The Truth about Lies

Did you know that according to Stanford University, a lie is an untruthful assertion, an intention to deceive?  Did you know that according to Merriam-Webster Dictionary, the true meaning of a lie is to make an untrue statement with intent to deceive? Did you know that there are supposed to be four types of lies according to an article titled “Interview and Interrogation Training: The Five Types of Lies” which can be found at www.losspreventionmedia.com.  They are lies of denial, lies of omission, lies of fabrication, lies of minimization, and lies of exaggeration.

A lie of denial is what we learn in early childhood when we say, “I didn’t do it”.  A lie of omission is what we do quite often when we are confronted with dealing with authorities, where we tell them every thing that all others actors performed except the part that we played.  A lie of fabrication is basically when your make an accomplishment greater than it really is, like you made a good grade on a test, and you continue to say just how much worse all others did on that same test to inflate your own ego and standing.  A lie of minimization is basically the opposite of fabrication where your make thing larger than it really is, here you make them as small as possible so that it could be easily over-looked.  Often times lies of minimization is directed at accomplishments others made.  A lie of exaggeration has an element of all the others and is quite distinguishable and easily discovered and challenged.

What’s the common, everyday lie that we tell others and ourselves, it’s the “I’m fine, nothing’s wrong” lie.  We say this when a simple “not sure but I will figure it out would work much better.  I say this because we often pretend everything is fine and when we do we partially convince ourselves that it is slowly burying deeper and deeper that issue or traumatic event which we know we need to address but are afraid to.  The longer we go without addressing it, the worse it is and the more control that it grabs over even our personalities.  Now your probably already know this so it is nothing new but I bet there is one thing your did not know about a lie.

A lie travels in packs, bunches, groups.  Your can never tell one without having to tell several more, think carefully about the last lie your told, did your not also have to make sure your told that lie the exact same way every time and what happened when your were challenged on that lie?  Did your then embellish and create other lies to compliment that first one and make it more believable?  If your said no, then you have just lied.

Some people think that others become very good at lying and can even pass a lie detector test and I say to you, this also is a lie.  To pass a lie detector test all your have to do is truly believe that what your are saying is the truth and not just half-way, your have to fully believe it.  The reason so many get away with lying all the time is not because they are good at it, it is because those who frequent their company has gotten numb to it, refuse to even question it, simply just don’t care anymore and have lost any interest in trying to help them tell the truth, but more importantly than that, the lies that they are telling are greatly beneficial or even profitable to them.

It’s strange and also a contradiction that many people will say that you should work smarter not harder yet ignore the great pains that we have to endure when we lie and the even more work that needs to be performed to maintain that lie.  Some have found it easier to just not bring up a subject but now you know that this is still a lie, a lie by omission.  Just like it takes less muscles to smile than to frown, it takes less energy to tell the truth than it does to lie.  I guess the best question to ask is do your want people to tell you’re the truth or lie to your because what you expect from them your must be first willing to give.