The real trick here isn't simply being honest—it's that Shakespeare plants this wisdom in the mouth of Polonius, a man whose advice is often suspect, which forces us to wonder whether *he* follows it. The quote gains its power precisely from this ambiguity: staying true to yourself requires first knowing who that self actually is, a far harder task than the surface meaning suggests. When you find yourself staying late at the office to impress a boss whose values contradict your own, you're not actually being false to yourself—you're just not yet clear enough about what matters most to you. The real fidelity to self comes only after that difficult reckoning.