How to Tell The Whole Truth …Most of the Time.
I hate being lied to, don’t you? I’ve told my kids more times than I can count that it angers me more when they lie than with whatever it is they are lying about. When they lie, it means I can’t trust them. And lack of trust hurts all of us. But telling the truth walks a tightrope: is it kind to be honest, or is it cruel? Is telling the truth always the best policy? The answer to both questions is, unsurprisingly, it depends. How to tell the whole truth…most of the time.
The anatomy of truthful people.
Truthful people are:
True to themselves.
True to others.
They are authentic.
They are reliable.
They are honest about their strengths and their weaknesses.
They are empathetic, compassionate and tactful.
They live and act their values.
Why is the truth important?
Skillsyouneed.com provides us with this excellent reason:
“Truth matters, both to us as individuals and to society as a whole. As individuals, being truthful means that we can grow and mature, learning from our mistakes. For society, truthfulness makes social bonds, and lying and hypocrisy break them.”
(Mic drop.)
Is there ever a place for NOT telling the truth?
To tell the truth…yes.
A lie can be a stated falsehood, or it can be the withholding of information. It can be for the good of an individual, or for the greater good. But keep in mind:
the decision to lie should not be made lightly.
Also according to skillsyouneed.com, two good reasons to lie are: 1) if you are asked to hold information in confidence, and 2) if you are an intelligence agent undercover.
That said, however, most of us are not the latter. And the former can and must be breached if that info with which you’ve been entrusted puts anyone in danger.
If you are familiar with Game of Thrones, people lie and do all sorts of bad stuff like it’s going out of style. But in A Storm of Swords, 2: Blood and Gold, this moral tidbit comes up:
(Samwell Tarly) “…Jon, could there be honor in a lie, if it were told for a…a good purpose?”
(Jon Snow): “It would depend on the lie and the purpose, I suppose. …I wouldn’t advise it. You’re not made to lie, Sam…”
Even in GOT, some people believe telling a lie should be considered very carefully.
Two times I’ve told the truth and mostly didn’t regret it
Both examples came, interestingly, during the time of COVID. A time we can all agree was scary, stressful and uncharted. Emotions were running high, sides were taken, and decisions were made well but often poorly. Mix all that together in a toxic soup and we all had our moments, good and bad.
You can be the judge of my truth-telling, and then I’ll take a turn.
Escapades in Honesty, Part 1
A friend from childhood was unhappy with my position on COVID. She let me know this with a series of angry messages filled with name-calling and all-caps and insults (including one about my shoes…?).
While she told me I could take as much time as I needed to get over her rant so we could move on and be friends again, I didn’t make her wait long. I told her, clearly so as not to be misinterpreted, that our friendship was over and to please take care.
She didn’t take it well, and I had to block her on social media.
Escapades in Honesty, Part 2
My second attempt at truthfulness involved my upline with the multi-level marketing scheme I was a part of. She and (many) others with the biz took to jet-setting during COVID, bringing people together from all over the U.S. in close, unmasked quarters. Given this was an MLM promoting “health and wellness,” their conduct seemed hypocritical and dangerous, so I told my upline:
I can’t be a part of a health and wellness team that doesn’t take COVID seriously.
While she seemed to take my resignation in stride, her IG immediately following suggested otherwise. Whether her posts on travel shaming and “being kind” were directly related or a coincidence, I can’t say for sure. (But I do wonder.)
Given the reactions of my now (former) friends, I know I could have done better. My truthfulness did not build social bonds as skillsyouneed.com reassured, but did exactly the opposite.
What did I do wrong?
The truth, tempered
It is important to approach giving the truth in a tactful way. Merriam-Webster.com defines tact as:
a keen sense of what to do or say in order to maintain good relations with others or avoid offense
Being blunt in our truthfulness hurts other people. Think Sheldon Cooper in Big Bang Theory. He has no filter. He doesn’t read the room. He certainly doesn’t consider others’ feelings.
Sheldon takes honesty and truthfulness to the extreme. What we need to do instead is practice compassionate honesty, remembering that what we are getting off our chests is hitting someone else right in the numbers. That information either gets their attention or hurts like hell.
In other words,
be kind when telling the truth.
But the truth hurts. It can’t possibly be kind.
Or can it?
Kindness and honesty are not mutually exclusive, but either taken to an extreme is damaging. Being too kind is inauthentic, leads to habitual lying, and from there breeds mistrust. Being too honest is just plain mean (remember Sheldon) and severs relationships. As independent scholar and therapeutic writer Meg-John Barker says:
“…real kindness requires us to be honest with both ourselves and others, even if that is painful and hard.”
“…real kindness requires us to be honest with both ourselves and others, even if that is painful and hard.”
Meg-John Barker
It may hurt, but the truth will also set you free
Without the truth, we won’t learn from our mistakes. We won’t grow as individuals. We can’t strengthen our social bonds or develop as a society. Yes, it can be tough to hear what we don’t want to hear, but we must crave truth, honesty and feedback in order to improve ourselves and humankind as a whole.
But we deserve that truth compassionately and constructively.
So, it’s clear I pissed off two people with my honesty. I threw kindness a small bone (You take care, congrats on your promotion…) but I see now that I fell short in the compassion department with my telling of the truth. I let my anger and frustration take more control than I should have, and clearly did not maintain those “good relations” or “avoid offense” as Merriam and Webster described in their definition of “tact.”
What could I have done and said differently?
Well, I could have let my emotions settle. Given myself more distance from the offensive words and actions. Cleared my head.
I could have said something more like this:
I hear that you are angry and upset. I wish I felt differently, but I can’t remain friends with you. I wish you the best. Stay safe and healthy.
and
Congrats on your promotion. I’m sure with that momentum you’re eager to get out and celebrate. But it’s risky to travel and mix company right now, so I can’t support a health and wellness business that isn’t taking the pandemic seriously. Take care and be safe.
Authentic understanding of ourselves arises from not simply hearing, but really listening, to the truth.
Teaching our kids to be truthful
Kids make mistakes.
And they don’t want to admit to it.
Unless we teach them otherwise.
Losing sight of what I valued, I accidentally taught my kids to lie. Which, as I said before, I hate. Once I realized my anger over specific transgressions caused my kids to fear admission of wrongdoing, I knew I had to change my strategy. Here’s what I began sharing with my kids when I found damage, danger or missing goods:
I’m not happy about what happened. But I’m even unhappier about lying. I need you to tell me the truth.
Often this involved setting a timer, allowing time for the mess to be cleaned up or the stolen item returned (if it could be). Always it involved the desperate whispers of children trying to beat the timer (which was, admittedly, a bit entertaining…). Because, when the “ding” echoed through the house, they knew it was time to ‘fess up. And I allowed the guilty party to come to me in confidence (humiliation wasn’t part of the punishment) with their confession and to receive their sentence for the original offense.
I want my kids to own their mistakes, and grow because of the experience. And to value the truth. That they should give it (compassionately) and expect to receive it (also compassionately). This is a work in progress, I know that for a fact. I’ve tried to be honest for a long time now, and I’m still working on doing it right.
What if compassionate honesty and tact don’t work?
Not everyone is willing to listen, much less hear the truth, no matter how kindly it is delivered. We can’t help that. We can only do our best to respect others and their feelings. The rest is up to them. Be prepared for your well-considered truth-telling to strengthen some bonds and break others. All you can do is
with your words.
Sources/links for this post:
growcounselling.com, Kindness and Honesty: Mutually Exclusive or Interconnected Ideas? by Elizabeth Kraich
linkedin.com, Why Hearing the Truth is So Good by Jeff Clark
skillsyouneed.com, Truthfulness
