DW's Blog

Honesty As Our Default

by DW Green — August 28, 2019

If you say you’re being honest now, does that mean you usually aren’t?

All of us have used phrases like these before. “I’m going to be straightforward with you here…” “I’ll be honest…” “No disrespect but…” Empty expressions or not, they prompt the question: If you have to preference your remarks with indicators of honesty or directness, what does that say about everything else you say? If you say you’re being honest now, does that mean you usually aren’t?

What if, instead, you cultivated a life and a reputation in which honesty was as bankable as note from the U.S. Treasury, as empathic and explicit as a contract, as permanent as a tattoo? Not only would it save you from needing to use the reassurances that other, less scrupulous people must engage in, it will make you a better person.