We Are All Liars
December 11, 2007 – 3:30 pm
The Washington Post recently has an article about lying. It’s titled The Truth About Lying. It asserts that all of us are liars. Yes, people will in some point of their daily lives will either a) lie about what they ate at breafast, b) say that a friends looks great in an outfit (even if they don’t), 3) pretend they are working, 4) fabricate a story, 5) smile even if you’re not smiling inside, 6) do all of the above and lie some more.
Lies are all around us. We lie to ourselves, our friends, our family, our coworkers, everybody. Consciously or unconsciously, we lie, even if we don’t intend to. How often have you heard someone ask “How are you?” and you answer “I’m great”, when in truth you are not. You feel bad, angry, self-conscious but you don’t feel like discussing your self-loathing and insecurities to someone you just met 10 minutes ago. So, you lie and you say you’re great and you smile. You might think then that you have succeded. Yes, you have thwarted him and the inquirer will go away. And he does, but not without you realizing that he, in truth, was also lying. He asked you how you were, but he really didn’t want to hear your honest answer, he expected you to lie.
And so this ugly cycle goes on. You lie to other people’s lie. They lie about lying. And we all lie to everybody.
In the end, who are we really deceiving?
“Everybody lies — every day; every hour; awake; asleep; in his dreams; in his joy; in his mourning,” Mark Twain – On the Decay of the Art of Lying
