I think, ironically, you and the people who recommend "being yourself" are trying to say almost the same thing you are, and for the same reasons. Because we ar

I think, ironically, you and the people who recommend "being yourself" are trying to say almost the same thing you are, and for the same reasons. Because we are so much at the whim of our environment, it can work against you to follow someone else's advice, because the advice is based on seemingly similar but different experiences, and the best thing you can do is to act mindfully in every moment, which is what "being yourself" is about, in my opinion. Acknowledging that you are in big part of your environment, and that you are the product of the combined imprint of life's experiences, you try to act in the best possible way you know how, given the combination of all of your experiences up to that moment, rather than some kind of answer you tried to prepare ahead of time, because that time was in the past, and your combined experiences now exceed those you had when making that plan in the past.