Honesty is the Best Policy

Good evening, class,

Honesty is a very broad word, and we could see it from many different points of view. On this particular occasion, I want to focus on self-honesty (being honest with ourselves). In my opinion, it is the most important kind of honesty since true change and healing cannot occur in its absence.

I would like you to take one minute and think of an answer to this question: Are you completely honest with yourself? Whatever your answer is, I am pretty sure your answers may vary, but I am also sure of the fact that right now, as you answered the question, you were not honest with yourselves. I do believe that for some reason, people feel the need to lie constantly. They feel that they are very good at doing it, and that no one would be able to catch them. We humans have this in our minds as a part of our nature. When I write and talk about honesty, several instances come to mind where this so-called self-honesty is put to the test. Now, please take another minute to think of whether or not you have taken an aptitude test. If you have, did you answer the questions honestly or did you just create an imaginary reality of what you wanted your results to be in regards to the career you wanted to study? Mmm…it is quite simple, isn’t it? Nevertheless, even in this case, I still believe you could be lacking self-honesty while replying. In any case, another instance comes to mind; I want to you think back and tell yourself if you have taken a personality test? In my view, most people do not answer the questions honestly even though it is something so personal. What happens in this situation is that people create a perfect model of who they would like to be, and not who they truly are. Even if that model is very remote from their reality, it is still the reality they want for themselves. People manipulate this kind of tests because at the end of the day, they merely desire to get the perfect results for someone like their imaginary selves, their models. A few weeks ago, I remembered there was a personality test I had taken not too long ago and decided to make an experiment with my closest friends. I did not tell them my results so it would not affect theirs in any way. I picked people that I knew very well and asked them to be completely honest. Yet, the results were not quite what a person that knows them the way I do would expect. However, I had taken the time to interview them indirectly to try to find out what kind of person they had interest in being. Some results matched the results I had gotten from my interviews, but truth be told, most of them did exactly what I expected them to do: They answered according to the perfect model of themselves that they have. This proves that people cannot be honest even when there is not a clear adverse consequence to it because they want to keep their shell intact. They do not want to feel that they are showing themselves just the way they are since they also fear others might take advantage of it. Therefore, lying is seen as some sort of shield that protects people from what they might consider unsafe.

All in all, this has helped me come to the realization that people cannot be one hundred percent authentic, for this could leave them unconcealed and cause others to take advantage of their vulnerability, maybe, or any other characteristics that may apply. One thing is for sure: if you cannot be honest with yourself, how in the world do you expect to be honest with others? You simply cannot, and bearing this in mind would really help you be careful out there and get by on that special model of your true selves, but also be careful not to be deceived by other peoples’ models.

Stanly Santos