The Sixth Step to Finding Fulfillment: Be Honest
October 23, 2009
Please Note: This is a guest post by my friend, Zoli Cserei, of Simply Will Do.
I read Lisis’ list of Five Steps to Finding Fulfillment with great respect and enjoyment, too. Let’s take a quick look at what she teaches us.
Just be. Because we all do breathe, eat, and sleep. Also the ability of just being is also something highly valuable. Then, be safe. Because you don’t want to be kidnapped, and financial security is a good thing, too. Be social. We love friends, and dating is awesome, too. The list goes on, be strong. And that’s not just lifting weights. And finally – everybody knows a smile has godly healing powers: be happy.
I decided to break out of the Maslow pyramid that Lisis used to organize the steps. I treat being honest as the cloud around the pyramid, which applies to all its levels.
These are goals in our lives that most of us try to reach. I’ve been working on them, with some very delighting results in my everyday life. However, there was one thing that was complicating the process: I tried to ease my tasks. How? By lying.
When you are not used to facing and accepting the truths, hiding them and sweeping them away seems much easier. Often you invent a second reality, that seems more comfortable to live in. You lie to your parents, to your friends, and end up with lying to yourself. That’s the moment when you don’t even realize that you’re lying.
Sometimes I even lied about things (and we all had), that didn’t even make sense (exaggerating, leaving out little details). And that’s the worst, when you lie to yourself and don’t even realize, you are so used to it. I caught myself lying quite a few times to realize that I have to take another step: be honest.
Be Honest With Others
There’s an old Hungarian saying, “An untrue man is caught faster than a halting dog,” which has proven to be true so many times. By being honest to others you will see many improvements over your life. You will gain respect. People sense it when someone is untrue, and vice verse. If you will aim to be honest, you will be more respected within your community. You will be able to avoid all the hassle that is usually caused when a lie is found out (oh yeah, lies are always found out)!
We all lied now or then, we all know how it feels, right? You know the success that you feel.. “another little trouble passed by,” maybe the twinge of conscience that is produced. Lying evokes ambivalent feelings.
Let’s look at the other side. The most powerful feelings evoked by truth are usually pride (sometimes you have to be really strong to be able to speak it out,) happiness, cleanliness and balance. These are all positive values. Yes, of course, you can argue: shame! Think about it, when do you feel ashamed? When you tell the truth, or when you admit something wrong that you have done? When you admit that you lied about the very same thing before?
Most Important: Be Honest To Yourself
At an interpretation session for A Midsummer Night’s Dream, our theatre group leader said, that from time to time, you can lie to other people. You can lie to friends and family, to strangers. You can lie to everybody. One thing you must always respect: be true to yourself. (Well, that might not have been the most ethical advice he has ever given us, however, there’s some wisdom in it, I believe.)
If you lie to yourself, then you do not know yourself.
If you do not know yourself, than it doesn’t matter anymore if others know you.
Consequently, if you lie to yourself, then you don’t even give others the chance to get to really know you. Your social life directly relates to your honesty.
Last year, I stuffed up a lot of tasks at the Student’s Council in our school, while still keeping my daily activities. What I took on was impossible to accomplish. I rather drank seas of coffee, and stayed up several night until dawn, instead of admitting that I just can’t do more. I cheated on myself, regarding my strength, and that jeopardized my safety, and my being after all. And that is just one example of lying to yourself. One from many I’ve seen or experienced.
Truth is always the right choice.
I’d like to finish this article with a citation that one of my readers left on my blog as one of the first comments I ever received. I think it very nicely presents how obvious the little truths of life are:
“Telling the truth is easy and pleasant.”
What about YOU?
Do you think telling the truth is easy, pleasant, and necessary? Can we lie to ourselves or others and expect to have meaningful relationships? If you are not being true to yourself, then isn’t everything else a lie?
Related posts:
- Fellowship Fridays: Finding Happiness
- Finding Relief from Sadness: My Favorite Things
- Adventure: Finding Beauty Close to Home
- For the Warrior, Poet, Mystic: On Finding Love
- Letters From Readers: Best Decision or Careless Risk?
Posted in Fellowship Fridays, Life, happiness, needs
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Wow and HI Zoli,
What insightful and powerful questions!!!! And being Honest…wow..its a perfect addition to Lisis-5 steps to fulfillment.
