If the Mask Fits
Self-deception: the action or practice of allowing oneself to believe that a false or unvalidated feeling, idea, or situation is true.
Why do people lie? According to Po Bronson, children lie to mostly avoid punishment from their parents or other adults, as well as to assert their status through bragging and as a coping mechanism for venting frustration, among other reasons. Teenagers lie about who they hang out with, their drug habits, what they do in their free time, what things they spend their money on, their grades, and their usage of alcohol. These kinds of lies are small enough that they can be easily dismissed or forgotten after the lie has taken its course.
Sometimes, however, lies grow. If a lie is big enough, or is told enough, people can begin to accept it. They can begin to use that lie as a part of a person’s personality, and adjust their conversations to suit it. When this happens, you too can begin to accept the lie as fact, even though you know that the fact is false. Give enough time, and you could even dismiss the part about the fact being a lie, and accept it as truth.
Congratulations. You've fooled yourself into believing your own lie. Welcome to self-deception.
It doesn't even have to be a lie that you are fooling yourself with. Take the idea of success, for example. Some people have the idea that being “successful” is living in a big house, with elegant furniture, with fancy clothing, and looking rich. The last part here is the most important. If you look rich, then people will begin to think that you are rich. All that has to be done is to buy any high number of suits, dresses, or anything nice, really. For the overachievers out there who don’t feel rich enough, buy some good furniture too. Given enough time, you too can be rich! Just ignore the inevitable debt you will put yourself into, and enjoy your expensive lifestyle.
Don’t want to be in debt? Self-deception can still be easy to fall into. You can fool yourself into loving someone you are not attracted to. You can fool yourself into enjoying an activity that is morally wrong. You can fool yourself into a depression if you take everything the worst possible way. You can even fool yourself into thinking that someone’s problem is your fault, even if you had nothing to do with it.
Once you fall into the pit of self-deception, the only thing stopping you from getting out is whatever made you fall into that pit. Theoretically, all that has to be done is to acknowledge that what has happened is all a lie, and to dismiss the lie. Once the lie is dismissed, the recovery can start, right?
Well, dismissing the lie is easier said than done.
Let’s go back to our example of success. To recognize the lie, all that has to be done is to look at your bank account. But what if you don’t want to look there? What if you’ve assured yourself that you have plenty of non-existent money? There would be no reason to look. No reason to climb out of the pit.
For example’s sake, let’s say you looked. There’s a large red number saying how much you owe. You could begin to fix this number… but what would your friends think? You’ve already convinced them that you’re rich. How would they react if you came out and said to them that you are swimming in debt, that you owe this much money to the bank, that all of the elegancy was an act?
Even if you didn’t care what your friends would think, fixing that number is still not an easy task. Selling everything you bought may work, except that it would be a slow process, and you may not be able to sell everything for it’s original price. Forcing yourself to not buy anything nice, and to give the bank your excess money would also be a slow process as well.
The easiest solution would be to not fix the debt. That red number doesn’t actually exist, you just imagined it. You don’t actually owe a ton of money to the bank. And you are, without a doubt, rich.
After all, if the mask you wear fits, what’s stopping you from wearing it more?
