Is Honesty Really the Best Policy?

From an early age you are are usually led to believe that honesty is always the best policy. It is obviously easier for parents and teachers to present children with a black-and-white view of the world where telling the truth is always desirable and lying is wrong. However, as you get older, you realise that life tends not to be as simple as that. Sometimes, it is tact that leads you to slightly distort the truth, whilst there are other times when you don't directly lie, but find yourself omitting certain facts. You often base your decision about whether to be honest or not on the likely outcome.

If your girlfriend asks you if you think she looks fat in what she's wearing, you may tell a little white lie to spare her feelings. You may even try to guide her into changing her outfit by telling her you think she looks gorgeous when she puts her short, black dress on, so that you actually pay her a compliment and make her feel good about herself. If your girlfriend or wife has put on a few pounds and she is feeling down about it, you obviously don't want to upset someone you care about and so you have to realise being honest may not always go down well.

When it comes to your personal life, whether honesty is the best policy or not depends on who you are lying to and what you are lying about. Telling your girlfriend you love her new haircut when she is feeling self-conscious about it may not be a bad thing, but if you lie about having a gambling habit and the fact you're in serious debt is not going to solve anything and will only lead to further problems. There are some issues that you shouldn't lie about, especially if your lies are going to hurt other people and could get you into trouble with the law.

Outside of your personal life, there is also your professional life to consider. You may think nothing of telling the occasional lie to a friend or relative if it for their own good, but when it comes to your job, lying could end up getting you into trouble. If you lie on your CV in order to get a job, you may be happy with your initial success, only to find a few weeks or months later that you are fired, having been found out. If you lie to colleagues about the amount of work you've done and frequently tell lies, you will get caught and this will reflect poorly on you.

In most cases, honesty probably is the best policy, especially when the likelihood is that your lies are going to be discovered eventually, anyway. However, there are occasions when it is kinder to tell a small lie to spare someone's feelings and other times when it is just easier to tell a lie than to give a full explanation of the truth. It all depends on the situation you find yourself in and how you decide to react.