Why, Books, Library » Psychology of lying » Why people lie
© Sam Harris
Excerpt from the book by Sam Harris. Lie. Why telling the truth is always better. — M.: Alpina publisher, 2020.
A lie, even the smallest one, is a weapon of terrible destructive power. Neither authority, nor long-term friendship, nor strong relationships can withstand his blows. You yourself will not notice how, having become carried away by lies, you will not be able to do without it and will lose the most precious thing - the trust of your loved ones. The author teaches us not to fall for lies and convinces us that openly telling the truth is much more profitable even in the most difficult situations.
Everything that is described in the novels “Anna Karenina”, “Madame Bovary” and the play “Othello” is also found in life. Most human vices and cases of social ill-being are generated and fueled by lies. Adultery and other forms of betrayal, financial fraud, government corruption, even murder and genocide all imply the moral defect of people being willing to lie.
Lying is a refusal to cooperate with others. This is both misunderstanding and unwillingness to be understood. To lie is to ruin a relationship with your own hands.
By lying, we deprive other people of the opportunity to know our views on the world. And our dishonesty not only influences the choices they make, but also determines possible alternatives, sometimes in completely unpredictable ways. Any lie is an attack on the independence of the one we are deceiving.
If we lie to one person, we potentially spread the lie to many others—even entire sections of society. Moreover, we burden ourselves with the subsequent need to maintain our deception, and this can greatly complicate our lives. We can confidently say: any lie darkens our future. It requires further “reinforcement”. But the truth does not need such sacrifices and efforts; it is enough to simply repeat it.
The lies of the powerful result in distrust of governments and large corporations. The lies of the weak make us insensitive to the suffering of others. Conspiracy theorists' lies raise doubts about the integrity of whistleblowers, even when they are telling the truth. Lies are like toxic waste, only in a social sense: the threat of being poisoned by this poison hangs over us all.
How would your relationship change if you decided to never lie again? What truth about you will suddenly come out? What kind of person will you become? And how can you change those around you?
These questions are worth finding answers to.
Orthodox Life
If I were faced with the task of formulating in one phrase the main principle of normal human communication, I would say: “Be afraid of being right.”
Of course, on the one hand, it is important for a person to feel that he is right. Then he is convincing and interesting. Honest, after all. At the same time, the absence of such a feeling is often the cause of uncertainty. Everyone knows that an insecure and indecisive person (in other words, a mumbler) is more annoying than anyone else.
However, there is another side. And it is distinguished by its considerable ugliness. Since the consciousness of one’s own rightness instills in a person, in addition to confidence, also aplomb, a sense of superiority and arrogance. The one who is right often allows himself to be rude, is cruel, cynical and ruthless. Let us take a close look at our sins, misdeeds and bad deeds. For which of them does your conscience torment you the most? Which ended in the most dramatic conflicts? Which ones entailed deep grievances and ultimately provoked a quarrel and even hostility? Right. Those in which we were absolutely sure that we were right. The feeling of being right gives a free hand, sanctions extremes, justifies sin. Therefore, it is necessary to treat it with the same caution as any other feeling, understanding that even the best in us is not alien to depravity.
And this caution should not begin in the process of a dispute or conflict. It’s too late to remember about it in the heat of a quarrel or in the heat of a discussion. To ensure that the feeling of being right does not spoil life for us or our neighbors, we should learn to at least tell the truth without harm to our neighbors or harm to ourselves.
Let's start with the fact that not every truth is actually true. The truth in its pure form is always one - this is the truth of God. There are no less human truths in the world than there are people. It is obvious that everyone believes in his own truth and in this regard he is completely honest with himself. However, it is equally obvious that a single personal truth remains true only for the one who believes it. From others the demand is different. What do I care about someone else's truth when I have my own? And in the end, what is the use of inflating, as Khodasevich wrote, “petty truths an empty prue”?
Hence the rule: remember that what I consider to be true constitutes my, so to speak, personal truth. It may actually be true, at least in my eyes. There may be “a penny’s worth of truth” in it. But regardless of this, my personal truth is, as a rule, not needed or interesting to my neighbor. So why say it? If someone is interested in our truth, it’s not a sin to tell about it, but if they don’t ask, then it’s quite possible to do without voicing it.
However, often simple human truth turns out to be objective. Does this mean that it must be said? Well, it may very well be what is needed. But before this, it would be useful to check the truthfulness of yourself. To begin with, let us note that doubts rarely arise about pleasant and easy truth: such truth does not lead to offense or conflict, and if a person is not disgusting by nature and, as a result, is not prone to thoughts like “I won’t praise, so as not to become proud.” “or the habit of not noticing the good and concentrating on the bad, then it will not be difficult for him to tell his neighbor the positive truth.
