On the other side of honesty

Yesterday, I gave you two scenarios that involved honesty. In Scenario 1, you are speaking about someone who is not present. In Scenario 2, you are speaking directly to the person.

I want you to compare these scenarios for two reasons.

The first reason is because both scenarios happen every day. You have daily opportunities to speak honestly about people and directly to people. You speak about a family member or to the family member, about a friend or to the friend, about a teammate or to the teammate.

The second reason is because people do not have difficulty being honest about someone or something. They have difficulty being honest with someone. They don’t struggle to tell the truth. They struggle to tell the truth to someone.

It turns out that honesty is not difficult as long as the person you are talking to is not the subject of your honesty. You have no trouble being honest if the person you are talking about is not in the room. Put that person in the room, however, and now honesty is hard?

Let that realization sink in.

Here’s what it means: Honesty is not hard. Honesty is easy. You get excited to express yourself honestly. Everyone does. Honesty can feel like a relief, as evidenced by how much honesty comes out with energy and conviction when the person is not in the room.

Honesty is not the hard part. The consequences you anticipate from honesty are the hard part.

If you struggle with honesty, it is because you are struggling with the consequences of your honesty, not the act itself. And not always the consequences themselves, but your expectation of consequences—your anticipation, your imagination of consequences.

You tell yourself that honesty is hard. You’ve said it for so long and heard others say it, too, that you believe it and accept it as accurate. But it is not accurate.

You don’t struggle with honesty. You struggle with the consequences of honesty, both real and imagined.

That opens a whole new set of questions and considerations about our integrity and character.

Event + Response = Outcome. Do the work.