This is something I sometimes struggle with. 'Struggle' isn't exactly the right word, but it's all I can come up with right now.
I just feel like I have many different sides of my personality (well, I suppose everyone does, so it's not like I'm unique in this respect), and in any one situation or with any one person, in any one moment, it's simply an impossibility, or unrealistic, or unnecessary, for all sides to surface -- because not all sides pertain to that given situation or moment in time. I've never viewed it as being many versions of myself, but sometimes I do feel like a chameleon. Part of it might be due to my desire to reach common ground with others, and so I build upon similarities. So the stuff we have in common may be the only thing that shows up for quite a long time, and then the other person might learn of another side of me and then they'll get confused or something, or think I'm a mass of contradictions, or think I've been fake(it's happened before), which I haven't been. It's just not possible for all sides to emerge all at once.
This is where I sometimes worry that it would be impossible for any one person to accept everything about me -- because at some point, some side is going to emerge that they just don't understand or cannot accept.
Edit: So to loop back to the OP, I don't really ever see myself as 'pretending'. I think all of it's the real me, but I do get confused at times (and imagine others might as well) due to the fact that I have these different sides that may not emerge all that often, because there's no 'place' for them in a situation, no context...
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