So, anyone who wants to tell the truth to another must also be truthful. You have probably heard such complaints more than once as “I reprimanded him, but he...”, “I want good for them, but they...”, “I tell her: no one will tell you the truth except me, and she ..." These and similar phrases are usually used to complain about how a person reacts to criticism. Fairly, I must say, he reacts. After all, if we do not take into account situations where a boss criticizes a subordinate, a master criticizes a student, and a teacher criticizes a student, then we will come to the conclusion that criticism, even if fair, is usually inclined to those people who have no moral right to they don’t have it and criticize it only “with the best intentions.” What are these motives? To figure it out, let's ask ourselves, do we want to criticize people we sincerely treat well? Or those we love? For example, it is extremely difficult for me to imagine a normal husband criticizing his beloved wife. Or it’s also hard for me to imagine criticism between friends. Will normal parents be critical of their child? No, everyone, of course, is not without vice. But the shortcomings of spouses in normal families are covered by love, the bad actions of children are corrected by education, and for friendship it is completely normal to accept a person as he is. Criticism is always implicated in passion. On anger, on anger, on envy, on pride... Therefore, the desire to criticize would be more correctly called the desire to say nasty things. And fair criticism will differ from unfair criticism in only one way: there will be no lies in it. However, a lie is not necessary, because the truth can be evil, and justice can be merciless. In the end, it is much more convenient for an evil, cruel person to use the truth, since it gives his criticism the appearance of objectivity and justifies it in his own eyes.
This is the truth. Only now it concerns not our neighbor, to whom we wanted to tell the truth, but ourselves. Our intentions and methods. Does anyone still see a moral right to tell someone the unpleasant truth?
So what now, you ask? Not telling the truth? Lie? Be a hypocrite? In no case. A Christian must be truthful and honest. Only first - with yourself and in relation to yourself. And in life we need to learn to tell the truth first of all when a lie can bring us benefit or cover up our sin. Or when the truth can prevent slander, when through the truth you can protect the weak and defenseless, prevent meanness and prevent injustice from happening. In general, whenever the truth is difficult and requires courage, when the end result of the truth is righteousness, and not a smug sense of one’s own rightness.
Archpriest Vladimir Puchkov
Why do people lie?
Undoubtedly, there are white lies. A necessary lie. But when lying becomes an everyday necessity, something needs to change in your priorities. You need to learn to tell the truth. Sometimes this is a very difficult task.
A person is not born with the ability to lie and embellish the reality. A small child, on the contrary, can talk with delight about how he cheerfully broke a vase or fed the dog his lunch. We call this childish spontaneity, but in essence it is true.
But children also have a considerable degree of observation; they notice that they are not always praised for speaking the truth. But the neighbor's bully, who kept silent about the trampled lawn or said that he ate his own lunch (which they fed to the dog together), was also encouraged. And the child begins to use these little tricks. That is, he learns to lie. And we, adults, push him to do this every day. At the same time, talking every day about how highly the truth is valued.
Magic ritual
Magic is on the side of those people who want to hear the truth about a person. Whether you need to use magical rituals is up to you to decide. After all, you may find out something that will push you away from each other forever. And if you love, you can’t live without him or her, and a conspiracy will help you find out the hidden, intimate? How to live with this then?
In parting, I want to say: first think a hundred times, and then turn to magic.
Magic ritual for sleep
On the day of the waxing moon, whisper in your husband’s ear while he sleeps:
“I remember the Glorious Lord, whose name everyone knows, whose name everyone glorifies. He rules all creations on earth, gives life to everything and everyone. I ask my Lord to put a petal of truth into the mouth of the servant of God (name of the man). Let that petal bloom in it and speak on its own. Let that petal in the dream of the servant of God (the man’s name) open into a great flower of truth, which will tell me everything I want to know, and I, the servant of God (my name), want to know everything. Key. Lock. Amen".
The husband will soon begin to babble the whole truth. Even if you fall asleep, his babble will wake you up.
How to find out the truth in a conversation
Tomorrow you want to have an honest conversation, suspecting that the person is not completely honest with you.
Write the person's full name on a piece of paper and light a candle. Move the piece of paper over the candle while reading the plot:
“He told me, he said everything, he wasn’t afraid. He came to me and poured out his soul. I'm talking about the servant of God (his name). On a universal scale, your truth is a drop, do not be afraid; in an infinite key, your truth is only yours. I will find out everything, I will understand everything, we speak heart to heart, we speak with our souls, not our mouths. As has been said, it will be so, but it cannot be any other way.”
Next, fold the sheet of paper in four and place it under your pillow. After the revelation, you need to get rid of it. Such a ritual will remove the fear of recognition from the soul of the interlocutor. Keep in mind that you will also tell a lot of things that you were silent about. Perhaps this will help improve contact with your interlocutor.
