Anthropologists, sociologists and psychologists agree: people are always wearing masks. There are emotional masks we hide behind because we fear the world outside. We pretend things are fine when they are not. We feel fake, or like we don’t belong anywhere. But they’re just masks.

We chose ten of them, some negative and some positive, and read each one through two keys: psychology and spirituality. The most important reason not to wear them is healing. When we wear a mask, we carve a piece of ourselves out, and we can’t truly heal unless we offer up all the pieces.