100% honest

Being 100% honest is a great ideal but the costs are high.

“From what I have observed, I think you are mentally weak”

“My God, you’re boring!”

“Have you noticed that you are getting progressively fatter?”

“No I won’t be meeting you for drinks because I find you unbearable”

Pretty soon we would be friendless, jobless and all alone.

Therefore we aspire to honesty but sparingly employ tactics to avoid it whenever it conflicts with our goals.

We feign deafness.

We hesitate to answer.

We tell white lies.

We omit the truth.

We outwardly agree with inane ideas but bitch about the plans to others.

We can’t go too far into falsehood forest otherwise we’ll have a breakdown and we already know what happens with the other extreme.

So we walk a tightrope through the grey area.

Not too much honesty. Not too much lying.

So, we can feel like we’re being true to ourselves while minimizing the damage to others.

Hat tip to Mr. Peck for the inspiration for this one.