38: Stuck in Lies

Hello, friends, and welcome to Grief Guts and Green Smoothies. I am your host, Melissa Dugalecki, and I am so excited to be here with you all to chat about ways in which we can all get through different adversities, challenges and loss, and how getting outside of our comfort zone and maybe having a green smoothie or two can help us do so. We will cover different topics, ranging from interviews to recipes, to sharing my own stories of my grief journey and the loss of my daughter, Layden. And I'm honored to be able to share her light in hopes of helping you spread yours. Now, let's dive in. All right, friends, we are getting a little bit messy this episode. We're going to get honest by talking about lying. There is a lot of lying that goes on in this world and there are different types of it and there's reasons for it. So if you have ever found yourself lying, maybe a little white lie, maybe a major one, right? Or maybe just avoiding the truth, or if you've been lied to, this episode is going to break down the different types of lying, where it comes from and how to make change and also how to handle it if you're being lied to. So buckle up, we're getting real. It's going to be a little bit bumpy. Let's dive right on in. All right. We are talking all about lying. And lying is something that everybody can relate to. And I think too often when we say the word lying or when we think of lying, we really are referencing really extreme, obvious external lies. You know, when somebody blatantly goes out of their way to tell a mistruth and not going to focus too much on those, we'll hit on them slightly. But I'm talking about the many other types of lying that occur. And the reality is that most of the time they're not intentional. It could be subconscious, but they're habitual. And as they continue to evolve and grow or become more of a habit, that's going to build momentum, right? Because energy grows where energy goes. So if energy is going to not standing in our truths, well, that's what's going to grow. And the reality is, is when we don't stand in our truths, we can't grow as a person. When we're in this spaces of low vibes, we're not going to grow, we're not going to evolve. It's going to keep us stuck. And that's going to manifest by feeling out of alignment, feeling overwhelmed, feeling not clear. We're going to talk about these different types that could be transpiring in your life or in the life of someone that you love. And we talk about them in a way that's nonjudgmental, that leads with curiosity, understanding, so that we can create change and better ourselves, so we have more to give to others. And so there are a few signs of not standing in our truths, not living our truths, and those can surface in different ways. And some signs or symptoms rather, of not standing in our truth, not owning our truth, or just being dishonest right with ourselves or others. Some signs include avoidance. So if we or somebody we know is avoiding certain conversations or topics, a big reason for that could be difficulty standing in the space of their truth. Another sign is difficulty with decision making. When we become very overwhelmed or unable to make decisions, that is a sign that we're unaligned, or we're resistant to standing in our truth for one reason or another. Or if multiple avenues or dynamics of our lives are overlapping and we're not clear maybe on priorities, or we're not honest about priorities with other different avenues, dynamics, or paths. When it comes time to make difficult decisions where we have to set those priorities, it can be really overwhelming. If we haven't been clear and honest with ourselves and with others about the pecking order, then all of a sudden we don't want to make those decisions and we're looking for other people to do it. But pawning off our homework is not going to get us anywhere. Another sign is being really overwhelmed. Similarly to what I just referenced with decision making, if we feel very overwhelmed or even angry or triggered by questions people are asking, that is a sign that we're not standing in our truth or we're not facing our own truth. Because for someone to trigger us that deeply, there's something out of alignment there. Another is if we're really focused on the other person's response more so than we're focused on owning our own truth, our own story, or if our mind first goes to how somebody else is going to reply or respond, rather than to how we control and navigate our own energy. That can also be a sign that we are resistant or struggling to stand in the space of our truth and our energy. And it's really important to be able to do this. I think instinctively, intuitively, we all strive to stand in our truth and be honest. But being honest isn't just about not lying. And I think that's a really important distinction to tease out. Being honest doesn't mean not lying. There's a lot more that goes into truly Being honest. And it starts with being honest with ourselves. As we talk about at length on here, we can't give to others what we don't have within. So if we're not honest with ourselves, how can we be honest with anyone else? We can't. We absolutely cannot. And so, like all energy work that we do here, it begins with ourselves. Right? Holding up that mirror. This is something I became really curious in, not only in my grief journey, but in really studying the four agreements. Right? Being impeccable with our word doesn't just mean not lying. Right? Being impeccable with our word means truly standing in our truths. And there was something really hard for me to do after losing Leiden. I wanted to avoid people who would ask me the question of whether or not I had kids. And the reality is I was avoiding that because it was too painful for me to face my own truth. I had a lot of shame around it. I had a lot of fear around it. You know, after losing Layden, it was really hard for me to be in a position where people might ask me to make plans, because that was so overwhelming. I was having a hard time wrapping my head around my own capacity and what I can do and this new world that I was living in. And so it took a lot of time, a lot of work, a lot of pulling back to understand how to own my own truth, own my own needs, so that I could then communicate it. And quite often, we struggle to share information that we think is going to upset someone. But the reality is that giving people the correct, honest, accurate information is the most