Don’t Lie. We Can Tell.

One of my first posts on here was about the show Lie to Me, which is really cool (the show, not the post).  The post itself was really more filler that I wanted to have on there for when we launched publicly.  You could read it here, but don’t.

Anywho, this morning in our men’s leadership study, we were talking about having friends that can call us up and make us better, not buddies that always agree with us and don’t genuinely help us.  We need to have friends that we can be honest with and we can tell them that we are not doing well when in fact we are not doing well. 

I told them that if someone asks you how you are, you should only say good if you are good.  I also told them that I know when you’re lying from watching the show Lie to Me.  I am certainly no expert, but I am learning to read people better.  Here is what we do.  First, we make this face:

Or you can scrunch your nose and/or raise an eyebrow.
Or you can scrunch your nose and/or raise an eyebrow.

Then we say with a high pitched voice, “good, I’m good.”  Wrong, that is a lie.  Some of us will go to the next tell of touching/rubbing the face or fidgeting with our hair.  Again, lie.

I said all of that this morning in part to be funny, but there was an unintended consequence.  When we broke up into small groups, guys didn’t know how to answer each other’s questions.  All we know sometimes is to scrunch our face and squeak out a good.  When asked how work is we have to rub our face and show stress before we lie and say that we are “fine.” 
I now pass this on to you.  Hopefully, now you will be aware of your own “tells” that expose your dishonesty.  This perhaps can encourage you to trust your friends more, go deeper in your relationships, and tell the truth about how we feel.  We need each other to make it, but to do that we need each other to be honest.

Comments

One Response to “Don’t Lie. We Can Tell.”
  1. Steve Manatt says:

    Good word Charlie. The other side of the coin you are talking about is how we should respond when someone actually risks to say something other than “fine.” Let us not take that lightly and recognize the trust that comes in going deep and what a privilege it is. Consequently, let us take the time to give God enough room to use that interaction to build real community.

    We will be more prone to share our hearts if we know that people are asking because they want to know what’s really going on. So, if you ask me that question, be prepared for more than a 15 second conversation. If you don’t have the time, don’t ask because I’ll assume that if you are asking, you REALLY want to know.

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