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You might be lying more than is healthy for you. Most people think lying is harmless, just social grease or a shortcut through conflict. I used to think that too. But the real damage caused by lying isn’t moral. It’s structural. It’s what it does to your internal model of reality. To be a convincing liar you have to believe your own stories. And the moment you start believing them, you compromise the part of your mind that knows what’s real. That internal compass, the one that helps you navigate the world and navigate yourself, begins to distort. Hannah Arendt warned that when lies replace truth, our ability to orient ourselves collapses. That’s the real danger. Lying feels like control, but over time it becomes the opposite. You create a false world, and then that false world starts controlling you. If you’ve been lying long enough, you’ve already split yourself in two: the part of you that knows the truth and the part of you performing the lie. Carl Jung would say the performer becomes a shadow self you start living inside. And if you inhabit that character long enough, you confuse their desires for your own. Eventually the performance becomes the identity, and your entire life bends around maintaining it. The prescription is simple, but brutal. Tell the truth again. But be warned. Truth is expensive. David Foster Wallace said the truth will set you free, but not until it is finished with you. Telling the truth means killing the false self, and that death is painful because you’ve been identifying with that character for years. You’ve invested in them. You’ve protected them. You’ve let them run your life. Worse, many of your relationships have bonded not with you, but with the liar, with the persona. And when you kill that persona, people will grieve it. Some will resent you. Some will leave. Some will tell you you’re not yourself anymore without realizing they never actually knew you in the first place. People love the lie. It’s easier to love. Cleaner. More convenient. When you start telling the truth, don’t expect applause. Expect resistance. Expect disappointment. Expect people to prefer the mask you wore over the face you’re finally revealing. But if you stay the course, something else happens. The world becomes solid again. Your mind aligns with reality. Your inner compass recalibrates. And you stop living as a character in a story you never meant to write. You come back to yourself.

Replies (44)

From my personal experience, lying can also literally distort your body posture. You can make yourself “bent out of shape”, or “bend over backwards”, or “crooked” in attempts to please others with your lies. To face and confront the truth of reality allows one’s posture to be unconfined and free. The facia is the decentralized network of the body.
Ultra hard mode is when you didn’t lie to yourself but others raised you within a web of lies. A friend of mine grew up with her struggling mum becoming part in Jehova witness. All siblings are fucked to some degree. Your metaphor of the compass sparks an image in my head of them being stranded on ground with magnetic anomalies beneath them. Every move they make betraying them somehow. What do you do? Stand still? Wait for help? Just run in each direction far enough? So grateful for my upbringing
Great essay, and I don't really disagree, but some examples or anecdotes might be helpful. What kind of lies are we talking about? Telling a 200 pound women that she's beautiful? Misrepresentations on a resume? Not providing full transparency to government agencies? Claiming you read the terms and conditions? Different lies have different impacts.
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↩ replying to npub1k4py...nqqz
I would say the big one is presenting a false version of yourself to friends and family. Lying about a covid vaccine in order to not put poison in your body doesn’t fall under my definition of self destructive. Though if you’re in a position where you have to lie about it in order to survive maybe it’s better to tell the truth about not taking it and let tha truth reshape your world.
Man do I like the profound Hodl! Wise words out there But is it just me or I also see in you two personas? The profound, wise father and the somewhat crazy and explosive you’re not stacking hard enough?
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To the degree that you are honest with yourself, is the degree to which you can be honest with others. To the degree that you are honest with yourself and others, is the degree to which you can live in alignment with the universe and, more broadly, God.
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Our words are far more powerful than people realise. Words expressed are also more powerful than those that are held in your mind & thoughts. To hold a belief & express something in contrast with that belief causes an rift within you, a seperation. To be free is to be integrated & aligned as a sovereign being. You cannot be free while you are lying or wearing the heavy mask of social conformity. From birth we are convinced than we are less than perfect. That we have sinned & need to redeem ourselves in the eyes of others. We try to convince ourselves & others that we are not selfish. That we put others needs above our own. This lie was hidden amongst all the other bullshit I thought was important to hide from people. The world is a mirror that reflects the projections that you place on it. It doesn't argue with you, it simply complies with evidence to support your beliefs. One must be very careful in making agreements about the nature of things because they have a very real impact on your experience. The worst lies are the lies we tell ourselves. 💚🫂
↩ replying to Brisket
You and Mudge are my two must see bitcoiners! You and I have spoken to each other through a screen … then we both stepped back knowing the shill was not worth the sell. Yet … a movement emerged. The beef initiative sparked entrepreneurial projects here in Oz - enter the great Jacob Wolki - from Wolki Farm! You and I continue to learn. To teach our children. That is my greatest goal, yours too I bet. And to truly work hard at building a grass roots movement. Keep in trucking in Brisket Snow! There is a phone call you and I once had where you told me to go for it - if I felt it was right. That has become my war cry. Love you brother 🧡💜🫂
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↩ replying to PringleMac
The biggest lesson I took from that was that your heart always knows what's best for you. Ignore its protests & prods at your own peril. I've always relied on my mind to find a path forward but I'm realising that my greatest power has always come from my heart. That's the lesson I want to pass on to my kids. I find it pretty ironic that we gain wisdom once we've lost most of our influence on our children. We'll meet F2F one day.
I've worked in tech start-ups most of my career, and this is a rarely talked about conditions that I have seen emerge in non-technical founders. It starts with "fake it till you make it" which is somewhat necessary for your CEO to do in the early days. Then they start believing their own jazz hands are magical. And before you know it, their grip on reality starts slipping. You notice them lying when it isn't necessary or even advantageous to do so. And as trust evaporates, they become paranoid, controlling, and their decisions become increasingly irrational. Founder's syndrome. It's real, and it all starts with lies.