-
John Lennon
Any relationships worth
having must be built on trust. Regardless of who you are associating with,
people need to know that they can count on those with whom they interact to do
the right thing. Whether these people are family, friends, acquaintances or
co-workers, if you are not acting with honesty and integrity, then you will
soon find that you will have fewer people who are willing to be associated with
you. Besides protecting your reputation, the dynamic of social interaction does
not work well if you cannot be honest and genuine with others.
Imagine being part of a
sports team in which communication could not be trusted. In football, if a
quarterback continually called plays in the huddle, didn’t audible to a
different play at the line of scrimmage and simply threw the ball into the
stands every single play, then his team would surely lose the game. His
teammates would question not only his integrity, but would also wonder if he
even read the playbook or prepared for the opponent that they were facing that
week. A similar situation occurs when you repeatedly lie to those with whom you
are associated. Dishonesty begins to bring about confusion and mistrust from
others. Those with whom you interact regularly begin to demonstrate a lack of
confidence in you. That’s why it is so vital that you are honest with the
members of your team: your family, with other people with whom you associate
and that you are honest without any omissions.
Being honest with your family
“I now know for certain that
my mind and emotions, my fix on the real and my family’s well-being, depend on
just a few grams of salt. But treatment’s the easy part. Without honesty,
without a true family reckoning, that salt’s next to worthless.”
-
David Lovelace
The most important people to
be completely honest with are your own family. Given enough time, anyone will
be able to discover if you are not being completely honest with them. With your
family, this is a given! In most cases, these people are in your life for the
long haul. Even if you are able to convince your friends and co-workers of a
blatant lie, your family will likely have enough time with you to determine if
you are full of it or are indeed telling the truth. Consistently lying to
family members has repercussions that will not soon fade away. Once the trust
has been broken within your own family, it is nearly impossible to regain it
again. Unlike other associations, their memories will span decades from who you
were as a younger person to far into the future when today’s events are a
distant memory. In short, it’s a very bad idea to lie to your own family. The
truth will eventually come out and, just like your family, your reputation as a
liar will be with you for the rest of your life.
Being honest with others
“Leading your life honestly
and truthfully will create trust and friendship.”
-
14th
Dalai Lama
Relationships truly do make
the world go round. Rather than large amounts of money or employing your own
personal army, it is actually more often your network of associations that
plays the biggest role in many facets of your life’s success. Conversely,
having toxic influences in your circle or a lack of a strong social network can
result in abysmal failure and a significant reduction in opportunities for achievement
compared to your peers. To build such relationships, one must engender trust,
communicate effectively and demonstrate empathy for others. In order for people
to trust you, they must have the confidence to know that what you say is true
and that when you say that you are going to do something, that you are indeed an
individual of integrity and follow through. To communicate effectively, those
with whom you associate must be able to believe that the words you speak are
true and honest. To have any reason to believe that what you are saying to them
may be untrue or misleading impedes your ability to communicate effectively. If
you are to successfully demonstrate empathy towards others, then they must
believe you to be a genuine, honest and trustworthy person. Otherwise, your words
will fall on deaf ears as they will believe that you truly do not care about
what happens to them. Worst case scenario, if you are a well-known liar, they
may even believe that your efforts directed towards empathy are actually mocking
them or somehow belittling what they are going through. In summary: honesty
builds relationships and dishonesty destroys relationships. Whenever you
communicate with those individuals with whom you regularly associate, remember
that honesty truly is the best policy!
Being honest without omissions
“The chief problem in
historical honesty is not outright lying. It is omission or de-emphasis of
important data. The definition of ‘important,’ of course, depends on one’s
values.”
-
Howard Zinn
Whenever most people lie,
they do so under the guise of telling the truth. Unfortunately, they neglect to
tell you which items they left out of their version of events. They ease their
conscience by telling themselves that the entirety of the account given was a
true statement. Such lies of omission are so prevalent in society that the
justice system often requires those persons giving testimony from the witness
stand to affirm the following statement from the judge:
“Do you swear to tell the
truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth so help you God?”
Unlike the courtroom, your associations will not be as forgiving about your deception as a jury of your peers. If you are to gain relationships and retain old ones, then you must tell your associations the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. Otherwise, even God himself may not choose to spare you the people in your life that walk away from the lies you choose to perpetuate. Being completely honest will ensure that your associations value their connection to you as a genuine person worthy of their trust.
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