Lies and how to deal with them
Today I am touching upon a sensitive subject that everyone is concerned with: lies. Deliberate lies, white lies, unconscious lies. It’s a strong word, I know, but how else would we want to call it if someone told themselves and/or others something that wasn’t true?
The consequences are from slightly irritating to plain horrific. In politics new terms got coiled like “fake news” or “alternative facts”. Today, digital tools allow to easily fake digital identities, documents of every kind, even bank accounts etc. Nothing seems to be 100% proven true anymore. That’s the world we live in today.
Just because someone is saying something with great conviction or is talented in presentation skills or has an impressive reputation doesn’t make a lie something other than it is.
But let’s start with the lies to ourselves!
Our ego – that part of our mind that has created a cluster of memories a long time ago to which one’s sense of “I am” is attached to – is a master of disguise. It alters the stories that we tell to ourselves according to its liking and profits.
Most of us believe what we tell ourselves. And we call our loyalty to what we believe in: “authentic”. We even engage in convincing our environment that what we believe in and what we think we are is true, assuming that when others buy into our lies it confirms their “trueness”.
It all would remain completely undiscovered if there wasn’t something in us that cannot be convinced no matter how skilfully we try. Some call it conscience, others the voice of the heart.
And the more and the longer we live in the contradiction between what is really true and what is just made true, the higher is the price we pay for losing our dignity, our self-esteem, and ultimately – our happiness.
Trueness always succeeds.
Postponing the inevitable is based on the fear of facing the truth. The ego resists the truth about itself with all its might. It gets especially tricky when the ego is educated in spiritual principles and teachings. Then it uses this knowledge to come up with a bunch of most subtle spiritual lies in order to maintain its old ways.
People also lie to others. They lie in their CVs, their attitudes, their speech; they lie to their loved ones, to their business partners, to the authorities and anybody around whenever needed.
Why do people lie? Because of fear. It is always fear.
Those whose ego is feeling inferior, portray greatness to the outside. Those whose ego feels cunning, portray honesty. Those whose ego feels resentment, portray kindness, and so on and so forth.
In this world of lies, we can only find solid ground when we start facing our own lies. This takes enormous courage, a courage that is existential because facing our lies feels like dying and annihilation to the ego. Most people would rather keep living their lies and pay the price.
In my work with people I see the consequences of this price every day in their sad eyes, in their fearful defenses, in their silent cries for help. Shame, guilt, fear are mighty soldiers ring-fencing the ego’s untrueness. It’s a very lonely space to live in.
I am certain that without the heroic mission to dissolve the lies in one’s life states like fulfillment, blessing and good fortune won’t come to visit. Especially when one has entered a self-realization path – may it be spiritually, religiously or as a way of human potential development.
For those heroines and heroes who see the inevitability of the challenge, paradise is not far away. With every act of us ending our lies, others are encouraged to do the same. And when there are no more lies, then there is no more fear.
And that for me is paradise.
With love, ❤ Marc Steinberg