| The worst lie | 5 comments |
 7 Nov 2009 @ 14:52They say, you can lie to others but you cannot lie to yourself. Now, I can tell you from hard won experience, that this is totally the opposite. It seems that the person you are most likely to lie to on a daily basis is noone else but YOU. „Oh, that cannot be, I am so honest, how could I cheat myself” – you say. Hmmm, is that really so?! Sorry, but that is not what I see around me on a daily basis while working with my coaching clients. I must admit, I also gained a large part of this experience from my own personal development. It’s indeed the gravest area of dishonesty, with far reaching effects in all areas of life. You might be an excellent actor toward the outside world, to the point that you ALMOST believe that favorable image you put up about yourself, your actions or habits. You can also be an expert at habitually lying to yourself, making it all look better than it is – but beware, however smart you try, it will slowly but surely catch up with you – because deep inside you KNOW. You cannot TOTALLY hide the truth from yourself. Keep on reading carefully, if you dare to face up to it. If you do, there is hope for you. You might ask: „Why should I lie to meself? What there is to gain?” – So let me tell you three good reasons. First of all, sometimes one makes a mistake or does something harmful. And because we are natively well intentioned, such deeds need to be explained somehow, we feel a strong need to justify them. To save face, you need to dream up some reason why that deed or error was inevitable or not too bad really. For example, you overspend your budget, then you tell yourself that it was really necessary for your survival, or you simply had to buy that pair of shoes. Or you knock off and break that precious piece – why did some idiot put it right there behind you?! Or you are overdue with a project – well, the computer broke down, and you lost some data, and that answer you expected did not arrive in time... You get the point. What are the consequences of justifications? If you do not really look at what you did, there will be no change – the same habitual mistakes or errors will tend to happen again and again. We all have a strong urge to be right – because we ARE right – that to prove it, we are compelled to do it all over again. Strange, but true. The second area of lies is that of apparent disabilities. We hate when we find ourselves unable to do something, so we do everything we can to dream up explanations to make it seem logical. Examples: „It is too much work, I cannot handle it” – „I cannot study” – „I cannot focus, I’m unable to concentrate...” – „ I am tired, it is too hard for me...” – „I can never learn to ...” Fact, that you are able to learn or do anything. It is just simply cheating yourself telling you “can’t do such and so”. You are much more capable than you ever imagined. But telling that you can’t, sure gives you lots of interesting games, nice juicy problems to keep yourself busy with, to occupy your mind, and mainly to divert your attention from the real, deeper issues of your life that you really don’t want to look at. The third large area of self deception is to be convinced that one already does everything possible. One anyway tends to go toward the least resistace, or stay in a comfort zone – while we know damn well that to achieve anything great, one needs to step out of it. I can only say, stop kidding yourself. You can do much more than you believe. The thing to do when you think "I can’t take it anymore" is to go the opposite way. Instead of cutting down your reach, simply take on even more to do. Bravely step out of your comfort zone. Widen your sphere of responsibility – and you will grow but quick. You will suddenly accomplish much more, and your problems will diminish. You know the saying, when you want something done give it to a busy man. Sounds tough, but this is the truth. So, in summary, if you notice you are explaining away something you did, or you pretend you are not able to do something, or when you feel “you are over your limits” – just stop for a moment, and take a good look. Are you kidding yourself?! Look, you are highly capable. Indeed, you are so powerful, that noone can help or change you. You are the only one who can change your mind. * Next time I will tell you about how you can notice if there is a lie involved in something? |