Medically reviewed by Elizabeth Erban, LMFT, IMH-E
Updated June 8, 2023by BetterHelp Editorial Team
If you can be dishonest frequently, whether on accident or on purpose, it’s natural to feel worried. After all, lying can harm your relationships and have a negative impact on your personal and professional life.
However, the fact of the matter is that almost no one is completely truthful all the time. In one Notre Dame University study, people told around eleven lies per week, for example.Most people lie from time to time even though lying is a bad habit. Some people tell little white lies to keep them calm, but some people tend to lie frequently as a way to get ahead. Nearly everyone agrees that telling the truth is better than telling lies and offers a greater sense of well-being in life. So, understanding this lying habit or compulsion from its root will help unlearn
A therapist can help you set achievable goals, form different habits, move past pathological lying, and identify mental health issues that are contributing to your lying. The first thing to understand when talking about pathological dishonesty is the difference between involuntary and normal behavior. If you’re trying to learn ways to improve or looking to live a more honest life, it’s important to do some self-reflection and look at your behavior – such as underlying reasons – that lead up to telling a tie.
What is uncontrollable dishonesty?
If you find yourself telling a friend she looks great even when her new dress is not your style, or telling your partner that you love the meal they’ve cooked, even though it’s not the best, that’s not compulsive lying. Those are considered ‘white lies.’ It’s something we tell that doesn’t hurt anyone and also keeps them from getting hurt. These types of small lies are generally forgiven and forgivable, even if the person never knows you lied. People tend to do this out of habit in daily life as a better response than an unnecessary harsh truth. The goal is to create better relationships.
Then there are gray lies, which are not complete untruths but are subtle lies we tell most frequently to other people. Lying is also a natural reaction to the fear of the unacceptance of the truth. Sometimes these lies can stem from anxiety, or feeling nervous, sad, upset, angry, or mad and trying to take it out in a different way. If done often enough over a long period, this pattern may become an addiction to lying, especially if you grew up around parents who were often deceptive or who withheld facts from you.
If you often find yourself lying more frequently about more things out of a bad habit, you may be a compulsive or pathological liar. People who lie compulsively often do it to:
· Make themselves look better
· Gain some sort of personal benefit
· Control someone else
· Cover up their bad behavior or avoid serious consequences
· Because it’s second nature
· Avoid losing loved ones and jobs when they are caught lying in the first place
· Mask their true feelings about a scenario
This addiction and maladaptation is something a psychologist can help with; they can help you to understand your needs and may be able to point to where these symptoms or actions stem from.
For example, low self-esteem may cause someone to use dishonesty to belittle or gaslight others. If you constantly put yourself last, you may lie to spare someone’s feelings no matter what it costs you.
Research and articles are also excellent resources that can help you to better understand the stories you tell yourself and the purposes for your dishonest compulsions. Choose only high-quality sources that are backed by recent research. Refer to scientific publications that have an editor-in-chief or articles and websites that end in .gov. If you carefully screen content, accurate and up-to-date information can help you make better decisions to end your streak of dishonesty.
Why not lie?
As you begin your journey toward telling the truth consistently, it may be helpful to remember why it is important not to lie and how damaging the effects of dishonesty can be. For example, this study of college students showed an association between daily lying and worse academic performance, self-esteem, and quality of life. Here are some additional reasons you may want to form a truthful habit.
Telling the truth is easier than lying
It’s a whole lot easier to tell the truth, even though you may feel tempted to lie. Think about all those times you’ve told lies instead of the truth. Keeping track of every single lie you’ve said, especially when they’re about your personal life can be exhausting. You must remember everything you said to this person or that person when you lie out of habit.
If you tell the truth, you don’t have to struggle to remember how to cover the tracks of lying behavior with more lies. You can just relax. Even more so, you won’t feel bad later because you were dishonest.
Lies often start as something that may seem small or insignificant but could end up costing you or someone else in a way you didn’t intend. Can you think of any ways that lying has cost you or someone else something you wouldn’t have had to pay?
Omission is the same as lying
If you fail to tell important information to someone, even when you know it’s necessary, it’s the same as lying. If someone is looking for their phone and you know where it is but don’t tell them, that is still an example of dishonest behavior.
It may not seem as obvious as telling a lie outright, but if you’re ready to practice some radical honesty, lies of omission also must stop. It is important to stop lying and telling the truth, or you will have to face the consequences which build up for a lying person over time.