Being honest somehow takes the back foot in our lives isnt it…
I know people who can be and say so many things just to please another person, but not really meaning it. In a way when you are dishonest to another person, you are directly dishonest to yourself too.
Telling the truth can be difficult at times, but for me personally i have a little secret about telling the truth. If i want to or am asked to be truthful about something, and I actually have something to say that might not please the other person- I start off with pointing our all the good points and then very gently the truth. Usually or lets say 98% of the time it works like a charm. The other 2% of the time it works a little later…cause then i try to make the other person understand that my intention was to be honest for their own benefit.
But being dishonest to others is directly related to the way we view ourselves….and in so doing are lying to ourselves too. The realization needs to come sooner than later isnt it
Thank you Lisis for such a wonderful guest post by Zoli.
Love
Z
Zeenat{Positive Provocations}´s last blog ..Strength, Courage and Wisdom
SO true,
Firstly, even when the truth is hard to say it ALWAYS is such a relief and such an amazing feeling once you’ve said it. It means you can climb over any problem and continue forwards, if you lie or keep something from someone it automatically creates a barrier which you cannot cross with out telling the truth.
Lying to yourself makes it easier to lie to others. If you are always honest with yourself, how you really feel about something or what you are thinking, it is almost impossible to be able to cover that up in front of someone near to you. Therefore, by being true to yourself you are automatically setting yourself up to be honest to others. If you can lie to yourself, it will be easy to lie to others too…
Natalia´s last blog ..Tęsknota za domem i rodziną
Telling lies is always a failure of courage. It takes courage to tell the truth, to stand up for yourself and your beliefs, and to admit when you are wrong. It takes courage to let people see the real you, instead of hiding behind false pretenses or masks. It’s hard to admit when you screwed up, or to tell the truth without exaggerating it.
I think that’s why so many people have such a hard time with telling the truth. Their courage fails them at the critical time, and they take the easy way out by lying. The good news is that courage is like a muscle, and the more you exercise it, the stronger it gets, and the easier it becomes to tell the truth. I know, because I’ve had to do a LOT of work on myself in this area…
Jay Schryer´s last blog ..Memories Best Left Forgotten
Good morning! That Zoli’s a firecracker, isn’t he? One day he wrote to me and said he loved the steps but felt there was one missing to make the picture complete. I couldn’t agree more… I am so thankful for his guest post because it showed me he really read the original series, thought about it, and felt it still needed a little something.
Honesty. How can we be honest with others when we can’t be honest with ourselves? We have to know and accept who we are before others will. I’m sure Zoli will be on here at some point within his time zone, replying to comments.
Thank you, Zoli!!!
WOW! Thanks to everyone for such positive feedback!
@Zeenat: I can totally agree with your approach. I believe that when you tell someone a lie that is often easier to say, the other one also realizes that you lied to him. Ergo, if he can’t accept the truth, and finds more comfort in an invented situation, he is too weak. By being honest you train others to be strong enough (step 4!
) to be able to accept the truth, and even more important: you train yourself.
@Natalia: Yes, lying to yourself is quite often precedes lying to others. I believe that happens because our pride just doesn’t let us admit to ourselves that we’re liars after all. So, first we make ourselves actually believe the lie, and then tell it. If we believe in it, we no longer treat ourselves as liars. That’s a very bad thing when happens.
@Jay: I read about a rabbi who told everyone his fears and his secrets. When he was asked why he did that, he said that when he has nothing to hide, he is impossible to attack. You can’t make fun of him because X.Y.: he was strong enough to say it out loud, then where would be the point of making fun of him that way? Now, I doubt this is possible today, but it’s still an interesting and motivating story to me. I also experienced that whenever I share a fear of mine, the fear actually becomes smaller. That’s also a way to become a LOT stronger.
@Lisis, dear Lisis
To be honest, I am not totally sure if I’m worthy of all the attributes that you said about me. However, to be honest.. it’s really good to hear that. Thank you 
And thanks everyone for the kind words, again!
Namaste.
Zoli.
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Lisis Blackston and malia , Jay Schryer. Jay Schryer said: "Honesty…such a lonely word…" ~Billy Joel. RT @Serene_Balance: The Sixth Step to Finding Fulfillment http://bit.ly/G6AN4 [...]
Fantastic guest post! Honesty is so important and I’m so glad you didn’t leave out the most important thing — being honest with yourself!
