Lets be honest. We all lie. Even if it’s only to ourselves. Nobody’s perfect. Lying is part of being human. It isn’t a nice part but it’s a human frailty that we all share. Some of us have made it an art form. Others hardly ever do. But we all do it – even if it as simple as saying,
” I ran out of time”
“I’ll do it tomorrow“
Or perhaps the all time world champion. “It wasn’t my fault.”
Deep down we know the truth, but there’s something inside us all that triggers a defensive lie. We can all live with that, I guess. Lying to ourselves in some ways defines who we are and how we sleep at night.
No-one will hang us for that.
When we lie to others
Unless we’re sociopaths, the lies we tell are largely defensive in nature. We lie not to hurt people, rather than to deceive. In essence, I think we’re trying to protect people from our own inadequacies. It’s a crazy misplaced anti virtue that I suspect we all suffer to some degree. I know that the most monstrous lies I’ve ever told have fallen into that category. I aren’t proud of them by any means. But, now, as the days are getting shorter and my shadow is growing longer, I kind of understand where they came from. It doesn’t make me any less ashamed, just a little more understanding of who I am.
Believing the lies we’re told
Sometimes we want to believe something so badly, we ignore evidence to the contrary. This happens way too often in relationships, business and politics.
We want to think everything is OK. Sometimes its easier to believe that the cheque is in the mail, that our partner really has to work late so often or that our political party can legitimately explain those anomalies away
Sometimes that bright new business opportunity presses all our buttons and we just have to be involved. Then we hang on desperately as the glitz and glamour loses its shine and the paint starts to crack and peel. We tell ourselves that its OK, we haven’t been duped. It will all work out.
There’s a part of us that simply wants to believe the lie. It’s easier that way. Our world isn’t disturbed. We can pretend that everything is hunky dory, even as our world starts to circle the drain.
When we believe the lie, we enable it. By enabling it we perpetuate it and ultimately sell it.
Ask the difficult questions. Test the veracity of the answers. Living in uncomfortable reality is better than dreaming a lie.
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