They lied

This comment was made to me by someone who lives in a nearby community. He was saying the organization who sold him his house didn’t keep what he heard as a promise. Even though the organization is taking steps now to remediate the situation, it doesn’t help. The feeling of betrayal swamps the recent experience.

I think this helps to explain some of the bad feelings in our society.  When the leadership states something as a fact that turns out to not be true, you distrust that authority. This happened during the pandemic, and it is happening in our politics now.

Why do people and organizations lie?  Sometimes it is to gain something (including my field of marketing), sometimes it is a habit; they don’t know how to tell the truth.

The effect of repeated lies on people is called gaslighting. Repeated lying causes you to distrust your own reactions.  You don’t know what is true anymore or at least you aren’t sure. I know, I have been through this with someone in my life who was lying about their drinking.

So, what can you do if you are the one being lied to?  The first step is to recognize the lie for what it is. You may not be sure, because your insides are contradicting what the person is telling you. Test it.  Check out other sources of information, what other people say.  Then, you need to accept that it is a lie.  Is this a habit the person has?  Is this a trustworthy person? You may need to mourn that this relationship isn’t what you thought it was, or the person isn’t who you thought it was. Accept the person for who they are.  You can’t change them. You can tell them that you know you are being lied to, but don’t expect them to change. After that, you can decide what to do about it. It may be that you don’t spend as much time with the person or that you cut the person out of your life entirely.

What if you see someone else who is being lied to but perhaps doesn’t realize it?  You can’t change them, but you can act as a trustworthy source for them to use. But you can’t hurry them along the process. They need to be ready.  If the person being lied to isn’t ready to accept that someone is indeed lying, they might cut you off and have no one to rely on when they do realize that they need reliable support.