Positively Present´s last blog ..working hard, playing hard
@Dani: thanks for the kind words
Of course, being honest with yourself is the most important – and most precious part of all!
My coping mechanism for living in an abusive home was lying…not just lying but manipulating others! I figured that he couldn’t take away anything that mattered if he never actually knew what mattered.
Around 13 years old, I realized I didn’t actually like myself. That was rough. That was when I made the decision to be 100% honest with myself and 95% honest with others.
You’re so right when you include projects into the honesty equation. When we pretend that we CAN do everything even when, deep down, we know we can’t – it can ferment resentment and negativity.
Being honest means having nothing to hide and having nothing to hide means embracing yourself and your feelings exactly as they are. It’s no longer simple honesty but an exercise in self-love.
That’s why I LOVE that you’ve added this step to fulfillment. What are we here to do if not love?
Hayden Tompkins´s last blog ..What To Do When You Are Drowning in Stuff
The quote you ended your post with was elegantly powerful, Zoltan.
Love it!
It was great to read your ideas here; thanks, Lisis, for hosting Zoltan today.
For me, being honest is simply the easiest thing to do. I can remember, many years ago, trying to smooth things over with a family member with a white lie. Years later, I forgot that I had done this, the truth came out, and I felt just horrible.
In short, it’s simply easier to be honest than trying to remember what you said and causing more pain later in the game.
Great post!
Lori´s last blog ..Are You Hazarding Your Best?
Hayden, I just wanna hug you because I guess I didn’t realize you were from an abusive home. I dated a guy who was also abused and pretty much every word out of his mouth was a lie (I later found out). It was sociopathic, really… it seemed like he had no conscience at all. I think what he was really doing was making up a “reality” that was better than his own.
Of course, any time you build your world on lies, it’s just a house of cards, destined to topple over at any moment.
Being honest has many colors I have found through my life.
I am honest with paying bills, with my promises but I have not been honest about who I am.
As a people pleaser I have not been honest about what my wishes were.
Feeling incapable I have not honestly used all my talents and I have played small to avoid failure.
I have not always honestly declared what I believed as I felt too vulnerable.
Hmm, being honest still has a lot of colors for me, but I am peeling off the layers.
I love the honesty that is showing up here, heart warming and that is when you know you meet honesty.
wilma ham´s last blog ..Ann-Marie on jumping the gap from Knowing to Doing in order to live life differently
Wilma, you’ve brought up a great point, and that is… just how honest does one have to be in order to find happiness and fulfillment? I believe it helps greatly if we are completely honest with ourselves. In fact, I’m pretty sure that’s required.
But how honest should we be with others? After all, some things are best left unsaid. Not everyone is ready to hear the truth (even if they think they are). Are there some lies one should have to live with?
For instance, I once saw an episode of Grey’s Anatomy in which someone had a fling… a one-night stand. The guilt was eating him up and he wanted to confess to his partner, so the truth would set him free, I suppose. But in doing so, he cleared his conscience at the expense of her happiness. Would it have been better for him to live with the guilt from his actions instead of dumping that knowledge on her, forcing her to carry it around?
So, although I believe we need to be 100% honest with ourselves, I’m not convinced we always should be completely honest with others… but I’d love to hear other opinions on that.
Magnificent post! Boy don’t we avoid talking about lying!
I read Hayden’s comment and shuddered. Been there! I took the insane route – I created in my mind a total fantasy and shoved the truth under the bed. I couldn’t take it, facing it. I know now that my “creations” were, in fact, lies but there is a silver lining in the whole thing. It fueled my ability to create, imagine and play! I honestly (this is no lie!) don’t think I would be as fearlessly creative today had I not had early “training”.
I look at lies as truth avoidance. Sometimes the truth about someone or some situation is so darn uncomfortable that we will do anything to avoid it. Trouble is, you really can’t run from truth. If we were all masters at truth………ahhh, what a different world it would be! Like Zeenat, when I must tell someone truth that I know they don’t want to hear, I try to start out with positive things – like a sugar coat. But lately I’ve been feeling that our truths are our perceptions, and as such, my truth may not be the same as yours. I agree that honesty with ourselves is critical – great post!
suzen´s last blog ..No Fear, No Doubt, Just Fly!!!!
