The Liar’s Scale (Some Lies Are Worse Than Others)

All lies are not the same, so today, I want you to consider how some lies can be better or worse than others.

On the path to seeking Truth in our lives, I think it’s important for us to think about this because if we don’t put any conscious attention on how truthful we are, or how truthful the people around us are or the systems around us, then our lives can descend into falseness. We may tell bigger and bigger lies, become surrounded by falseness, and then one-day truth and falseness can blur together.

We should always maintain our grasp on truth because grasping truth means grasping reality. To help you maintain a better grasp on truth and reality, I present you with The Liar’s Scale: (Lower numbers indicate lesser lies, and larger numbers are for bigger lies.)

1) The Survivor’s Lie

The purpose of these lies is to meet personal needs – such as for food, water, shelter, or other necessary comforts. When telling such lies, the primary goal is to survive and not take more than necessary.

2) The Positive Lie (E.g., “White Lie”)

The purpose of this lie is not to cause any harm and not to hide any misdeeds. The purpose is usually to help prevent someone from feeling bad or to help someone feel better. Your goal is to somehow improve the situation for someone else by telling a positive lie.

3) The Minor Lie

These are small lies that we may tell to get our way in fairly trivial situations. The purpose may be to help others somehow, but often we are more interested in helping ourselves to feel better or avoid a negative consequence, rather than on how this lie impacts others.

4) The “Saving Face” Lie

This is a lie where you make up an excuse or state something just for the purpose of not looking bad. At this stage, you want to manage how people think of you, even if this involves lying to them. Rather than being motivated to make people think you are the best, you don’t want them to think less of you. At this stage, you lie about who you are, which seems to be bigger than the prior lies on the scale.

5) The “I Can’t Fail” Lie

With this type of lie, you had a goal in your life, and you have realized that you could not meet it normally. To meet it then, you have decided to either tell a lie or to cheat in some way to get your desired outcome. At this stage, the lie should only be an isolated or rare incident and not a regular occurrence. However, this type of lie is higher than the prior ones because at this stage, to avoid derailing your entire life or losing a job, people can be motivated to tell much bigger lies (or cheat in substantial ways).

6) The “I Must Win” Lie

Here, the need to always win or be right or better than others will result in lying to always have that competitive edge and to maintain the illusion of being the best. You are determined to be highly competitive or possibly the best, even if it means telling big lies. This is a larger lie than the prior ones because you have decided on an outcome you must meet, and you will do anything to get that outcome, which includes lying or cheating to meet that objective.

7) The “I Will Protect You” Lie

With this type of lie, someone is aware of a bad action (by themselves or someone else), and this person lies (or purposely does not state the truth) to protect someone from having to learn about this bad action. Someone may tell themselves that they lie to protect others, but often they are also lying to protect themselves from the backlash they will receive if people learn the truth. This lie is fairly high on the scale because these lies can easily turn into further lies to cover up prior lies. It is also high on the list because, generally speaking, this involves lies that people consider major breaches of trust or integrity. Otherwise, they would not expend so much energy in maintaining this type of lie.

8) The “I Will Hurt You” Lie

The above lies are usually not intended to cause harm actively, and that is why this lie is higher up on the scale. At this point, a person is motivated to harm others – it may be for revenge, to teach someone “a lesson,” or because someone has personal reasons for disliking someone. Such lies may be used to acquire money or valuables or to cause psychological or physical harm.

9) The “My Life is a Lie” Lie

At this stage, someone has discovered that lying is a powerful tool for getting what you want. You may be able to gain sympathy by making things up or exaggerating your problems to absurd degrees. You may make up stories to entice people to give you money. Whenever your integrity or expertise is called into question, you may have lies ready to support your behavior. At this stage, major aspects of your life may have been fabricated. Your resume may be mostly made up of falsehoods, your attire may indicate that you are much more successful than you are, and your relationships may be based on promises you have made and never intended to follow through on. At this stage, a person is so used to lying as their way of life that when they are inevitably caught in a lie, they make up new “facts” to support a new story that justifies their actions.

