Oh what tangled webs we weave… (The lies we tell)

when first we practice to deceive! – Sir Walter Scott

I’ve had Sir Walter Scotts quote running through my head today, and have loved it since I was a little girl. Though I didn’t always find it easy to apply to my life.

“If you tell the truth you don’t have to remember anything.” – Mark Twain

My mother was one of those, and still is for the most part, that is so affected by lying that she rarely will tell even the whitest of lies, or even a lie by omission. As she’s aged she’s less likely to find it as uncomfortable to lie by omission but telling a straight out lie is just not in her comfortably.

I, however, grew up lying. I lied, I lied a lot. It made other people happier if I didn’t speak the truth, my truth or the truth, it didn’t seem to matter.
So if I thought/believed that by lying someone else would be better off, I would do it, without a 2nd thought.

Throughout my 20’s I learned (mostly through ridiculously angry fights with my partner) what I was doing, and how it was actually harming me. How I was repressing my truth, my light, my joy. For everyone else but me.
And how bitter I was becoming over it, how I was killing myself slowly, if not softly.

By the time I hit 30, lying became something I had to put energy in to, thought in to how or why or when. And I grew increasingly uncomfortable with the straight out lies, though I must admit the lies by omission are much easier to sneak by (myself).

At 35 I find I loathe lying, even by omission. I’m left so utterly uncomfortable by it that I feel nauseaous, even with a lie by omission.
I finally feel comfortable saying things such as, I really don’t want to eat there, or I really want to go home not out to a movie, or.. the little things, or so they seemed, that were actually quite big things over time.

And when others inevitably show some irritation at me not doing what THEY want, I just don’t take it on anymore, it doesn’t worry me like it once did. Perhaps because now I see how much I began to hate the people I thought I was lying FOR. Making them happy in the moment was really just that, in the moment, and it didn’t last.
So I wasn’t happy, and they weren’t happy for long, so what was the point?

Considering my recent “career” choice, it is often necessary to not share everything, and even lie – for general safety of others around me. And I’ve come to hate what I do.

Not simply because of the omissions of my life, but because I’ve come to realize that most people lie. A lot.

Even the one other person in my life, aside from my mother, that I believed to always tell me the truth, even when I didn’t want to hear it; has been lying, a lot.
And another friend I love dearly, seems to lie habitually – and hey, I understand this, where it comes from, but.. it still hurts.
Neither of them knows how much I really know about the truth, or what I see to be the truth (the facts vs. their stories).

So I’m in a conundrum, allow them to continue their lies? Confront them? Never speak to them again? (I can’t imagine this last one really happening)
Am I lying by NOT telling them that I know what they are doing?

Yes, I do still find myself telling those “little white” lies and occ. lies by omission, so perhaps I have no ground to stand on, despite my efforts to be as honest as possible, as often as possible, especially with these two people.

I suppose it doesn’t mean I have to continue to be in their company, truthfully it makes me uncomfortable to be around others whom I know to lie (whether to me or to everyone else is not really the point, is it?), and I realize I’m lying to myself to believe that to ME they must be telling the truth all of the time.

Perhaps the only answer out of all of this, the only, well, truth, is to be true to myself, true to others, and let the rest go.

Knowing we’re all a little bit afraid of what happens when people discover our truths, and accepting that.

 

“Teach me to behave like the orange which, though crushed and bitten, fails not to impart its sweetness.

Battered by unkindness, bitten by carping criticism, or hewed with hard words and cruel behavior,

teach me yet to pour the unceasing sweetness of my Love.” – Paramhansa Yogananda

 

Otherwise, I might have to move out to the country, keep my critters as my only company, and become a hermit..

Well, that doesn’t sound so bad some days.