Where there’s dishonesty, there will be drama
This truth in our personal lives is playing out on a wider scale too
When we or others are unable or unwilling to be honest - either with ourselves or in relationships- or indeed in the way we regard our wider society - then drama is bound to appear at some point. Chaos even.
Let’s look at how we are dishonest with ourselves first. In a loving way - because we’re all here, we all struggle, and because truth and love are best mates - it’s hard to witness reality without pouring bucket loads of kindness over it.
And the world isn’t always kind, which means there are plenty of seemingly legitimate reasons to be dishonest, especially if our ego is in the driving seat that particular day. We think we need to lie - to ourselves, or to others, to get where we want or what we want. We actually think we need to be dishonest to AVOID drama, arguments, disconnection, conflict or rejection. In an imperfect world, that might be the case for a short period, but it never works out like that in the end.
When we lie, we are resisting reality. This means a tension then builds up between the reality and the lie we tell ourselves. It gets worse if we then act on the basis of believing that lie. Through our will, we are building up a force of energy that moves against the flow of reality.
It doesn’t matter whether it’s legitimate or not, understandable or not. There’s no blame here. The simple fact is, when we refuse to accept reality, we generate tension, like two poles of a magnet opposing each other.
Dealing with the devil - or rather our ego! Ego likes to lie to save its skin.
We do it for all sorts of reasons.
It can be painful to face up to ourselves, our own behaviour falling short - or even our own feelings falling short of where we wish they were.
Maybe we are scared of being rejected, so we tell someone we are doing what they approve of when we aren’t.
Maybe there’s peer group or family pressure to accept something and act on something that seems untrue.
The thing is it doesn’t matter how legitimate the fear seems - when we are unwilling or unable to be honest , we are asking for a whole ton of drama to come crashing down sooner or later, depending on how long and how heavily we’ve been hiding from the truth.
We all do this to a certain extent. Even white lies, like ‘these calories don’t count’. (I’m not for counting calories, I think we should all eat what we want, this is just an example).
All that happens is reality catches us with us later - and we may find that we have a rude awakening with a pair of jeans and nothing else to wear that fits. Drama.
Or a more intense example - we lie in a relationship to our partners. We say we are happy when we aren’t. Then suddenly other people start looking attractive. Then maybe we forget what we weren’t happy about and start moving down a route that can lead to a lot of drama.
This is true for jobs, relationships, projects in our personal lives.
For me, dishonesty includes perfectionism.
My personal nemesis has been my unwillingness to be honest and face that I am human and can’t do everything. Or that I will, despite my best efforts, make mistakes. In the past this has led to a lot of drama, as I say yes to things I can’t do, impossible deadlines, or refuse to accept help. I rationalise and argue for why the mistake is right. And then a whole ton of drama when the truth is revealed, I let people down, I miss the deadline or my body conks out, exhausted from how hard I’ve been running it. The mistake is compounded as I don’t address the root cause.
My self pity party after I refuse to accept I can’t run the world single handedly and do all the things.
The longer we hold onto a lie, the more we act it out with others, it picks up people and emotional energy and whatever force we’ve applied to suppress it so when what’s really true comes out - it comes out more violently and dramatically than it would have had we been willing to face it earlier.
This can happen on a large scale too - it is now playing out rather dramatically re Brexit and this current government. Fucking drama everywhere.
When we get honest, we avoid drama.
It's hard and it’s vulnerable, especially in a world when being honest is sometimes seen as weakness. Or when people don’t want to hear our honesty. It seems like being honest is not rewarded by society - or by people around us. But our peace of mind is. And that’s a big fucking reward, a soul reward, not an ego one.
Zero judgement here - sometimes it takes a while for us to develop our courage muscle and practise this. At first the telling the truth can be so charged that it comes out messy! All our fear and defensiveness comes out too. But that’s OK - it’s a process.
Sometimes we are in denial and don’t even know we are lying. If drama is showing up for you and you don’t think you are being dishonest, well - it might be worth investigating if you’re in denial about something. And be loving and gentle there. Nothing or no one wants to show up only to be condemned. That’s why it hid in the first place.
Be compassionate to yourself and to others if you struggle with hearing honesty or being honest. But honesty - without the charge of just offloading or whatever - is always going to be less climatic, dramatic and chaotic in the long run.
Not being honest doesn't always look like lying and stealing and cheating! Sometimes it can look like
- denying what you want even though you really want it (drama down the road later when you wake up to a situation you don’t like and then have to reverse everything)
- denying your feelings got hurt (you don't have to spray them everywhere but you do at least need to be honest with yourself) - drama because the emotional energy doesn’t go away
- escaping from reality (hey I am hugely uncomfortable about an issue so I am going to buy a new dress!)
- denying you have human limitations
- denying your body what it needs to survive (not eating or sleeping then you get ill - body drama)
- pretending you never or have never done the thing that you are blaming someone else for (drama because you are way angry at something you could understand - doesn’t mean it’s OK, or you have to tolerate it, but it does mean you don’t need to self detonate)
- saying the issue is bigger than it is (hey it’s ok to have big feelings about a small issue)
- pretending someone can meet your needs when they are incapable. (then drama when you get mad and hurt at them for not meeting your needs when you knew they were unavailable)
- putting yourself in a situation where it is likely something bad will happen (hey I’m going to move in with this person I don’t know who I’ve heard bad things about then act surprised when they turn out awful)
This is not about blame, it’s about avoiding drama. Which is a much more effective use of time and energy. And it’s a work in progress. For us all.
As far as politics goes, we are all responsible for creating a type of society where we can witness uncomfortable truths, the reality of where we are right now and still work towards building a better world.