responsible and loving thing that we can do. When we're focused on how their reaction is going to make us feel, we're no longer focused on that other person. We're focused on ourselves. So here are some different types of dishonesty that can take place. And there are different terms you can put on them, but these are the ones I see the most frequently. And I think it's important to really understand where it comes from so that we can make change. Because if we don't understand where it comes from, it's impossible to make change. So one is there is shame of our truth. So when we feel shame around our truth, it's really hard to stand in our truth. And when we can't stand in our truth, obviously we can't share our truth. So shame is a really big component as to why we have difficulty being honest. Another reason is a fear of rejection. Now, again, it's important to know when we have a fear of rejection and we lie or we aren't honest about something, or we alter information or we withhold information, it is no longer about the other person. So sometimes we can trick ourselves by saying, well, I don't want to upset them. But the reality isn't that we don't want to upset them, it's that we don't want to feel the impact of them being upset. I think about that. We don't want to feel the impact of them being upset. And if you really think about it, that's truly selfish, right? That's self centered. So that fear of rejection isn't about the other person, it's actually about us. The most loving thing we can do is give people full information and let them make their own decisions and choices accordingly and trust that things will align or they won't. But trying to manipulate or force it isn't going to work, right? And that's going to pop up in a lot of these different types of dishonesty. Another one very similar but different. So I want to untangle the fear of rejection from people pleasing. Those are two different things. One is leading with that fear of being rejected and one is leading with that need to please others. And when that need of pleasing others, this can also very easily be master confused as taking care of others or reaching out or being thoughtful or you know, whatever it may be. I think this is one of the trickiest ones is that people pleasing can be considered to be very selfless. But what it's really doing at the core, if it comes at the cost of honesty, is it's about that person and their need to feel loved or to feel celebrated or appreciated or whatever it may be that they're getting out of that. So people pleasing when it's in an exaggerated sense, right, or when it's at the cost of honesty is not about caring for and being good to other people. It's about filling our own ego, right? Filling our own soul, filling our own holes that may exist, right? Filling our own cup. So don't get lost in people pleasing as necessarily being a positive thing or being justified because you're looking out for others. Because at the core of it, fear of rejection and people pleasing, we're really looking up for ourselves. Another reason that we may have difficulty being honest, whether it's ourselves or someone else, is the pain of our truth. And it's similar to shame of our truth. But pain is a little bit different, right? Shame can cause pain. As I shared with my example about Layden, this was a big reason I had a hard Time. Being honest in the sense of being able to stand in my truth and being able to put myself out there was. I couldn't deal with the pain of my truth quite a while. And so understanding that if something's really painful for you and it's preventing you from being honest, you gotta dive into that spot, right? You've gotta do some work there and really work through. And there's no weakness in that. There's no shame in that. It's not something to muscle through. It's something for you to tend to, right? To nurture, to be compassionate with so that you can heal, stand in your truth, share your truth with others. Another reason for a lack of honesty is a need to be the best, right? A need to be the top. We all know those, like one uppers or, you know, people who might exaggerate something or as soon as you say something, they will have to take credit for it or, you know, any information you bring, they've already known. They've already read the book or they've already listened to that podcast or they've already done any, you know, anything that you could possibly share. And chances are they probably really haven't. But it's this need to be the best, this need to be at the top. And similarly to the fear of rejection and people pleasing, this is about that person filling their need by being dishonest, right? Not standing in their truth to fill their own need to feel worthy. And it's important to recognize that this is happening in ourselves or in others and tend to that need. Another reason is manipulating outcome. And this is when we're really attached to results. So this goes along with that people pleasing. When we are more focused on how other people are going to reply or if we're more focused on how other people are going to react and how that's going to impact us. We are not focused on the other person. We are focused on the impact going to have on us. Now, if we're truly impeccable with our word and we're truly standing in our truth and we're truly caring and loving for somebody else, we share our truth gently, kindly, honestly, and we allow that person the space to have their own reaction. We allow that person the space and the opportunity to make informed decisions with accurate information because otherwise we are manipulating outcome. And that's about our own needs. And a really, really common, maybe the most prevalent that I've seen in my work and my experience is not saying our truth, avoiding them, denying them, right? And that can be, again, if you're avoiding certain conversations or topics or withholding bits of information intentionally, or only sharing parts of a truth that you think somebody wants to hear and holding the other parts back. Maybe not being honest about, you know, other endeavors in your life. Maybe not being honest about relationships that you have or that you're in. Maybe not being honest about, I don't know, foods that you ate or things that you drink. It could be anything, books that you read. But it's holding information. It's kind of like you take white out to certain parts of your story and you only give the bits that you believe other people want to hear or that