You’ve probably noticed that some of the lies people use are recurring lies.
Take Joan, for example. Joan likes to “inflate” to importance of her position at work. Even though she is a receptionist at a car dealership, to anybody who asks she tells she is an office manager. Somehow it makes her feel more successful.
This lie is innocent enough in a sense that it doesn’t do anybody any harm. However, most of the recurring lies fall into two not-so-innocent categories:
1. Cover-up lies designed to let a liar get away with something, prevent him or her from facing consequences.
2. Manipulation lies used to make someone either do what a liar want them to do, or feel the way a liar wants them to feel.
An employee coming up with various wild stories to explain his habitual lateness for work is using cover-up lies. Recurring lies don’t need to be identical, but they do need to serve the same purpose.
A fake friend making up stories in order to make another person feel bad is using manipulation lies.
How do you stop someone in your life from telling recurring lies? There is a very simple tried-and-true method for that. Both cover-up lies and manipulation lies are used by liars for practical reasons. Until those lies achieve goals they were designed to achieve, until a liar succeeds at using them for his or her purpose, the lies will keep recurring. But it’s in your power to stop those lies from working:
1. Stop believing recurring excuses, make them ineffective. For example, you can tell a habitually late employee that you’ve added the time he owes you and came up with so many hours. And that he has to work those hours off by the end of the month — on weekends if he has to — or he will lose his full-time employee benefits. Then, make sure you follow up on that. Or subtract the hours from his paycheck.
2. See a manipulation for what it is and either ignore a manipulative lie completely or do the opposite of what a liar wants you to do. So, next time a “friend” starts telling you a devastating story, interrupt her casually, tell her you need to make a call or go to a store, and then do so. Don’t listen to her stories and ignore her “well-meaning” advice, or she’ll keep doing it.
Sometimes this technique works almost overnight, like a charm, but most often you would need some patience and consistency for a few weeks to start seeing results.
(to be continued)
Related Posts:
How To Make Someone Tell The Truth. Part 1.
How To Make Someone Tell The Truth. Part 2.
How To Make Someone Tell The Truth. Part 4. (coming)
