Lying to ourselves

Why do we humans lie, and more importantly, why do we lie to ourselves. This is the subject that has been bouncing around my skull all day while I go about my routine. I'm curious about people by nature. I like to learn their dreams and goals, I like to learn about them as a person. But the more I learn, the more I see a disturbing trend. They don't truly believe what they're telling me. Many times I have learned about someone only to see that what they want is right in front of them, but they won't take it. There's always reasons, some of them may seem logical to them. But if they would just stop and take the time to think about it, really think about it, they would see how their internalized rules and conditions that they impose on themselves prevent them from obtaining it. I think that's the main problem, people simply just don't stop and think. They don't spend any time simply allowing their brain to work without forcing it in one direction or the other. I have gotten into the habit of taking 30 minutes out of each day and just allowing my brain to work. No distractions. No music, no movies, and nobody around. Just simple peaceful quiet. The trick is that you can't force yourself to think in a certain direction, your brain is a marvel and it is more than capable of sorting your various thoughts and ideas into implementable actions. It cuts through the haze of everyday life like a knife. You will figure things out going on in your life or in others life and never know how you did it.

There's a series of articles on Sirlin.net called "Playing to Win". The series is a fascinating read, but I'm going to talk about one section called "Introducing...the Scrub" (http://www.sirlin.net/ptw/intermediates-guide/introducing-the-scrub/). I realize it's talking about game play, but it can also apply to real life. Sirlin describes a Scrub as someone who has built up a set of internalized rules on how they play. This of course prevents them from winning against higher level opponents because they refuse to use tactics that they have arbitrarily defined as "cheap". He doesn't really play to win because he has decided that these rules, which are not defined by the game he is playing, is the true way to play. Think about how that applies to your life. Do you have internalized rules about things you will or will not do in your career, love life, or home life? Do you have some rule that if your boss is an asshole on a paticular day that you're not going to work very well for him? Do you even know if you have it, or is it just automatic and you never really thought about it? Do you have set rules about who you will date and who you will not? What if you are a perfect personality match, get along great, and share many of the same ideas but she isn't perfect looking? Or will you not date them because you're too good of friends? What about your home life? Are there set boundaries on the things you can and cannot talk about with your family? Why? Families should be able to talk about anything, no matter how embarrassing the subject is to one party or the other. But we don't, even though we tell ourselves that's what families are for.

So the moral of this whole rant is, don't let your internalized regulations get in the way of something you truly want. If you stare at the few ugly trees long enough, you'll miss the beautiful forest that you could be living in.