The truth will likely come out
You may have already experienced the consequences of this one. If you’re not telling the truth, sooner or later an unexpected social interaction will probably occur that exposes your lies.
Your long-estranged mother might walk into the office one day to tell your receptionist all about that great party you threw for her last weekend. Or your close friend will stop by the soup kitchen you (supposedly) volunteer at every Friday and hear that you’ve never actually been there.
The smallest lies can unravel quickly, even when no one is intending to prove you wrong, and you will be left with the consequences of the habit of lying. People will no longer trust you and more than one relationship may be damaged.
The truth may stop being so scary
Sometimes people lie to feel a sense of safety or to hide something about themselves they don’t think others will like or accept. It can be hard to take a leap of faith that people will accept you as you are, not a person you fabricated or tried to make “better” in some way.
Consider giving the people in your life a chance, and you might be surprised in a great way when you discover they can digest it.
So just how are you going to stop lying and begin to tell the truth? It’s often not an easy process to stop lying, but over time and with the right resources, you can create better habits for yourself that reduce your instinct to lie. Here are some considerations to think about when making a sincere attempt to stop lying and make a change for the better if you think you may have a lying problem.
Make yourself accountable
Sometimes it feels tempting to do things if we think we’ll be able to get away with it or that it isn’t a big deal. How will you feel about that decision to lie to a person later though? Be accountable to yourself whenever you speak, and make sure you tell the truth, even if no one can find out you lied in certain situations.
Focus on being honest with yourself about why you’re lying as well-what do you hope to accomplish? What is your end game? What is easier in this situation about lying versus telling the truth? Remember, with lying, there are often consequences more severe than the truth.
Start small
It’s overwhelming to think you must change all at once to stop. Lies can become an addictive part of your life. Instead, start by telling people a few true things every day. Set a goal for yourself. Don’t say “I won’t lie today” because that can be very hard to achieve at the beginning of your process. Set a specific goal on how many true things you’ll say that day about yourself. Maybe you start with three or four, but you want to start small and work your way up from there to stop lying.
Before you know it, you’re going to be in the habit of telling the truth, and you’ll see the immensely positive impact it has on your relationships and your overall life.
Decrease stress
For some people, lying can be a stress reaction. Something may have been happening where you felt so overwhelmed that you could not think straight enough to feel like you could come up with a good answer, and the result ended up being a lie. Lying serves to take the pressure off in this way. Sometimes, people are genuinely not aware they’re telling lies if lying is an almost automatic stress reaction. In these types of cases, someone else might be calling your attention to the reality that what you said was untrue.
Learning some healthy methods to identify and cope with stress could help this type of lying. Over time the consequences of the habit of lying and not telling the truth inevitably lead to more stress.
BetterHelp can support you in improving and recovering from bad habits
If you’re struggling with stopping lying and would like to recover from lying as a coping mechanism, therapy can support you in curbing the habit. Therapy is a personal experience, and not everyone will go to it seeking the same things whether to stop bad habits or otherwise. Keeping this in mind can ensure that you will get the most out of online therapy for lying, regardless of what your specific goals are.
If you want to get help, but you have trouble finding the time, BetterHelp can help you find a therapist that can work with your schedule. BetterHelp is an online platform that allows you to speak with trained therapists from the comfort of your home. You won’t have to worry about stuffy waiting rooms or uncomfortable conversations with a new counselor. A therapist can help you work through your reasons for lying, as well as give you tools and resources to stop lying, such as daily strategies or connections with a support group with people with similar issues. You’ll have someone who cares and is ready to share feedback about your behavior.
Your therapist may also be able to recommend appropriate resources for learning about lying and how to manage it. For example, they may let you know that the website you’ve been referring to isn’t backed by research and suggest a study or other helpful report that includes strategies for how to stop lying.
Additionally, recent peer-reviewed studies suggest that online therapy is just as effective for treating common mental health conditions as in-person therapy, providing similar levels of improvement over time and, in some cases, a higher level of patient comfort and self-led progress.
Takeaway
Even though you might be comfortable with the way you’re coping, there’s always a better way. You deserve to feel free from the stress and discomfort that comes from your compulsive lying, and the people around you don’t deserve to be manipulated through lying. Take the first step today and find a therapist who can help you stop lying and start telling the truth instead so you can improve your relationships and experience personal growth. Whether online or at their practice, mental health professionals can offer you the tools to overcome pathological lying. **