How to force a liar to confess
On the waxing moon, looking at the photograph of the liar, say:
“As soon as you look into my eyes, you stop lying. The truth makes you feel bad inside, it makes you sick, it’s better without it, tell me once, then it will go on its own, you can speak, so it pours out. Our frank dialogue. Everything pours out, everything leaves, everything comes to me. It’s easier for me and it’s easier for me. My eyes, your truth. As has been said, it will be so, but it cannot be any other way.”
The next day, look the liar in the eyes, then just listen: he will tell you everything as if in spirit. This technique can be applied to children who are liars. Now decide for yourself, do you want to know the whole truth?
Technique "Surprise"
A question on a subject that interests you should be asked unexpectedly, contrary to the previous logical chain of dialogue. For greater efficiency, a deliberate course of conversation is created in a friendly mood, with a soft and kind smile, more than once emphasizing your own trust in the interlocutor. Lulled suspicion increases your chances of surprise. And if you take care in advance that your opponent does not take advantage of the opportunity to remain silent or laugh it off, or in another way to avoid answering (for example, asking a question so loudly that other people interested in the answer can hear it), then a high percentage of the probability will provide you with a truthful answer .
The first level is when you tell the truth to yourself about yourself.
This was a huge problem for me because I had been lying to myself for many, many years. It's hard to imagine a person lying to himself, but it happens so easily, and I did it for a long time.
ADVICE : For example, when you experience so-called negative emotions - anger, resentment, anger, rejection, etc. - admit it to yourself: “Yes, I am experiencing this . What to do with these emotions - decide for yourself based on your experience and skills.
But first admit to yourself that you NOW have these emotions.
And you will immediately feel better.
Personal gain
A person will be more willing to contact you if you can outline to him the personal benefits of your conversation. But under no circumstances deceive the person. For example, offer the person information in response to their information. This way you can find out the truth without ruining the relationship. But remember that you cannot give away other people's secrets. If you decide to tell a person something, tell him the information that is in the public domain, but about which your opponent had no idea before the conversation.
Is it not so easy to bring a person to light and she does not agree to admit guilt? Then you can accuse yourself of some crime and say that you do not consider it shameful to hide this part of your biography. Seeing a frank attitude on your part, a person can also boast about his misconduct.
The third level is when I tell the truth about myself to another person.
In other words, approximately what I am doing now.
ADVICE : We are afraid or avoid telling the truth about ourselves. We worry that they will think badly of us, or judge us, or that everyone will turn their back on us - and we will be left alone. But it’s not for nothing that this level of truth is Third. It was after passing the First and Second.
For example, when we are criticized or made comments, we rush to justify ourselves. Even if we were wrong. At this moment it is useful to stop and agree: “Yes, I am like this (like this)” , or “Yes, this is so” , or “Yes, I did it (did)” .
As a result, your conversation will become more fruitful and useful for its participants. You will save time and energy that would otherwise be spent on clarification and arguing.
Traditional methods
How to force a person to tell the truth? Conspiracies and other magical actions that you can use to bring a person to clean water greatly harm your karma. It is better not to use witchcraft; firstly, it is useless and acts by the method of self-hypnosis, and secondly, it greatly reduces your vital energy. It is much more effective to force a person to tell the truth in a dream. How to do it? Good results can only be achieved from those individuals who often talk in their sleep. What do you need to do? Give the person a little push to awaken their consciousness. You don't need to wake the person from the sleep state. The person must continue to doze. Ask any question you have and wait. Soon the person will formulate an answer and completely satisfy your curiosity.
How to force a person to tell the truth? Magic, fortune tellers and conspiracies do not work. Don't waste your time or money. Charlatans may promise you miraculous elixirs of truth, fragrant oils or magic words. All this will not produce the desired effect, you can’t even hope for it.
The fifth level is when you tell the truth to everyone about everything.
And if you can take these five steps, you are five steps closer to heaven, because heaven... there is no more need to lie.
No more need to lie
* * *
These recommendations are easy to read, everything is clear and simple. How can you implement this understanding into your life? Yes, right from point 1.
Yes, it is not easy to tell the truth about yourself. But when this level is passed, the Soul becomes soooo easy! And you can move on to the next one.
Each level requires awareness, i.e. understanding - why am I doing this? Is it worth the hassle? Decide for yourself – why and whether it’s worth it... And I sincerely wish you good luck!!
PS I will be glad to see your response in the comments ! PPS If you have a few more minutes, read >>> Healthy Relationships as a Couple
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The second level is when you tell the truth to yourself about another person.
I also used to lie to myself about other people for many, many years. For example, for many years I told myself that I loved the most romantic love of the person I was with.
When I started to think that this was not true, when I allowed myself to imagine things like: “Look, maybe you don’t love her anymore,” my inner voice said: “Don’t be stupid, of course you love her.”
Because I had to think so . This is how it was supposed to be for me.
So I lied to myself for a long time, until one day I told myself the truth.
I didn't even say it out loud, I just said it to myself, which was overcoming a huge barrier for me.
Tell yourself the truth
