Honesty

As part of the 7 principles, this mediation is on Honesty. We have all been honest, and I am sure almost all of us have been dishonest. This meditation explores why we feel the need to be dishonest, looks at honesty from a few different perspectives, and I hope it helps you to bring honesty to your daily life.

Transcript

Welcome to another meditation in a series of meditations based on seven principles that I strive to live by every day.

Today we're going to be talking about honesty.

Let's begin by getting into a comfortable seated position.

Close your eyes and take five deep slow breaths in and out.

And as you breathe in and out,

Allow your body to fall into a deeper and deeper sense of relaxation with every breath.

Honesty.

It is a word we all know.

We all have a definition for honesty.

But do we apply honesty to our day-to-day lives?

In a previous meditation we focused on bravery.

We understand that bravery is often the harder choice to make.

This too applies to honesty.

In order to be honest,

We must understand and practice all of the other principles in these meditations.

Because all of these other principles affect,

Or can affect,

Our honesty.

Sometimes to be honest,

We must be brave.

Sometimes when we want to be honest,

We need to remember love and respect,

And be gently honest.

Other times we may need to show humility when being honest.

Honesty shows up in different ways.

We've all experienced being honest,

And we've more than likely all experienced not being honest.

Have you ever taken the time to think back on the times you were dishonest,

And question why you felt the need to do that in that moment?

Was it out of fear?

Was it to tell a white lie,

To spare somebody's feelings?

Was there a way you could have been honest,

And still spare that person's feelings?

Take a few moments just to think of maybe one or two times that you were dishonest with someone.

And really think about why you felt the need to be dishonest in that moment.

Just take a moment to think about that.

Let's look at honesty in a bit deeper lens though.

There is honesty in words and actions.

We're all very familiar with those.

This is a very common conception of honesty.

Most people will visualize moments where they've told a lie,

Or they said they would do one thing and did another.

Through our day,

We may face many interactions where honesty comes into question.

Someone asks you how you are today.

Do you answer honestly?

Or do you simply say,

I'm fine?

Did you tell your partner or your spouse that you would walk the dog,

And you didn't?

Why?

Honesty in words is probably the more simple and most understood aspect of honesty.

Until you face the reality that your words can hurt,

And lying to people also hurts them,

It breaks their trust with you.

Do you think those people that you spared their feelings would feel better knowing you lied to them?

Or do you think they would have appreciated perhaps a gentle,

Kind and loving,

Honest response?

When we look at honesty and we think of it in a deeper level,

We have to start looking inward to ourselves.

Are we being honest with ourselves?

This is often a sense or form of honesty that a lot of people don't think about.

Do you know you made a mistake on something?

Do you in your head say,

Oh that was stupid,

You're stupid?

That's being dishonest with yourself.

You are not stupid,

You simply are human,

And humans make mistakes.

So if we can't be honest with ourselves,

How do we expect to be honest with the rest of the world?

When we have that negative inner talk,

When we say we can't do things,

I'm no good at something,

I'm a loser,

Those kinds of thoughts in our heads,

They're not based on fact.

And it's your own self lying to yourself.

Because lying often is the path that's easiest.

And so to be honest with yourself might make you face some hard realities.

Maybe you need to be a better person,

Maybe you need to make some changes.

But the truth is,

Is those changes can be made if you're honest.

But know that we all can make changes.

Everybody can be better.

There's not a single human on this planet that cannot be better than what they are today.

Sitting down in meditation,

Listening to this meditation,

This is a form of trying to better yourself,

To improve yourself,

To set your mind right for the day.

Whatever it is you came to this meditation for,

Just know that honesty while you're in meditation,

Honesty with your thoughts,

That is a form of honesty that many of us forget even exists.

We can't heal our internal traumas until we're honest about them,

Until we face them.

And this is where the other principles come into play.

We need to be kind and loving with ourselves when we're honest.

You're not a loser.

You made a mistake.

So rather than say,

Oh,

I'm a loser,

I'm a failure,

Why not say,

Well,

I really tried hard,

But I made a mistake and it didn't turn out the way I wanted.

That's being kind but honest with yourself.

You made the mistake.

Honesty with ourselves allows us to take responsibility for our actions and words and our thoughts.

It allows us to accept our failings,

Our shortcomings,

Our strengths and weaknesses without damaging our self-esteem.

There are lots of things in this world that I am not good at,

But I don't beat myself up over it because I can be honest with myself and say,

Maybe I'm not interested in those things.

Maybe I haven't tried those things or maybe I tried them and I just wasn't good at them.

It's not my thing.

And that's OK.

It's not a statement of who I am.

It's not a statement of my character or my ethics or my morality.

It's just simply stating I'm right now,

Currently,

Not very good at that thing.

Honesty with ourselves helps us heal all of that trauma.

It helps us move beyond the trauma.

Think of honesty as a hammer that smashes through negative and non-factual inner thoughts and it smashes through our trauma.

But it's not going to be easy.

Oftentimes,

It's the most difficult decision to make.

Another form of honesty is spiritually.

Are you honest with yourself and with others?

I know some people that live in a religion that they don't believe in and that they don't want to follow,

But they do.

Because that's what their family expects.

They're not being honest with themselves,

Nor their family.

