Quotes About Honesty

If you don't say what you think then you kill your unborn self.

If your life is not what it could be, try telling the truth. If you cling desperately to an ideology, or wallow in nihilism, try telling the truth. If you feel weak and rejected, and desperate, and confused, try telling the truth. In Paradise, everyone speaks the truth. That is what makes it Paradise. Tell the truth. Or, at least, don't lie.

If you betray yourself, if you say untrue things, if you act out a lie, you weaken your character.

Don't use language instrumentally

If you will not reveal yourself to others, you cannot reveal yourself to yourself. That does not only mean that you suppress who you are, although it also means that. It means that so much of what you could be will never be forced by necessity to come forward.

Ask yourself what you would require to be motivated to undertake the job, honestly, and listen to the answer. Don't tell yourself, "I shouldn't need to do that to motivate myself." What do you know about yourself? You are, on the one hand, the most complex thing in the entire universe, and on the other, someone who can't even set the clock on your microwave. Don't over-estimate your self-knowledge.

In Paradise, everyone speaks the truth. That is what makes it Paradise. Tell the truth. Or, at least, don't lie.

When you have something to say, silence is a lie—and tyranny feeds on lies.

If we lived in Truth; if we spoke the Truth - then we could walk with God once again, and respect ourselves, and others, and the world. Then we might treat ourselves like people we cared for. We might strive to set the world straight. We might orient it toward Heaven, where we would want people we cared for to dwell, instead of Hell, where our resentment and hatred would eternally sentence everyone.

Truth reduces the terrible complexity of a man to the simplicity of his word,

Taking the easy way out or telling the truth—those are not merely two different choices. They are different pathways through life. They are utterly different ways of existing.

But there will be times in your life when it will take everything you have to face what is in front of you, instead of hiding away from a truth so terrible that the only thing worse is the falsehood you long to replace it with.

telling people you're virtuous isn't a virtue, it's self-promotion. Virtue signalling is not virtue. Virtue signalling is, quite possibly, our commonest vice.)

Dare, instead, to be dangerous. Dare to be truthful. Dare to articulate yourself, and express (or at least become aware of) what would really justify your life.

truth, virtue, and courage are not necessarily enough, but they are our best bet.

Collect a hundred, or a thousand, of those, and your life is miserable and your marriage doomed. Do not pretend you are happy with something if you are not, and if a reasonable solution might, in principle, be negotiated. Have the damn fight. Unpleasant as that might be in the moment, it is one less straw on the camel's back.

What shall I do with a lying man? Let him speak so he may reveal himself.

A good therapist will tell you the truth about what he thinks. (That is not the same thing as telling you that what he thinks is the truth.) Then at least you have the honest opinion of at least one person. That's not so easy to get. That's not nothing. That's key to the psychotherapeutic process: two people tell each other the truth—and both listen.

ourselves properly, we would have to respect ourselves—but we don't, because we are—not least in our own eyes—fallen creatures. If we lived in Truth; if we spoke the Truth—then we could walk with God once again, and respect ourselves, and

Bread is of little use to the man who has betrayed his soul, even if he is currently starving.

most lies are acted out, rather than told

If you haven't done anything wrong, do not apologize.

If you betray yourself, if you say untrue things, if you act out a lie, you weaken your character. If you have a weak character, then adversity will mow you down when it appears, as it will, inevitably. You will hide, but there will be no place left to hide. And then you will find yourself doing terrible things.

What should you do, when you don't know what to do? Tell the truth.