Honesty

I have been thinking lately about the concept of honesty. It's something that I hold onto as one of the fundamental principles of how I live my life, even to a fault. I have been called 'brutally honest' by various people that know me. My friends know that I will not coddle them with things they want to hear, even if we end up in an argument about it. Which has also happened in the past, and probably will again in the future.

I don't know why honesty has become such a cornerstone to my life. And I don't just mean honesty in one's dealing with others, I also mean honesty in one's thoughts about themselves. Certainly a lack of honesty with oneself allows life to be smoother, and no doubt happier.

People always say there is such a thing as 'too honest' and that's true, the application of honesty involves tact. Which is very important to have side by side with honesty. Of course tact can be relative, what one person finds acceptable, another person may not, but hey, that's life.

I guess what I have never been able to understand is how people are dishonest with themselves. It's easy enough (though not necessarily correct) to lie to another person, because you know you are lying to them. But how does one lie to themselves? What process in the brain actually allows someone to believe something that is blatantly not true? Ultimately you must know the truth somewhere, and so it must make you really unhappy and miserable. But saying that, sometimes the truth is hard to face, and facing up to it can also make you really unhappy and miserable.

But I guess, to me, it's more important to be truthful, because at least if you're truthful, when it comes time to make a change, you are starting from a position of honesty and therefore much more likely to succeed. If you aren't being honest with yourself, then you aren't ever going to change or improve because you are not being realistic.