Unfortunately, sometimes telling the truth is socially unacceptable. I agree that being true to yourself is incredibly important. When you lie to yourself, you have lost yourself. It is also so important to be genuine in our relationships. Thanks for a great discussion on honesty!!
lena´s last blog ..Being More; Doing Less
@ Suzen: I know all too well what you mean about the fantasy/ insanity route… I wish I didn’t. Although, I’d love to hear more about your journey through imaginary worlds sometime. Have you blogged about it?
You’ve also brought up a fantastic point, that my truth is not necessarily your truth, they are merely perceptions and interpretations based on our own filters. Yet another reason to practice care when we “dump” the honest truth on someone else as if it were an objective fact. I can feel the plot thickening around this whole Truth issue… just how truthful should we be with others?
@ Lena: I feel fairly comfortable in the realm of saying we should be honest with ourselves. I’m increasingly less comfortable with the idea that being honest with others is always the right choice. As you mentioned, sometimes it is socially unacceptable. Other times it could cause more harm than good. This brings us back to the issue of how honest or genuine one should be in a relationship.
Hmm… lots to think about on this one.
A nice post with great ideas.
I completely agree with you on the fact that when you lie to yourself, you lose yourself and you won’t know who you are anymore.
When you keep lying, you’ll need to create more lies to mask the previous lies, which then just creates a whole cluster of messy stuff.
It is best to be truth to others, but most importantly to yourself.
However, in my utter most honest opinion, I really don’t think being truthful completely is possible. You can try, but not everybody is the same, and the truth will affect people in different ways. Sometimes it’ll benefit them, but sometimes it really won’t.
But then again, what is the truth? I don’t think anyone on this blog knows the absolute truth to their lives. In a way, everybody is living under their own sort of reality or “illusion”, in which is sometimes supported by lies. Everybody has a different perception to the world. Nobody thinks EXACTLY alike.
We are all human beings, and we all have the instinct to protect and promote our self-images, in which sometimes lies get subconsciously created for those purposes.
Those who want to be happy, try to create a positive reality, and those who doesn’t know how to be happy, automatically create a negative/dull reality.
bottom line, I agree we should be truthful, and I really wish we all could be…but sometimes we just have to, and sometimes it is just our natural instinct.
Unless that wish from the movie “Liar Liar” came true for all of us…I wonder what the world would be…YIKES.
anyways lol thanks for the post Zoli!
Steven
Love your friend’s post. I agree, being honest to one’s self is the key to authentic happiness and fulfillment. If you try to find out what’s the most important thing to you, you could then focus your attention on those things. Once you know what’s important to you, you get to know your real self. And once you become in touch with the “real” you, you’ll be able to master the art of happiness.
Linda Davis´s last blog ..Recovering from Tragedy – Helping Your Family to Forgive
@Hayden: I can totally relate to the not-liking-yourself part. I am 17 years old now, and I’ve been through that, too. I believe all of us has, at some age. Some of us remember that, others don’t. Most of us don’t talk about that. It’s not cool to walk out and say “hey I just realized that I don’t like myself”.. And yes, even if there are trends (sentimentalism, romanticism, nowadays “emo”), we never *really* talk about our questions regarding ourselves. We may not like our looks, our achievements.. we might sometimes complain in general terms, however the whole drama goes through you in a hidden way. You first realize you hate yourself to be able to learn to love yourself.
@Lori: Yes, honesty is an easy thing to do. What I found very hard is goooooing to honesty. I found it very hard to gradually become more and more honest. Especially with others, prejudice makes the quest harder, but hey, that’s how you learn.
@Wilma: nice point there
I sometimes think about whether am I really honest with myself, or is this just another lie. Because you can make yourself believe that you’re honest, and then you totally don’t realize how big of a liar you can become. Honesty is a complex yet very beautiful subject, that I hope will learn much about.
@lena: Sometimes it’s inevitable to lie. The mission is to minimalize the number of those moments, thus simplify your life.
@Linda: oh yeah, getting in touch with reality and truth is like getting a ticket to the highway of happiness. When you lie to yourself, deep in your soul you still know that the lies make you happy. When you’re true to yourself and the others, your happiness flows through truth and freedom
When you are honest, you are free!
Thanks for the kind words
Best of all,
Zoli
[...] written an article discussing honesty and sharing my experiences on my journey struggling to become as honest as possible. I’d like to take the occasion to say thanks to my friend Lisis for accepting my [...]