Uncover the truth

The truth is out there—but we only find it when we stop talking.

The truth is, I don’t know how I feel about the truth.

I want it.

Sometimes.

Other times, I want something else, and the truth won’t get it for me.

When I was very young, what I wanted was to “not get in trouble.” So yeah, no, Mom, I definitely didn’t knock over that vase.

“Maybe it was the dog,” Mom says.

And boom, just like that, we learn the undeniable value of not telling the truth, the whole truth, and something like the truth, so help me God.

But even so, we still need to uncover truth—especially in relationships. Lies obscure. Truth clarifies. And with clarity comes better decisions.

So how do we uncover the truth?

I think the answer is listen.

The moment someone opens their mouth to speak, there’s a sort of illusion of coherence and confidence that tricks us and we go, “Wow, this person knows what they’re thinking and feeling!” Really, though, it’s the reverse—most people speak to figure out what they’re thinking and feeling.

We believe: “I know what I think and feel about things, so I speak about them.”

When really: “I speak about things so I know what I think and feel about them.”

With this in mind, listening becomes an exciting adventure of emotional spelunking, where we’re simply trying to excavate—what is really going on in this other human’s inner world? What do they believe? What do they want? Neither of us know but let’s figure it out together.

But if we’re trying to convince or persuade, openness often gets swapped for defensiveness.

And the truth is lost.

And everyone loses.