is truly hostile to you, what you can control is the space you reserve for yourself within your own mind.