be more honest

I think this has actually changed quite dramatically. I’ve always been in the habit of painting a picture that I think people will want to hear, so even when it wasn’t outright lies it was often not a very accurate representation of how things are. But I’ve changed that a lot. Mostly now I manage to stop and think before I say something that’s not really truthful. Then I ask myself whether I really want to say it. Usually the answer’s ‘no’, which is good. About 1 in 10 times I probably still go ahead and say it, but it’s still a big improvement and it’s getting better all the time.

But I’m a lot more aware of it than I ever used to be and that is a good start. Sometimes I feel like I have to go through little battles with myself about it, but that’s okay – it’s not like everything has to be smooth all the time. So long as it doesn’t turn into an ongoing battle.

I’ve been having a lot of thoughts about it anyway, and when it’s not so late I’ll write some of them…

I’ve started something that might help with this. I won’t go into it on here as it’s perhaps not the easiest thing to talk about at the moment, among other reasons. But I’ll maybe share it at some point later if I get the urge….

Being quite closely linked to 14 this is perhaps improving a little recently.

I’ve been lying my head off recently. Not without good reason, but still…I don’t like it – it makes me uncomfortable, and then there’s that thing I was going on about before, about people always ‘knowing’ in a way when you’re lying. Even if they don’t know they know. All in all it puts distance between people and between you and the world and yourself.

I guess the first step to stopping is to notice when you’re doing it. I’m really going to try and take more notice.

The goal about thinking about what I say/do is kind of linked to this one (in a way it’s a subgoal to this, but also includes other things that wouldn’t come under this heading). I need to think about both more.