I consider myself above-average in the honesty department, and occasionally I blurt out something over-the-top blunt, but I wouldn't look at pictures of someone's newborn and exclaim "Wow--it looks exactly like a root vegetable!" Which too many do, unfortunately. (Or a larva.) A little diplomacy greases the skids, and unless it's a moral/ethical thing, I try to err on the side of kindness.
I find as I get older, I don't have time for BS. I call it like it is and I prefer it that way. I refuse to put up with drama and drawn out issues. Now more than ever.
I think there are things that may not be nice, but still need to be said. I look back at those things and wish I could have done better, but honestly there was another person involved so ya know you can only do so much.
Funny thing is that over the years I have done this with my mom several times. Not pretty at all! However over time it has improved our relationship. These things directly affected our relationship and needed to be said.
"An injurious truth has no merit over an injurious lie. Neither should ever be uttered. The man who speaks an injurious truth, lest his soul be not saved if he do otherwise, should reflect that that sort of a soul is not strictly worth saving."
- Mark Twain
I think there is often a thin line between people who consider themselves bluntly honest tellers-like-it-is and malicious, passive-aggressive blowhards.
I'm not religious anymore - but that New Testament verse sums it up nicely - "speaking the truth in love". You need both truth and love together to be effective.
One of the reasons I view myself sometimes, as Aspergery, is things like I saw yesterday. I was out and doing some work stuff and stopped to eat, and saw a woman come in and sit, while "waiting for her party". She flirted with the waiter to get free stuff while her husband was there, and of course then shrugged off any concept of a tip, etc. This "flirting" (censored), and the games that people play in relationships, I have never understood. To me it is simple dishonesty, and why I have found relationships very hard.
A friend once advised to ask yourself these three questions if you're unsure whether to say something: Does it need to be said? Does it need to be said by you? Does it need to be said now? She was a drug counselor; I think it comes from al-anon or something similar.
sure you can. I work in a political environment and have to keep many of my opinions (and answers) in a safe category. Some people just cannot handle the truth.
So I realized a connection with a friend, she is looking for a job but can't consider a long list of things because of her integrity (apparently living off family does not hurt her integrity). I am connected with her in a loose group of people doing similar work in our state and heard a story about how she handled something that basically got her fired. Her version is that she had to have integrity but the more I hear I think she may be confusing integrity with not being able to deal with a difficult emotion. One example is that she cannot work for any adoption agencies, she adopted a severely mentally ill child who is now 19. Well my daughter chose adoption, I get photos of my grandson, it was the bext possible experience but we also had to check out what we were doing. So her truth is negative about adoption, and I have many positive experiences between me and my families at work.
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