When we're not honest spiritually,

We start to harbour bad thoughts and ill feelings towards whatever is causing us to be dishonest spiritually.

That could be us,

And we could be making excuses,

Saying,

Oh well,

I need to make my family happy.

Would your family be happy with knowing that you're doing something you absolutely hate?

Or would they be happier knowing you're doing something that you love with your time,

And you can love them as well?

But that conversation may be very difficult to have,

And that's where honesty often,

Again,

Is not the easy path.

Are you spiritually interested in a completely different religion or a completely different set of beliefs,

But you're afraid to ask people about it or to look into it or to go to that weird bookstore down the road from you?

And when we talk about spirituality,

I don't mean a higher power,

A God,

You know,

Anything like that.

I mean just within ourselves.

When I say spirituality,

I mean how do I feel inside of my body?

How do I feel about me?

How do I feel about the way I'm reacting to the world right now?

I am my own spirituality,

Beyond what else I believe.

When we begin to be honest with ourselves,

It's very difficult.

When we start to deal with our past traumas and we start to be honest about those,

It can bring up a whole range of emotions.

Anger,

Sadness.

But we need to remember that we need to move through that process.

And practicing our honesty and continuing to be honest about how we're feeling,

What we're thinking,

How we feel about ourselves.

These are the things that will help us work through that trauma and work past the hard parts of that healing journey.

Is there something in your life that you need to be honest about?

Is it something that causes you unhappiness within yourself to be dishonest about?

Take a moment to think of that thing that maybe you know you need to be honest about.

When you think of it,

Where in your body does it,

Do you feel it?

Connect that thought.

It is through honesty that we can see the interconnectedness of all of the principles.

So as you are thinking about that moment or that thing that you need to be honest about,

Or that you know you're being dishonest about at this moment,

Think about the other principles and how they can help you be honest.

Bravery,

Love,

Kindness,

Understanding,

Humility.

These are things that we can use as tools to help us with our honesty if we're struggling.

Visualize yourself now in a situation where maybe you're being honest about that thing.

Is it an honesty to yourself?

Is it an honesty to someone else?

Have you told another person but haven't told them everything?

Be honest,

But remember with yourself or with others to be brave,

To keep love,

Kindness,

And respect in your thoughts and actions at all times when being honest.

Now just take a moment again to just visualize what being honest about that thing would feel like.

And really understand where in your body you're feeling that.

Now when you think of these two things,

When you think of whatever it is that you're being dishonest about now,

And you think about what it would be like to be honest about that,

Where in your body did you feel those?

Compare that.

And how did it feel to think about being honest about that?

Was it scary?

Was it nerve-wracking?

Did it cause you any anxiety?

This is where bravery comes in.

This is where understanding comes in.

Understanding your fear.

Everybody is afraid at times.

And fear is a tough thing to get over.

But I find that when we tend to be more honest,

And we tend to be kind and loving in our honesty,

We can overcome that fear.

And once we've worked through fear one or two times,

We start to understand that fear is just an emotion.

It is just a thing.

But we don't have to live in fear.

We can move past it.

Just like we can move past being sad or angry.

Think about moments through your day where you maybe are dishonest with those little white lies.

Or you're dishonest with yourself.

On a day-to-day basis,

As we move through our day,

Just picture those times where maybe you got a coffee and the person asked you how your day was and you just said it was fine,

Even though it wasn't.

Think about those moments where somebody asked you a question and you responded out of automatic response,

Rather than actually thinking and answering the question in honesty.

Think of these times now.

Think about how you can be honest in those situations.

Without being brutally honest,

Without hurting people's feelings,

Without being mean.

But how can you be honest?

How can you tell a friend,

No I don't want to come over to your social function tonight,

Rather than saying maybe I'll try to make it.

Or,

Yeah,

No I'll be there and then not show up,

Come up with a last minute excuse and lie again.

When we compound these lies,

It doesn't make us feel better.

Honesty allows us to not have to think about these things anymore.

We don't have to have anxiety about the lies that I told to get out of that social function at work the other day.

We can just be honest.

And how other people respond to your honesty is out of your control.

But if you maintain your honesty,

Your integrity,

Your kindness and your compassion for people,

And be honest out of love and respect,

Then you can move forward from that situation where maybe the other person was very upset with your honesty.

Maybe they didn't like to hear it.

But you can move forward knowing that you didn't do anything wrong.

You were honest and you were kind and you were not mean about it.

And that feeds our self-esteem in a positive way.

We can feel good that we were honest and that we were kind.

7 Principles 7 principles are more than just words.

They're a guideline for me on how to live.

A guideline on how to act.

And a guideline on how to treat other people.

Now as we come to an end on this meditation,

On honesty,

Remember to walk forward in your days and carry that honesty with you.

And when you see moments where you would normally just blurt out a lie,

Or you would be a little less honest than normal,

Figure out ways that you can be honest with love,

Kindness,

And respect behind it.

8.

Bring your awareness back to the present moment.

And allow your body to come back to the awareness of what's around it right now.

Open your eyes and walk forward in honesty.

Thank you for meditating with me today.

Reviews

I really enjoyed this one 🙏🏻

Very good. Thank you

That was really insightful - a lived experience of the challenges being honest brings up - in real depth and understanding. Thank you

Thank you Darcy. This was outstanding. Grateful for you.