Is honesty always the best policy or does there come a point when being so becomes a hazard? Should it matter?
By Susan Creamer Joy - Monday 19 Dec 2011
Getting right to the point, honesty can be a brutal tactic in relationships and often rings the death knell no matter how long-standing or steadfast we may perceive those bonds as being. The application of legitimate honesty requires a certain bravado and a controlled ability to step apart from sentiment and sympathy, as well a tremendous resolve to remove oneself from all subjective attachment to a desired outcome.
Of course, this runs counter to our sacred perception of intimate relationships as being safe havens of mutual respect and unconditional support where the first rule of thumb is to make each other happy. Once you throw complete honesty into the mix, your rule, by default, now includes your middle finger causing happiness to cower well behind outrage.
Think about it. While we might appreciate a friend’s partial honesty in alerting us to the fact that we’ve exited the restroom at a fine restaurant with a white streamer of toilet paper cascading down the back of our Ann Taylor skirt, we are not necessarily grateful to learn that an entire table of businessmen were pointing at us and snickering as we passed by.
Some layers of truth we simply do not need to know.
Elderly people are noted as being unflinchingly honest. I suppose it is because for the most part they’ve outlived the meat of the game and are no longer dependent upon the judgements of others to bolster their self-esteem. We expect them to finally capitalize on all those years of experience by handing us a neat bottom line.
The good news is that while accepting honest counsel from an elderly friend or relative may require the same emotional vetting as it would coming from anyone else, it never seems to sting as much. Old Aunt Gert can reveal to us something about ourselves that coming from a close friend or a peer might throw us into a huge funk and make us reconsider our decision last month to quit drinking.
Perhaps it is because we can say to ourselves that since Aunt Gert no longer hits on all four cylinders upon ignition, any unwelcome remark she makes can be easily chalked up to approaching senility, and we can reason our escape through those gapping moth holes in the fabric of her fading mind.
But what of the friend who has always been a wellspring of comfort and support who now suddenly takes issue with the very things you hold dear? That is when you have to pull out the big guns of philosophical thought and learn to differentiate between the honesty of truth and the honesty of opinion.
Sometimes, you just may have to walk away.
It has taken me several decades of stoic rebounding from recurrent backhanded, filial bruising, but I have finally come to understand that love bent around a discerning movement of gracious withdrawal is often more an act of kindness than is a benevolent drizzle of loyalty to an unworthy constituent of the larger tribe. You don’t do yourself or anyone else any favors by feigning admiration for someone when there is none or by accepting their camaraderie when you suspect it is fraudulent. This does not imply ill-will. It merely suggests that moving on would be best.
Don’t give trouble enough time to find you.
I will say that middle age and its concomitant retrospection appears to make parsing the folly of social intercourse much more logical and the idea of speaking the truth much more necessary. It can mean the difference between advancing toward wisdom and merely committing to another go ‘round the hamster wheel.
It is a fact that honesty is a mandatory component of wisdom and there are no short cuts to that end. This being so, the first person you need to be honest with is yourself. Attempting to live without doing so will only result in half-truths and can lead you toward much greater difficulties – somewhat like learning that the use of oars is an excellent way to navigate the ocean without the understanding that they work only if you are in a boat.
Just because you have both of your oars in the water, it is not necessarily an indication that you are going to get anywhere.
Honestly.
Of course, this runs counter to our sacred perception of intimate relationships as being safe havens of mutual respect and unconditional support where the first rule of thumb is to make each other happy. Once you throw complete honesty into the mix, your rule, by default, now includes your middle finger causing happiness to cower well behind outrage.
Think about it. While we might appreciate a friend’s partial honesty in alerting us to the fact that we’ve exited the restroom at a fine restaurant with a white streamer of toilet paper cascading down the back of our Ann Taylor skirt, we are not necessarily grateful to learn that an entire table of businessmen were pointing at us and snickering as we passed by.
Some layers of truth we simply do not need to know.
Elderly people are noted as being unflinchingly honest. I suppose it is because for the most part they’ve outlived the meat of the game and are no longer dependent upon the judgements of others to bolster their self-esteem. We expect them to finally capitalize on all those years of experience by handing us a neat bottom line.
The good news is that while accepting honest counsel from an elderly friend or relative may require the same emotional vetting as it would coming from anyone else, it never seems to sting as much. Old Aunt Gert can reveal to us something about ourselves that coming from a close friend or a peer might throw us into a huge funk and make us reconsider our decision last month to quit drinking.
Perhaps it is because we can say to ourselves that since Aunt Gert no longer hits on all four cylinders upon ignition, any unwelcome remark she makes can be easily chalked up to approaching senility, and we can reason our escape through those gapping moth holes in the fabric of her fading mind.
But what of the friend who has always been a wellspring of comfort and support who now suddenly takes issue with the very things you hold dear? That is when you have to pull out the big guns of philosophical thought and learn to differentiate between the honesty of truth and the honesty of opinion.
Sometimes, you just may have to walk away.
It has taken me several decades of stoic rebounding from recurrent backhanded, filial bruising, but I have finally come to understand that love bent around a discerning movement of gracious withdrawal is often more an act of kindness than is a benevolent drizzle of loyalty to an unworthy constituent of the larger tribe. You don’t do yourself or anyone else any favors by feigning admiration for someone when there is none or by accepting their camaraderie when you suspect it is fraudulent. This does not imply ill-will. It merely suggests that moving on would be best.
Don’t give trouble enough time to find you.
I will say that middle age and its concomitant retrospection appears to make parsing the folly of social intercourse much more logical and the idea of speaking the truth much more necessary. It can mean the difference between advancing toward wisdom and merely committing to another go ‘round the hamster wheel.
It is a fact that honesty is a mandatory component of wisdom and there are no short cuts to that end. This being so, the first person you need to be honest with is yourself. Attempting to live without doing so will only result in half-truths and can lead you toward much greater difficulties – somewhat like learning that the use of oars is an excellent way to navigate the ocean without the understanding that they work only if you are in a boat.
Just because you have both of your oars in the water, it is not necessarily an indication that you are going to get anywhere.
Honestly.