The pursuit of honesty
Recently my spiritual intention for the day was to be honest with myself which, at this stage of my life, should be simple. I cannot think of anything about my life or activity which, if shared, would trigger shame or even embarrassment. I have not developed the social medial habit of sharing intimate moment by moment details of my life since there are many details of my life I do not share just because they are private and uninteresting.
That having been said, I have long had the habit of keeping secrets from myself. For example, I was, at an early age, brain washed to believe that I could only be loved by God if all my sexual desire were heterosexual. I also needed to remain a virgin until I was married. So, despite all evidence to the contrary, I convinced myself that if I remained a virgin and married a woman at age 25 I was heterosexual. Obviously, being desperate to have a sexual relationship was not a reason to get married even to someone I truly loved. Eventually I had to confess to myself that my primary sexual attraction was not to people of the opposite sex even if I was attracted to and deeply loved a person of the same sex.
As a child I often lied to my mother if I thought I could avoid a beating. I would use my seemingly intuitive awareness of her prejudices or biases to craft a lie I thought she would believe. Then i would feel very shameful and pray to the God of my then understanding for forgiveness. My earlier memory of consciously doing this was at age 5. I knew full well what i was doing.
Later, I would learn to more effectively lie to myself about any behavior which I thought would be displeasing to others or to the God of my understanding. Since I “knew” that God knew all I could only convincing lie if I clearly believed the story I told myself. If a lie or “an alternation of the truth” was “known” to me I was ineffective at convincing others of it. My mother instantly knew because it was revealed by my shifty eyes and guilty look. Soon I learned to attempt to keep secrets from myself which then allowed me to tell her “the truth” which, of course, was not the truth.
I have since learned that lying to ourselves is a common trait of us humans. The good news is that we want to the person who others and perhaps the God of our understanding will respect and love. Thus, the Nazi’s had a licensed doctor (obviously not a physician/healer) sign the death certificates of all who were murdered in the gas chambers. The doctor who agreed to do this told themselves that one had to look at the state as one looked at individual humans. Sometimes with individual humans one has to amputate a limb to save the life of the person. Sometimes, one has to “amputate” certain individuals in order for the state to live (J. Lipton, The Nazi Doctors). I am fascinated by the need of us humans to convince ourselves and/or others that one is a good/moral/ethical person and thus can be understood and respected by others.
The motivation for many of the lies we tell ourselves and which become the truths we tell others is because we may believe that it is they only way we can have or retain the love and respect of others or is the only way to gain what we “need” to prove our worth. This is different that the intentional lie we tell others to avoid their displeasure. We teach children from an early age to tell intentional lies. As parents we often ask the “why” question knowing full well the answer. For example, a parent might ask as child, “Why did you eat a candy bar when you knew it was dinner time?” The child might lie and say, “I forgot.” The child knows that if they tell the truth they will get in trouble. The truth might be, “I rather have candy than supper.” Why questions frequently are intended to elicit a lie but then we punish the child for lying.
Any action, feeling or behavior which does not align with the story we want to believe about ourselves and which we may not want others to know, can be a “reason” for lying to ourselves. The motivation for doing so is very understandable. The sad results are, of course, two fold:
· We do not get to know and love ourselves for who we are.
· Others do not have the opportunity to get to know and love us for the humans that we are; humans with a variety of thoughts, actions and feelings; humans who are always in the process of becoming.
Honestly with self is on ongoing journey for all of us. Just for today I will remind myself that it is safe to be me with all my human thoughts, feelings and emotions. Just for today I will peel back another layer of self-deception.
Written June 24, 2021
Jimmy F Pickett, LPC, AADC
coachpickett.org
Recently my spiritual intention for the day was to be honest with myself which, at this stage of my life, should be simple. I cannot think of anything about my life or activity which, if shared, would trigger shame or even embarrassment. I have not developed the social medial habit of sharing intimate moment by moment details of my life since there are many details of my life I do not share just because they are private and uninteresting.
That having been said, I have long had the habit of keeping secrets from myself. For example, I was, at an early age, brain washed to believe that I could only be loved by God if all my sexual desire were heterosexual. I also needed to remain a virgin until I was married. So, despite all evidence to the contrary, I convinced myself that if I remained a virgin and married a woman at age 25 I was heterosexual. Obviously, being desperate to have a sexual relationship was not a reason to get married even to someone I truly loved. Eventually I had to confess to myself that my primary sexual attraction was not to people of the opposite sex even if I was attracted to and deeply loved a person of the same sex.
As a child I often lied to my mother if I thought I could avoid a beating. I would use my seemingly intuitive awareness of her prejudices or biases to craft a lie I thought she would believe. Then i would feel very shameful and pray to the God of my then understanding for forgiveness. My earlier memory of consciously doing this was at age 5. I knew full well what i was doing.
Later, I would learn to more effectively lie to myself about any behavior which I thought would be displeasing to others or to the God of my understanding. Since I “knew” that God knew all I could only convincing lie if I clearly believed the story I told myself. If a lie or “an alternation of the truth” was “known” to me I was ineffective at convincing others of it. My mother instantly knew because it was revealed by my shifty eyes and guilty look. Soon I learned to attempt to keep secrets from myself which then allowed me to tell her “the truth” which, of course, was not the truth.
I have since learned that lying to ourselves is a common trait of us humans. The good news is that we want to the person who others and perhaps the God of our understanding will respect and love. Thus, the Nazi’s had a licensed doctor (obviously not a physician/healer) sign the death certificates of all who were murdered in the gas chambers. The doctor who agreed to do this told themselves that one had to look at the state as one looked at individual humans. Sometimes with individual humans one has to amputate a limb to save the life of the person. Sometimes, one has to “amputate” certain individuals in order for the state to live (J. Lipton, The Nazi Doctors). I am fascinated by the need of us humans to convince ourselves and/or others that one is a good/moral/ethical person and thus can be understood and respected by others.
The motivation for many of the lies we tell ourselves and which become the truths we tell others is because we may believe that it is they only way we can have or retain the love and respect of others or is the only way to gain what we “need” to prove our worth. This is different that the intentional lie we tell others to avoid their displeasure. We teach children from an early age to tell intentional lies. As parents we often ask the “why” question knowing full well the answer. For example, a parent might ask as child, “Why did you eat a candy bar when you knew it was dinner time?” The child might lie and say, “I forgot.” The child knows that if they tell the truth they will get in trouble. The truth might be, “I rather have candy than supper.” Why questions frequently are intended to elicit a lie but then we punish the child for lying.
Any action, feeling or behavior which does not align with the story we want to believe about ourselves and which we may not want others to know, can be a “reason” for lying to ourselves. The motivation for doing so is very understandable. The sad results are, of course, two fold:
· We do not get to know and love ourselves for who we are.
· Others do not have the opportunity to get to know and love us for the humans that we are; humans with a variety of thoughts, actions and feelings; humans who are always in the process of becoming.
Honestly with self is on ongoing journey for all of us. Just for today I will remind myself that it is safe to be me with all my human thoughts, feelings and emotions. Just for today I will peel back another layer of self-deception.
Written June 24, 2021
Jimmy F Pickett, LPC, AADC
coachpickett.org
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