Lessons from Lying...

34/100

I used to lie. A lot. I lied because I thought it made things easier to manage. I lied because I thought somehow it protected me. I got very good at lying. 

I lied mostly to myself. I think when someone battles with addiction (mine was/is food) she becomes really adept at lying. I spent all my time telling myself I didn't have a problem. Hey I can quit any time. I don't NEED that hamburger, but hey... I only had a small breakfast so a double cheeseburger is okay today. 

In my late 20s, I had a moment in my life where my lying caught up with me. Everything sort of fell apart and I found myself curled into a ball on the floor trying to sort out the pieces of the mess I had made of my life and the lives of others around me. The problem with lying is after a while the lie takes on a life of its own. You have to keep lying and eventually the lie becomes more real to you than the truth. 

From that moment on, I have made the conscious effort not to lie - especially to others. For someone who is a natural storyteller, it's hard not to lie about things sometimes. The story is so much better with a little exaggeration... and I am not innocent of that. However, at 42 I see where my body is because I am not always honest with myself about what I am eating or how often I am exercising. Telling a tall tale is one thing, lying to yourself about something that is destructive to you? Is completely another. I've learned to be honest with others, but still struggle at times with being honest with myself. One of the reasons I started this blog was to keep myself accountable and hone those 'honesty with myself' skills.

The issue of lying came home to me again yesterday. Many years ago, I posted something on a website... a positive review of a friend's business that I care about. Someone else had posted an unfairly negative review and I felt like if I didn't write something positive, there would only be that bad review for everyone to see. Except instead of posting as myself? I posted as someone else. As a writer it wasn't difficult to create a whole persona that was 'close' to true, but not actually true. Until yesterday. Yesterday someone seeking advice wrote to me because of the business review I had made. I was faced full on with a crisis. Do I continue the lie? 

What I realized is that I was faced with not only losing my credibility as a person, but if I continued the facade and got caught?  I would cause my friend's business to lose credibility as well. Now, some of you might be saying, "Seriously, MK? You got all worked up over one review you posted on the internet? A review you wrote because you cared about a friend? A review you wrote that was based on truth, but wasn't actually *your* truth? Get over it."

Except lying? Eats away at integrity. I know the reasons why I lied were in my eyes, 'noble' but the results weren't. It's made me look at myself and accept that even a lie told for a 'good reason' comes back and haunts me. Not only that, but in my profession of educator, I spend a great deal of time talking to my students about lying. How can I, as a teacher, tell my students not to lie, when I don't own up to my own moments when I don't tell the truth?

In the end? I found a good way to 'fix' the situation. It was more honorable and more accurate than when I tried to 'fix' the situation on my own. I think, because I spent my life trying to 'fix' situations as quickly as possible I jumped to the 'easy' fix. I jumped to try to fix it myself instead of looking at the larger picture and finding a situation that didn't cause me to compromise my own integrity. The 'easy' fix of telling a lie doesn't end up being easy and in the long term, usually ends up being painful.

So here's a toast to the truth in all its sometimes ugly and usually difficult glory. The more I deepen my relationship with it, the fewer burdens I carry and the lighter I become.

Peace,

MaryKate