We have all had some embarrassing moments in life, but there are few more embarrassing situations than being caught telling lies. And we have all been there, done that and some of us continue to do it. What is it about telling lies that makes us keep doing it?

Well, for one, sometimes it seems the easiest way to get out of a sticky situation, or so we think because when our lie gets exposed, we get stuck with shame. At other times, we lie because we feel it will make the other person feel good, like when our friend wears an expensive dress that doesn’t suit her but we still say she looks like a dream. Or we simply don’t speak up the truth in order to cover up for others or ourselves, such as you know who has broken your mum’s favourite flower vase but you still keep mum.

looks like a dream. Or we simply don’t speak up the truth in order to cover up for others or ourselves, such as you know who has broken your mum’s favourite flower vase but you still keep mum.

A lot of times, without actually intending to be dishonest, we may make misstatements or simply not come up with the truth, in order to do some good (in our opinion). But it is still lying, and very quickly, without us even realising it, lying becomes a habit. And in some cases, the liar tells a lie so convincingly and in order to prove it is the truth, they starting believing in the lie themselves.

And it just doesn’t stop here, because to prove a lie to be the truth, one has to tell more lies, and have a good memory too to remember all the lies they have been telling and to whom. But it is impossible to keep all the stories straight and cover up all the tracks.

The American statesman Abraham Lincoln once said: “No man has a good enough memory to be a successful liar.”

Lying is morally, ethically, culturally and socially wrong. No religion or culture in the world supports or promotes lying. Truth is a universal standard that is used to judge and evaluate all things, especially people and their conduct and character.

We cannot be forced to stop lying unless we realise for ourselves how wrong it is and what is at stake when we lie. Not to lie and stick to the truth is a moral standard that we have to set for ourselves and only we can truthfully determine whether we are meeting that standard or not. And we cannot lie to ourselves.

So many things go wrong when we lie, even a harmless little untruth that harms no one can cost us a lot. Most importantly, we lose credibility and a good reputation. Then we end up hurting the people we lie to, who are often our very close loved ones. And on top of that, we have to face the consequences when our lie is caught and out in the open.

Let us look in detail at the reasons we should not lie and always be brave enough to speak the truth.

Loss of reputation

When we lie, we are doing wrong to ourselves first as we are putting our credibility and reputation at stake. The person we are lying to isn’t going to loose as much from not knowing the truth as we are from being found out to be a liar. When the person we lied to gets to know the truth, they are bound to tell others about our dishonest act and soon the news will spread and we will lose our reputation.

Often people think they are so smart that no one will find out about their lie and they confidently spin up stories, presuming that others are foolish enough to fall for their lies. But one shouldn’t underestimate other people’s intelligence because it is more likely that when people are being lied to, they are smart enough to realise it and are likely to catch the lie there and then. This is one sticky situation that liars find themselves in often and the foolish ones end up telling more lies and sinking their reputation further.

Surely we don’t want to find ourselves in such a mess, do we?

Loss of trust

Trust takes years to build, just like reputation, and one single incident to break, again just like reputation. When a person is caught lying, people stop trusting the liar, no matter how good and honest that person had been before that little lie.

If a person can lie once, they can lie again, so from that moment on, others tend to not believe anything the person says, even if it turns out to be the truth.

Loss of relationships

Lying also spoils the liar’s relationships with others as everyone who has been lied to gets hurts that they were not worth being truthful with. In other words, they were not considered worthy of the truth and this hurts more than the actual lie. Many friendships and relationships have been spoilt because people have not been honest.

Before we tell a lie, we need to remember that our lie will hurt the person we are lying to. Is the lie worth the hurt we will be causing? Is hiding the truth worth losing a relationship for? The answers will surely change our mind about lying.

Loss of self-esteem

Nobody rests easy after telling a lie. It pinches us, deep inside and each time we meet the person we lied to, even if our lie isn’t caught, we can’t meet their eyes and can even end up avoiding them all together.

What has happened here is that we have lost respect for ourselves because of our lying habit, our self-esteem has taken a plunge and we don’t like ourselves for what we have done. And when we don’t like who we are, how can we expect others to like us? This eventually brings our self-confidence down.

Habit-forming

One of the worst outcomes of lying can be that it may become a habit without us realising it, especially if we keep getting away with our lies.

Yes, it is common to find people who are habitual liars, they lie about things that they need not make a misstatement about at all, where the truth is already out in the open and there is no way for them to get away with lying. But they are helpless, they have been lying so often that they have started to con themselves into seeing an alternate reality where the lie they tell appears as truth to them.

This can also be because to cover up a lie, one has to tell more lies and this goes on and on until fact and faction get totally messed up and people can’t escape this vicious cycle of lies.

If one has lied for any reason, one needs to stop before one gets caught up in such a cycle of lies and lying becomes a habit.

Legal troubles

A little lie in everyday life usually brings only some embarrassment to us most of the time, but it is possible to get into serious trouble on an official level and with the law. Lying at school, at the workplace and at other instances can go against the rules, lead to breaking the law and getting one in legal trouble. This usually happens with people who have got into the habit of lying from an early age and have been getting away with it.

Habitual liars end up lying on paper when they fill forms and give declarations and statements, and this has legal implications.

Lying isn’t worth all this trouble and stress. Telling the truth — even if it seems difficult at that instance — is still easier in the long run and makes life so very easy. Let’s make our lives easy and just stick to the truth.

Published in Dawn, Young World, December 22nd, 2018