As much as we are rational animals, that does not mean that we have a reasonable and realistic image of what we have closest to hand: ourselves. It may seem paradoxical, but having access to almost all the information about who we are and how we feel does not mean that it is reliable.
In fact, There are many situations in which those who understand us best are others , for the simple fact of being other people. The biased vision of our own Self is a burden that each of us carries, while our friends, family and colleagues already have the advantage of observing us from a more distanced and, in many cases, analytical perspective.
Definitely, There are many ways we lie to ourselves ourselves so as not to compromise certain aspects of our own mentality.
Why do we try to remain blind to those aspects of reality that we do not like, if knowing them could be useful to solve them? The answer lies in a concept well known in the world of psychology: cognitive dissonance.
Do you recognize that feeling of discomfort that you experience when you realize that two beliefs that you feel attached to or that, at least, seem reasonable to you? There is the key. In short, cognitive dissonance is the state of tension that appears when two or more beliefs come into contradiction since they are incompatible.
There are several ways to avoid cognitive dissonance or to cease its existence, and many of them do not lead us to better understand reality by reflecting on what we thought we knew until now. In this case, what happens is that we deceive ourselves. This happens in different ways, as we will now see.
In these ways we lie to ourselves
Although it may not seem like it, most of us are more than delighted to resort to self-deception to keep the mental image of who we are intact. And the self-image is very delicate and, sometimes, the mechanisms we use to not confront it with reality are automatic.
Now, for the same reason we try to preserve this self-image automatically, it is difficult to realize those moments in which we are deceiving ourselves.
To make it easier for you to detect the warning signs related to self-deception, below you can see the 4 ways in which we usually deceive ourselves.
1. Confusing the need with the will
Many times, situations in which one party dominates the other They remain camouflaged under a false image of freedom. For example, there are relationships in which the glue that unites the two parties is simply the fear of loneliness of one of them. This fear keeps the relationship going despite being clearly harmful and asymmetrical.
In these cases, the person held on by dependency dynamics believes that all those moments of discomfort they experience are due to the sacrifices we are supposed to make for the sake of romantic love. Any indication that what is really happening is that her partner vampirizes her will be ignored by all means.
By the way, something similar often happens in the relationship that recently addicted people have with the substance they consume.
2. Play with the meaning of words
When it comes to alleviating the discomfort caused by cognitive dissonance, one of the most used strategies consists of modify our belief system to assign a new meaning to some of those that were in contradiction and, thus, make it “fit” well into one’s own mentality.
If this results in deep reflection on our beliefs and we end up accepting that reality is not as simple as we first believed, possibly that will be a constructive and humbling experience. But if the only objective pursued with this is to assuage as soon as possible that anxiety born from the uncertainty of not knowing what to believe, we will fall into self-deception.
Specifically, what is usually done in these cases is to “remove” a little the concepts that we use to understand certain areas of reality. so that its meaning becomes more ambiguous and the illusion is created that the idea that previously conflicted with them now fits.
For example, someone who may believe that homosexuality is unnatural because it does not promote reproduction but, confronted with the idea that many heterosexual people choose not to have children, defend the idea that homosexuality is unnatural because it is a statistical abnormality, and so on. until giving the concept of “unnatural” as many definitions as necessary.
3. Avoid contact with dangerous ideas
Another way to deceive ourselves is to completely ignore one of those “dangerous ideas” , not paying attention to him, ignoring him. In this way, it is common that if someone brings up this topic of conversation, the other responds with “well, let’s not argue” or, sarcastically, with “well, okay, only you have the absolute truth.” They are ways to win an argument by not winning it, a lazy resource to avoid being in an uncomfortable situation.
4. Believe that we are the only ones who are unique
This is a very recurring thought that is used as a shield for our self-image when everything around us shouts in our face that we have a problem. Basically, it consists of believing that no matter how much the outside world is governed by objective truths, our case is unique and special and no one can tell us what is happening to us or what will happen to us.
For example, this happens a lot with tobacco addiction: we see that people who smoke more than three cigarettes a day have serious problems stopping consuming it, but we believe that we, who do the same, have neither developed an addiction nor We would have problems if we wanted to give up that habit.
