When trying to make any changes in your life, honesty truly is the best policy.
Most of us know that lying to others isn’t a great thing to do but we’ve all done it to get out something every now and again. These white lies can actually help us socially quite a lot. Who really wants to hear the truth when they’re not looking their best!
However, often we could benefit by being a bit more truthful with ourselves. These white lies can hold us back the most, preventing us from changing our behaviours or other aspects of our lives.
Sometimes this is called denial.
“I haven’t got a problem.”
“There’s nothing wrong.”
“Things aren’t that bad.”
“I didn’t do anything wrong, it was due to…”
Sometimes it’s self-delusion.
“I´ll start the diet tomorrow.”
“Just one more.”
“When my anxiety improves, I´ll…”
“I´ll change when I get some time off.”
“If I just wait until this changes then I´ll…”
“I´ll leave this relationship when…"
You get the picture. There can be endlessly creative ways in which we convince ourselves (and sometimes try to convince others) that it’s not the time to change or we might do it tomorrow.
We all do it.
If we do it enough we end up feeling stuck, frustrated and unfulfilled.
Admitting that we’ve got a problem and we want to do something about it is the first step. The next step is being honest to yourself about how and when unhelpful behaviours show up in your life to delay the opportunity to make these changes happen.
This self-honesty is the next key step to lasting behaviour change and I invite you to enquire as to where you may be skirting this reality in your life right now.
Are there areas in your life that you would like to change?
How might you be deceiving yourself that you will change and delaying or denying the issue?
What’s a positive action that you could take today towards that change?