Honesty - The Best Policy?

Yes, honesty is the best policy. Is it the most used policy? Of course it's not. We are all liars.

Bask in the positivity of that statement my friends and go on about enjoying your Friday. You're welcome.

We lie. We lie to our friends, we lie to our co-workers, we lie to our partners, we lie to our families; hell, we even lie to ourselves. Usually, it's not done in a malicious way. Often, they are little white lies we say in order to keep the peace, save face or not hurt anyone's feelings. Unfortunately, all that we're doing is protecting ourselves; we don't want to deal with the fallout telling the truth may cause.

I'm not saying we need to tell everything all the time - there are times when it's best to keep some things to ourselves. It's probably not in our best interest to tell our boss how many office supplies we "borrow" or our new boo that we've looked at all their photos on Instagram. We might keep to ourselves how our BFF's new love has the most atrocious breath or how much you can't stand your mother-in-law. Unless we're asked directly, there's no need to share some things. Even then, I encourage you to proceed with caution. Many people say they want the truth, but again...they're lying. Don't take it personally, they're mostly lying to themselves.

When it comes to affairs of the heart, the honesty-best-policy issue becomes a lot trickier. All of us believe we want an open and honest relationship, but...we can't let all our crazy everything out at once. Is it a lie if we don't acknowledge we're still working out our feelings about our ex-boo from the 8th grade? Or if we "forget" to mention that several of our FB friends are people who've seen us naked? (Which is why you shouldn't be FB friends with a new boo right away anyway!) While these little white lies of omission can seem harmless, most things eventually come to light.


Several months ago, I dated this guy we'll call Bob. He seemed really nice and we were having a good time getting to know each other. Suddenly, his job informed him that he would be moving halfway around the world for a stint and he was forced to put his personal life on hold (i.e. dating). Given his profession and background, this was a totally believable possibility. To say the least, I was disappointed and was sure the universe was really trying mess with my head. Recently, I learned that while Bob may very well be headed to foreign lands some day, he's also headed down the aisle as he got engaged to someone in the last 6 months.

Bob lied.

In this circumstance, it would have been much less painful for me if Bob had just told the truth - he was a devout Christian who does not feel comfortable with homosexuality. Clearly, he and I would not have made it far since I am an honorary lesbian and have a severe church allergy. I'm not sure why it was difficult for him just to say he wanted a nice church girl who doesn't spend her quality time with the gays, but for whatever reason, he felt compelled to tell me all kinds of little and big lies that led to my faith in men weekend being ruined.

Thank God he is a church-going Christian...that makes his lying less liar-y.