A Fool’s Fool
“Everybody plays the fool sometimes. There are no exceptions to the rules.” Those lyrics, sung by the famous R & B group, The Main Ingredients, soulfully explained the gullibility of being a fool, in this case, for love-both man and woman taking their turns playing the fool and doing the fooling. It’s only befitting on April 1, April Fool’s Day, we pay homage to the fool’s fool of life.
While April Fool’s origins aren’t exactly known, there are some historical findings that date back to pranksters playing tricks and hoaxes on people since the early to mid 1500’s. The basic premise hasn’t changed since then-you play a trick on someone by telling them a lie. Sooner or later that day, the trick is revealed as a lie, it's over, and all is well. The hoaxes have become bigger and more elaborate in the present-day form of April Fool’s Day, and pranksters are still fooling the fooled for being slow to catch onto the hoaxes. Except now, April Fool’s Day has become emblematic of a world that views lying as a normal occurrence, but happening every day of the year without the revelation of the truth.
Like the song explains, we have been both the fool and the perpetrator…the naked emperors and empresses wearing nothing but a crown of glory in the name of foolery. As a complicated theme, foolery riddles something like this: maybe just maybe, we’re all a fools’ fools for we’re counted among the fools that have been fooled by a fool, who think they’ve fooled a fool by themselves, a fool, who has only fooled him/herself because the fool thinks the fool fooled someone that actually knew they were being fooled but, to their detriment, was determined not to be a fool by showing the fool how much of a fool the fool really is. In a way we’re all self-installed fooled fools by the lies we tell, secrets we hold, deception it takes to perpetrate it all, and our inaction for allowing lies to stand. Hear me out on this one.
This is an essay on my impressions of the lies, secrets, and deception of modern-day foolery, in other words, lying: Everyone lies. We lie to ourselves and others. We lie by omission. We lie by offering selective truths. We lie with boldness and audacity. Whole industries have been created around untruths. Among its more notorious culprits- the Bunny, the Chick, Santa, Cupid, Stupid, News Anchors, The Vampire, Zombie, and an Uncle named Sam. Lying is one of the most pervasive, covert acts of human existence, sometimes unsuspectingly impacting the lives of the unwitting and sometimes benefitting the lives of the knowing. What I know about lying is most of the time there is culpability on both sides in order for it to exist, even if one of those sides is blissfully ignorance to the truth or afraid to tell the truth. Lying is circular and unending until the cycle is broken: Secrets lead to deception. Deception leads to lies. Lies lead to secrets. They are like festering sores in the darkness of our lives only healing when brought to the light. And here’s the thing: everybody has had secrets, no matter how “out loud” someone lives, no matter how transparent we think we are because we are only human.
In fact, by way of a testament, I have a secret to reveal: The biggest lies I’ve consistently told over the years was, “everything is fine, it’s alright, or I’m okay,” when I really wasn’t. I didn’t want to say, “I’m not okay or my heart aches or my pockets are shallow, or I’m angry, confused, scared or unfulfilled.” Whether it was my pride, shame, or something yet unidentified, I chose to keep my “business” to myself all the while suffering inside. That kind of avoidance takes an unimaginable toll on one’s physical, emotional, and mental health. Instead, why couldn’t I have simply said, “I’d like to share how I feel, but I’m not ready right now; or, I’m having a difficult time expressing how I feel; or it’s really hard for me to be so revealing about certain aspects of my life.” How did pretending something didn’t hurt or exist make anything better?
Lying is complicated. We say we’re protecting others when we lie, but make no mistake, the reality is we’re really protecting ourselves. I kept my financial hardships a secret from my sons (and others) after I separated from and later reunited with my husband just before his death. All that was important to me was that I provided a loving environment and thriving life for my sons in light of their loss and emotional challenges. I didn’t want my burdens to be their burdens. But wait, couldn’t they have benefitted from the truth of my situation? After all, I wanted them to have a good chance at living an emotionally healthy life. My justification was that I loved them so much that I was willing to sacrifice my personal happiness for them. So, I lied or tried to. Luckily for me, no matter how hard I tried, I wasn’t a believable liar. There were some people I couldn’t hide the truth from. Besides, my reason for trying to lie didn’t make me any more honorable anyway. Know that lying denies us the benefits of growth of character, a full heart, meaningful connections, well rounded morals, healthy ethics, peace of mind, and genuine self-love.
