Don’t have enough time to read the entire 10 Ways Lies Grow series? Here’s an executive summary below including an excerpt from each. The title of each link is the “Way Lies Grow” for that episode. You’ll also find a quote from each episode of #WaysLiesGrow. Click the “Tweet” button if you want your followers to know about it.
Quote:
“The best pesticide for rationalization of lies is personal integrity.” Tweet
Excerpt:
In his Letter from Birmingham Jail, Martin Luther King Jr. said, “Every man must decide whether he will walk in the light of creative altruism or in the darkness of destructive selfishness.” Lies start as selfishness–but begin to destroy your own integrity, which is your best ally in life over time. Lies are convenient short-term fuses that buy time–but blow up later. The best way to stop a lie from growing is to not tell it in the first place because we choose our integrity over our comfort.
Quote:
“A lie is like cancer—the affects of a malignant tumor can come long after discovery.” Tweet
Excerpt:
When you yourself have gotten away with a lie—when you feel that small simple rush of energy that comes from telling a half-truth or a white lie, when you inflate your ego through a bloated story of your accomplishments, when you add that extra line on the resume or brag unduly about something you did back in the day—these are the moments to pull back the shroud around your rationalization.
Quote:
“Some who trust me most are those I’ve confessed sin to. Repentance builds trust.” Tweet
Excerpt:
If you keep playing this game of high-stakes poker when you’re bluffing (lying) then eventually you’ll be caught. So why not get out of this lie why you still can walk away with some chips? (Those chips may be your dignity, what’s left of your integrity, your relationships, etc.)
Quote:
“All professions that require exceptional communication skills are dangerous breeding grounds for lying.” Tweet
Excerpt:
Once a liar has not only rationalized it, gotten away with it and then told it twice they are in pretty deep. If they do this multiple times and actually start to hone the skills of lying things start to accelerate, and the hubris begins to multiply. If you find that you’re actually getting kinda good at telling lies it’s time to get help. Confession to a friend may not be the answer. It’s time to talk to a professional.
Quote:
“Lying to someone close starts to erase the last shreds of dignity a liar has left.” Tweet
Excerpt:
Of course people skip to stage 5 lying all the timewhen their lie involves adultery. When you are cheating on a spouse sometimes they are the firstperson you lie to—not the fifth stage in a journey of lying. This is why adulterous affairs can shatter someone’s life so quickly. Those who trust and love you most are lied to and their entire world comes crashing in.
6) They tell it to themselves.
Quote:
“A liar remembers it like they said it, rather than remembering it like it really was.” Tweet
Excerpt:
Walking back the lie now would be so painful, would be so overwhelming, would expose how weak of a person they are—that they are actually to the point that believing their own lies is preferable over continuing to juggle the truth and the lies. In some ways this stage may become a relief for the liar. Instead of nervously plotting their lies, the falsity becomes second-nature. The lie has a life of it’s own—the only life the liar has.
Quote:
“It’s one thing to ruin your life with lies—it’s another thing to ruin other people’s lives.” Tweet
Excerpt:
There is a unique moment when you hear someone else telling your lies that can trigger the conscience. It’s one thing to tell your own lies—but when the fiction about you comes out of someone else’s mouth—then you have the chance to doubt it as something outside of yourself.
8) They suppress those who question it.
Quote:
“The only thing worse than a liar is a liar with power.” Tweet
Excerpt:
There’s a point when a liar really becomes rotten to the core—becomes an evil person. It’s hard for me to say when that is. Are people ever themselves “evil” or is evil something that is “out there” and a person is torn between good and evil? I don’t know. Part of me wonders if someone at stage 8 has really “turned themselves over” to something darker—something more scary, something my grandmother would have called “demonic.”
9) They multiply lies with more lies.
Quote:
“Some giant monster lies have their own offspring: little lies birthed like demons in the dark.” Tweet
Excerpt:
If you do confess at this stage the whole house of cards comes tumbling down. Your monster lie will be slain, but all the little lies will be rounded up and the expansiveness of your lying will be told. And also the broader culture of lying will be exposed. The many other liars will also be affected. Such are the intricate implications of stage 9 lying.
Quote:
“A soul without confession is like a lung without oxygen.” Tweet
Excerpt:
The risks at stage ten of a growing lie are so large that they out-weigh any real-world benefits of confession. The liar cannot see any way out. If the lie is confessed they will lose their job, their husband or wife might leave them, their kids will resent them, their friends will be betrayed, and they might even–in extreme cases–go to jail. The are truly trapped in these lies. The liar finds that they are between a rock and a hard place and a steel curtain and an iron door–all ways out seem blocked.