you're okay with them hearing. Now, of course, everybody's entitled to a sense of privacy. That's really different, right? Not saying something intentionally is a form of denial. Not sharing information from somebody intentionally because of their reaction versus your need for privacy is really different. And we can. It's hard to tease these out because we are really good at tricking ourselves, right? And convincing ourselves otherwise. The really good news is that all of these behaviors are starting in need and all of them are changeable. We can change our choices, our habits, our patterns any given day. This is why I believe that morning mind work that I have people do is really important because it's shifting energy and it's building momentum around that. And so if you are struggling with this or you know someone who is, it's not just going to magically get better or go away. We can be talking year long, decade long, lifelong habits, right? And so to undo those, we've got to bring attention, we've got to bring energy. And it's going to start with calling ourselves out or calling someone else out. We're not owning our truth. You're not owning your truth. I'm not owning my truth. Now, we do that in a way that doesn't judge, right? We do it in a way that doesn't judge. And maybe that says like recognizing to yourself, this is hard for me trying to figure out the reason. I'm afraid of rejection. I'm afraid I'm really dependent on people pleasing. I'm ashamed of my truth. I'm pained by my truth. I feel like I always have to be the best or I'm not good enough. So we want to call ourselves out without judging. And so we understand where it comes from. We observe and we bring compassion. And then we got to make a change, right? And it's with ourselves we got to do the work. And if it's with others, we got to set boundaries we got to set expectations or we got to adjust how much trust we put in that person and that's going to be different for everybody. So, you know, we always talk about not taking things personally, but there is also a level of accountability. So if somebody is chronically dishonest with you in one format or another, you know, you either decide to have that conversation with them, you set boundaries, or you reduce the level of trust that you put in that person and in that relationship. And it's going to be different for everyone based on the circumstance and based on what you want to achieve. It's a relationship you want to grow. It's then reducing trust isn't going to be the way to do that. If it's a relationship that you're not sure if you want to grow, then maybe you reduce trust and have a conversation and just see what happens. But we can absolutely have accountability and not taking things personally coexist, right? So we don't take things personally, but we also instill a level of accountability either for ourselves or for others. And then to really break these habits, we've got to bring the opposing energy, right? So if we're looking at the shame of our truth, we got to bring compassion, compassion for ourselves. We're looking at fear of rejection. We want to bring worth, right? That sense of self worth that even if we're rejected, we're still worthy. If it's about people pleasing, we've got to look at our own self love. Where do we need to love ourselves up a little bit more if it's a pain of our truth? We want to look at opportunity. What opportunity is going to come from this truth that we're living, right? How are we going to get through it? Where are we going to bring resiliency for needing to be the best? Or at the very top, we want to bring a sense of acceptance, right? A sense of self acceptance that it's okay if we're 2nd, 3rd, 4th, or even gasp, 24th, whatever it may be, not taking ourselves so seriously that we impose such pressure, it's about manipulating the outcome. We gotta lead with trust, right? Trust that other people have the right to make an informed decision. And then if our journeys are meant to align, they will align. And if they're not, they're not. And there's something better out there, there's something else out there. Or maybe they're meant to align for a certain wave or phase of our life and that's gonna shift and that's okay. But when we are manipulating outcome, we're denying other people the right that they're entitled to to make informed decisions. And we're also really blocking ourselves from standing in alignment. If we're not saying our truths, right, if we're denying them, if we're avoiding them, if we're intentionally withholding bits of information, well, then we really want to bring clarity. What's going on? Where am I not being clear about a pecking order? Right? Where am I not being honest with different things that may be overlapping about what I need and where they stand or what I want? Why am I withholding this information? What am I afraid of? And how do I need to make adjustments accordingly? So lying is a really common thing. We talk about this all the time. The good news is that even if it's existing, we can learn from it, we can grow from it, and we can change it. So thank you so much for hanging out with me on this episode where we got a little bit deep, right? Standing in those spaces that aren't comfortable, but those spaces that allow us to grow and try it out. Do your own kind of truth test, your own honesty test. Write down these different types of mistruths. Notice where you're doing it in your life. Notice where other people are doing in your life. And make change. Call yourself out, call others out. Don't judge, right? But then step up, right? Step up for yourself and step up for others. Whether it's setting boundaries with yourself or others, clarifying expectations, building trust, holding accountability, you've got to bring energy to it to make change. Energy grows where energy goes. So bring energy here and then see what begins to happen as you build momentum in a new direction. Standing in your truth, you'll find a sense of clarity, of weightlessness, of relief, of power. And when you're in those spaces, that's when things can really take off. And it's not easy. But I so believe that you got this. As always, it means so much to be able to share these lessons I have learned from Layden or that have been strengthened through Layden. If this episode resonated with you, please share. Head on over to itunes or Spotify Rate and review that allows us to spread the work that we're doing here and far beyond. And we'll talk soon.