The cold came back with a vengeance last night. It’s foggy and still here. Montana does get less sun than Colorado; it’s a shift that’s subtle but impactful. I loved 300+ days of sun. The weather is still manageable, but I feel how it can hit you hard. Colorado never really did that. I can feel how this place wants to test you.

Fighting on Instagram

I feel like talking about lying today. Mainly because I saw this video on Instagram where this child asked her mother, “Why did you lie to that man in the store?” She asked this hours later, obviously still thinking about it. The mother went on to basically validate why she lied to the man, teaching her daughter that it’s “okay” in certain circumstances.

And I’m here to tell you why that’s wrong. Why is it always wrong to lie. And why, when you practice not lying, you actually find reality just a bit better, and that’s a life we all truly want.

The ego and lying

Your ego loves to hold onto lies because it is a form of self-defense.

Even your arguments about why it’s okay to lie “in X circumstance” are an armor or an identity unwilling to stand down.

Most lies don’t come from malice. They come from fear. The fear of being hurt, exposed, rejected, or seen as small. The ego can’t stand that kind of nakedness, so it builds illusions to keep control. It says, “I’m fine,” when you’re not. It says, “I didn’t care,” when you did. It says “I don’t know how to bake” when a stranger asks you if you’re a good baker in the grocery store (that was the Instagram video lie).

It tries to hold together a self-image that’s actually easily cracked. Because any identity that doesn’t live in virtue and values, but in scarcity, fear, or protection, is weak.

But every lie splits you a little further from what’s real. That’s probably one of the biggest reasons not to lie, ever. When you lie (regularly, constantly, with ease, or even not realizing how much you’re lying at this point) you start living in a story instead of the truth, and eventually, the story owns you. 

That is what it means to live in delusion.

But, the more honest you become, the more the ego starts to dissolve. That’s why truth-telling feels like dying sometimes (the big ones are hard to get out)—it’s the death of the false self. But it’s also the birth of peace (you usually feel relief afterwards).

White lies

I like to think most people agree that lying is bad. We don’t want to be lied to. We want honesty and truth in our relationships. Most people I know would rather have the truth, even if it hurts, than live in a delusion. They want to know if their partner is unfaithful or if their kid is hiding candy. Or if vaccines are causing autism (had to get that in there).

But even with that, people still argue about the social role of “white lies” or “polite lies”. Some argue that small lies help smooth social interaction. I argue that they erode authenticity and lead to slippery slopes. And guess what, it sounds more to me like the situations where it seems the most “hard” to tell the truth, don’t mean we get to choose the “easy” route. That’s what virtue and values are. They get applied to all situations, and sometimes they make things hard, but they keep them real.

And research shows those “small” lies aren’t as harmless as they seem. A 2012 study from the University of Notre Dame found that when participants stopped telling even minor lies for ten weeks, their relationships improved, their stress levels dropped, and their physical health got better. If that alone isn’t a reason to stop lying, then your head must be hard, and your ego is big.

And, you feel the dissonance when someone lies.

It’s why the little girl asked her mom about it hours later. Because she feels the dissonance, she is sitting with it, still, trying to make sense of why that feeling is there. I think back to my own mother and white lies—oh, the white lies, truly so many of them! It erodes trust, and you know when it's happening. Facts don’t make sense, answers aren’t clear. Sometimes you even ask for the truth, and the lie gets doubled down. That’s the worst.

And I’m not perfect by any means. I’ve been a serious liar in the past. From wanting to “look cool” to hiding drugs from my parents. I used to lie about what generation of American I was, too. It was in like 4th or 5th grade, I can remember something about wanting to seem like I was “just off the boat”. I couldn’t tell you why today. I guess my little girl self thought it was better to be seen as a more recent immigrant. I guess this was growing up in the social justice era.

I even withheld something from my partner the other day.

We were sitting on his bed, and I wanted to take his doggy out. The doggy is injured, so she can only have 20-minute walks and needs a heating pad on her leg before each walk.

I didn’t want to use the heating pad (because I’m lazy), and so I started to ask, “Do I have…” and trailed off. He asked me what I was going to say, and I said, “Oh, nothing, nothing, don’t mind me.” I didn’t even want to ask the question because I didn’t want to do the thing, and instead of saying that, I lied and said I didn’t have anything to say. What a crazy hoe.

He pushed a couple times (good man) until I finally said the truth: “I was gonna ask you if I had to put the heating pad on her before the walk, but I don’t want to do it, so I stopped asking.” His response? “I literally knew that was what was going on”. He’s smart and better than me.

We often underestimate how much those lies, white lies, damage trust—because the receiver feels the dissonance, even subconsciously. He felt it, and honestly, he knew what was going on anyway. We can’t really hide from the truth, even if we want to.

White lies might seem like kindness, or make things easier for us, but they actually create subtle (and sometimes very big) distance. I can see, fast, how even that interaction with my boyfriend might make him suspicious the next time he knows I don’t want to do something and I don’t say it. He might not trust what I’m not saying, and that makes it even harder to trust what I do say.

That sucks, and that’s a relationship dynamic that gets seeded, soiled, and watered slowly but surely, until there’s a weird weed in your garden that you didn’t want and is fucking up the roses.

White lies make the relationship about comfort, not truth. And the more we get used to lying to “protect” others, or make things easy, the easier it becomes to lie about everything and anything.

The truth is creative

It’s also as uncreative as I’ve ever seen. Get fucking creative in your truth-telling.

Circling back to that woman on Instagram: Ya know what she could have said to the “stranger” in the grocery store asking her about baking?

1. “I’m so sorry, I’m with my children and I’m not available for a conversation right now” — not a lie, just not engaging. (creating a boundary)

2. “I am a good baker, thank you” (and walks off)

3. “I am a good baker and I’m not interested in a conversation.”

4. Just not answering. Walking away. It’s so simple. If you have the mindset that you “don't owe this person anything,” then literally don’t! It’s not worth the cost of lying, teaching your child it’s okay to lie (and watch how they start lying to you), and bastardizing values.

We’re all imperfect.

But we have to get off the slippery slope—the one that trades integrity for ease.

I think that’s the real test of character: telling the truth when it would be simpler not to. Virtue doesn’t mean life gets easier—it means we stay aligned when it gets hard. That’s what keeps things real.

Try actually not lying, not even white lies, for 30 days. If you do, I actually want to know, and I want to hear how it went for you.

And watch, truly, how your life and being transform from just this one thing.

Love,
Val

I’m writing every day right now. If you missed one or want to see what’s been written before, click below.