Lying to Yourself
Date Posted: December 16th, 2010
From Robert Fritz’s The Path of Least Resistance:
There was a man who woke one day convinced that he was a zombie. When he told his wife he was a zombie, she tried to talk him out of this outrageous opinion.
“You are not a zombie!” she said.
“I am a zombie.” he answered.
“What makes you think you are a zombie?” she asked rhetorically.
“Don’t you think zombies know they are zombies?” he answered with great sincerity.
His wife realized she was not getting anywhere so she called his mother and told her what was going on. His mother tried to help.
“I’m your mother, wouldn’t I know if I gave birth to a zombie?”
“You didn’t,” he explained, “I became a zombie later.”
“I didn’t raise my son to be a zombie, or especially to think he is a zombie,” his mother pleaded.
“Nonetheless, I am a zombie,” hes said, unmoved by his mother’s appeal to his identity and sense of guilt.
Later that day his wife called in their minister to talk to her husband.
“You are not a zombie, you are probably going through a midlife crisis,” the minister said, trying to be the psychologist he always wanted to be.
“Zombies don’t have midlife crises,” was all the man replied.
The minister recommended a psychiatrist. The wife got an emergency appointment, and within the hour the husband was in the psychiatrist’s office.
“So, you think you are a zombie?” the psychiatrist asked.
“I know I am a zombie,” the man said.
“Tell me, do zombies bleed?” the psychiatrist asked.
“Of course not,” said the man, “zombies are the living dead. They don’t bleed.” The man was a little annoyed at the psychiatrist’s patronizing question.
“Well, watch this,” said the psychiatrist as he picked up a pin. He took the man’s finger and made a tiny pin prick. The man looked at his finger with great amazement and said nothing for three or four minutes.
“What do you know,” the man finally said, “zombies do bleed!”
We lie all the time, to our friends and to ourselves. “That outfit looks great on you.” “I failed the test because the teacher hates me.”
We do it because it avoids awkwardness in the short term. If you say the outfit looks terrible you’ll create drama. If you tell yourself you failed because of you didn’t study you might have to make a change in your life. A little lie is a lot easier than an uncomfortable truth.
Of course, long term, if you lie you’re going to have problems. Example: if you direct your life as a zombie when you’re really a living mortal you might unnecessarily kill people for their brains. Or you might be less cautious since you’re already dead. Or you might stop showering since zombies don’t shower. Bad times for all.
If you don’t think you lie to yourself, you’re lying to yourself right now.
Seriously.
This Week’s Challenge: Write down at least one instance where you lied to yourself. Deep down your heart of hearts knew the truth and you didn’t accept it. Bonus points if other people echoed your heart of hearts. If you’re feeling brave put you answer in the comments.
If you honestly can’t think of anything, ask your significant other or best friend or one of your parents or siblings for help.
We’ll talk more about this next week.
Realistically, I probably won’t work on it this week either. Maybe next week.