What was so wrong with simply telling the truth, especially since one cannot hide the truth. You can cover it up, be deceptive, but it doesn’t change the fact that the truth still exists. Whether it’s sneak eating; habitually fabricating responses to personal questions like age; doing drugs; making excuses for being late to work; not discussing the mentally ill person in the family; over-embellishing the truth; portending self-importance in some way; over indulging in alcohol or searching for that elusive orgasm; taking pills or using creams to recapture our youth; or misrepresenting height or length saying, “if I stand straight up, I’ll have another half inch,” all those little, white, big, whopper, and super-sized lies, family and friend lies, and even institutionalized lies one tells to a nation, add up to become a way of life that, in a way, ironically reveals the truth about a person or group of people. Lies always have a hidden motive behind them. They linger within the restless corridors of our minds. They exist because of one’s selfishness, greed, incompetency of self, wanting to please, manifest inadequacies, need for dominance, lack of communication skills, jealousies, insatiable pleasures, or convoluted desires, or in other words, damaged egos.
Lying is all about manipulating people and situations, profiting emotional or monetary gains, taking an unfair advantage, stealing "something,"or un-leveling the playing field in some way. Think about all the times you’ve lied? I know I have. It is an expedient way of gaining control of others thoughts, actions, and behaviors while neglecting the impotence of our own. Just ask some politicians or Fox New anchors. Lying and deceiving is easier than putting in the hard work of parity- equally communicating, negotiating, collaborating, and working with self or others. Part of the entertainment or joy of lying is getting away with it. It’s a euphoric high, the crack of immorality. Lying is the kryptonite that makes us helplessly weak humans. And, until we’re ready, we stay as far away as we can from the mirror that reveals the metaphoric naked truth about ourselves. But isn’t that what life is all about: figuring out what makes us do what we do and, if we choose, do better.
Lying means we don’t trust ourselves, so we make up stories that gives us a false sense of trust and that false sense of trust pervades throughout every aspect of our lives, from our relationships to our reality, family, to our existence, and friends, the chosen family in our lives. So, sometimes it’s easier to lie than to face the truth. Lying allows us to retreat into a made-up world that makes our lives more palatable to live because the reality of it is sometimes not enough or too painful. That’s the new April fool. The person who keeps lying to protect him/herself from the truth of who they really are, what secrets they may be hiding, or fears they may be avoiding. They are the people who tell you what they think you want to hear not what’s in their hearts’ truth. It’s vulnerability that’s hiding behind the lies. So, here’s my amateur relative analysis about lying: the more you lie, the more insecure you are about the choices you make. The less you lie, the more willing you are to face your vulnerabilities to the person or people you’re attempting to be honest with and those associated with the person you’re attempting to be honest with, even if that person is yourself. The whole moral quandary of a lie presents itself as a tug-of-war between integrity and perversion.
Understanding how the dynamics of lying, deception, secrets and truths affect our relationships with self and others is important. My greatest pain in my life has come from someone else’s secrets, deception, and lies. My next greatest pain has come from my own secrets, deception, and lies. My greatest joy and growth have come from two things: as much as I can, I’ve stopped subjecting myself to other people’s secrets and lies by choosing my relationships wisely, and seeing people for whom they are, not how I want to see them. Next, I’ve stopped lying to myself about who I am, finally accepting myself for whom I am and my situation as it exists, not what I want it to be; thereby developing a better relationship with myself. That was a long, and still is, an ongoing process of self-love that has, nevertheless, enhanced my life tremendously.
Here’s a lesson I learned about lies: life’s too short, time is too precious, and people are too valuable to live with lies, deceit, and secrets. On the flip side of that coin, life is too short, time is too precious, and connections with others are too valuable to enable someone else’s lies, secrets, and deceit.
My advice to those who feel they have no other choice but to lie: if you’re going to do it, make it count for something. Make it count towards the evolution of self and others where you’re learning the truth of whom you are and someday be able to share it. If you don’t learn something about why you lie, create fantasies, be deceitful, withhold information, have secrets, or cover up the truth, then you won’t learn more about the “something” that is too painful or too fearful for you to face. That’s a heavy burden to carry on your life journey or to that great gig in the sky.
