Why Do I Lie?
I decided to dig deeper and I went on to write about why do I lie. It is a very strange and taboo topic as a writer, but this is also a random epiphany that hits me when I was traveling back from Dental. If not the line is not drawn well, anything could be considered as lying. One of the examples that I commonly faced and felt is unmet expectations. Another thing would be pure lying, of course. It is also interesting to note that I would create a whole new persona and lie. It could be me going into chatrooms, me getting to know people virtually through a crafted persona and so forth. It is through the interactions where I would tweak certain aspects of the narrative. I lie to myself a lot too, from Denial, from only looking at the good of someone, and ignoring the bad. I make up reasons, stories, just to romanticize people, just so it is an excuse for me to stay in the state of depress.
I am pretty...well...damaged. Not that I am batshit crazy (yet), but there are several characteristics of my mental wellbeing that points to bad self-care. This might be one of the brutal pieces of work that I had worked on, and throughout writing, I decided to turn off everything and just focus on writing this piece of work. Maybe it is me facing myself and forcing myself to answer the uncomfortable question. Maybe it is just me. Let me apologize in advance if it sounds like a listicle, but I kinda list out the reason why I lie and slowly dig alittle deeper and work on it.
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It Helps Me To Cope
As funny as it sounds, lying helps me to cope with depression and anxiety. Creating a persona and talking to people is a strange form of escapism for me. Becoming someone else, makes me feel smarter, makes me feel that I am a better person and makes me feel that I don't have depression, nor am I anxious. Playing a therapist allows me to give back and be better. Being somebody else allows me to hide from the pain and the ghosts that haunt me. The monsters can't recognize me when I am under another persona's skin. Though I won't stay there forever, it helps me to breathe and cope every now and then.
Crafting Narrative Gives Me Control
Lying about things gives me control. It is utterly funny and ridiculous to say that, but it gives me absolute control to shape whatever I want. It helps me to feel less anxious if I don't want to disappoint, it helps me to be more confident if I need to, it helps me to make the characters in the narrative better. Though not done often unless my mental health screams help, lying helps me to stop being anxious, mostly.
It Makes Me Feels Normal
This happens when I am broken and I couldn't cope. I didn't dare to tell anyone that I am considering therapy, that I am seeking help and listening ears, that I am constantly assessing my mental wellbeing. The most commonly used sentence is, "I'm okay, I just needed time to be alone", since I would always close up when I am sad now. I figured it is also an easy way out since I don't have to dive into my problems and bring people down.
I Live For Romanticism
I lie to myself, and sometimes others in regard to this. I love to paint my love like the paintings in the cathedral. Maybe it is alittle bit of over glorifying, but I always would leave out the bad and only tell myself the good. This unhealthy romanticism makes it harder for me to move on when I only look at one side of the scale. They say a person has both good and bad, but not allowing myself to see the bad ruins myself in a lot of ways. This is not limited to lovers but sometimes friends as well, I was once in a very toxic friendship where he would hurl verbal abuses and hurt em but I stayed because I love him (as a friend, I'm straight. Thanks). It was until one day that I decided that I am done, and I am happy that I'm done. I also lie to myself when I sent postcards to people that I have loved but left, something that I badly need to fix.
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Writing out not only helps me to be more aware, but also allows me to be honest with myself. I know it is never good to lie, be it white or black, sometimes the truth isn't meant to set us free. But then again, how do we define the state of ultimate freedom? When there is no truth to hold us back? or when there is a lie to cover up the truth that hurts us? This exercise actually allows me to understand myself more, and hopefully, I can better assess and be better. Maybe not lying to myself sometimes will do me lesser hurt in the long run, and this is probably the self-care that I eventually need to fix myself.
*not sure if I would post this, but it is actually pretty theraputic to write it all down
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