The “Keeping the Justice” Lie

Another type of lie that will not be easily ranked above is the “Keeping the justice” lie, where someone lies to uphold some greater sense of justice or values. The reason this one will be kept unranked is that, in the end, we must all make our judgment calls as to whether it is worth it to try to keep the justice or not. And we may all have different impressions of what is justified.

I’m interested in discussing lies because it happens quite a lot, and we tend to accept it as a way of life. Anything someone tells you or anything that you read today may be a lie. We are all aware of this and probably have made some level of peace with this.

Unfortunately, the more lies a person tells, the more likely they are to fall into a pattern of telling deeper and bigger lies more frequently. At the highest stages of lying, a person’s life consists more of lies than of truth. When they get up in the morning, the first thing that runs through their mind is which made-up stories they may have to tell to which individuals to get the desired results or protect all of their prior lies from being discovered.

Even at lower stages of lying, one can easily slip into deeper levels. Imagine if someone perpetually tells minor lies (#3 on the scale). These may be small lies, but it seems like in time, this person may slip deeper and deeper down the scale as lying becomes a regular part of their life.

I would encourage you to become more conscious of any lies you may be telling in your life. Sometimes, they can become so routine that we fail even to notice them. For example, perhaps there is someone in your life which lies to you regularly. If you “go along” with these obvious lies, then in a sense, you are lying too.

If someone lies to you or those around you often, think about what you can do to break this cycle where they “sell” you their lies, and you appear to “buy” into them. We should find ways to reduce the lying around us because people who do this regularly may not even be conscious of what they are doing. And if they think they are getting away with it, they may be motivated to continue. Perhaps this is a bad habit they developed, and they will not stop unless they are called out on it somehow.

Here are some remarks I have made in the past or that I might make if I hear something that is an apparent lie:

• Really? That’s not what “such and such source” told me.

• Where are you getting your facts from? I don’t think I would trust that source.

• Some people are concerned with (insert whatever sense of integrity or value the person aims to protect with this lie), but I couldn’t care less.

• So what do you think about (mention another topic)? Or “Look at the time – I really have to get going.” (This can get them to see that you will not sit by and listen to lies.)

• Wow, that is truly unbelievable – that is one for the record books (said with slight sarcasm).

• Now you are just making stuff up (not in an irritated tone, but possibly a slightly amused tone).

• I wasn’t born yesterday, you know.

• Now that flies in the face of everything I know to be true (I may save this one for a pathological liar).

Think back to times you have noticed that someone was most likely lying. If you pay attention, you can often spot signals that will indicate someone may be lying. For example:

• An inconsistency in what someone has stated. Perhaps they claim to be whatever is advantageous at the moment, and this may result in conflicting statements.

• Their body language or tone of voice is out of sync with the words they use. They may tell you bad news in a happy tone of voice.

• They always have excuses to avoid having to do undesirable activities.

• They tend to get overly defensive, and their tone of voice rises sharply.

• They become uncomfortable and touch their nose or face as they speak.

• They closely monitor your reaction, possibly to see if you are “buying” their story. They may check for your reaction to judge if they should continue with their story or modify it to appease you.

• They make claims that do not have common sense or reason behind them – and they do this regularly.

I have given you a lot of information here. Why don’t you take a minute to reflect on the lies in your life? Consider:

What types of lies do you tell?

On average, where do they fall on the Liar’s Scale?

Have your lies gotten smaller or bigger in time?

What about the people around you. How much do you think they lie, and are you doing anything about it?

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If you liked this post, you may want to read this post next - The Path to a True and Fruitful Life - where I discuss the most impactful truths that I have found in my life.

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If you are ready to pursue your unique path to truth and understanding, you may wish to read Your Personal Truth: A Journey to Discover Your Truth, Become Your True Self, & Live Your Truth.

You can read the book on Amazon and other major retailers.