personal development on Dishonesty

Almighty God, from the very beginning, You have designed us for glorious work. You have given us Your Spirit and spread before us limitless resources. Because You have made us a royal priesthood, we n...

Gracious God–who opens Your arms wide to welcome us just as we are but who’s too loving leave us that way: in response to Your invitation we come humbly and boldly with our broken hearts and weak hand...

It's discouraging to think how many people are shocked by honesty and how few by deceit.

Evading self-acknowledgment of our faults enables us to avoid painful moral emotions: guilt and remorse for harming others; shame for betraying your own ideals; self-contempt for not meeting even our ...

Lying to ourselves is more deeply ingrained than lying to others.

A friend who attended a prestigious MBA program once told me about the business ethics course he took there. The professor counseled honest business practices for two reasons. First, if you lie or che...

When in doubt, tell the truth.

Trust is built on telling the truth, not telling people what they want to hear.

In a time of deceit telling the truth is a revolutionary act.

Pretty much all the honest truth telling there is in the world is done by children.

When we observe evil, sinful behavior from a distance, the inclination is simply to see people as acting with malicious intent. We assume they are “bad people.” But often the motivations that lead to ...

Of all the liars in the world, sometimes the worst are our own fears.

To stand up for truth is nothing. For truth, you must sit in jail. You can resolve to live your life with integrity. Let your credo be this: Let the lie come into the world, let it even triumph. But n...

As my AA, NA, and CA friends have repeatedly reminded me, rigorous honesty is the first rule of recovery.

Recently at church I asked our congregation, “How many of you battle with self-deception?” A few people in the crowd raised their hands. Then I asked, “How many of you know someone who is very self-de...

He wonders if he’s lying. If he is, he is hung in the middle of nowhere, and the thought hollows him.

Self-deception is a major part of what defeats spiritual formation in Christ. In self-deception the individual or group refuses to acknowledge factors in their life of which they are dimly conscious. ...

Tell all the truth, but tell it slant. . . . The truth must dazzle gradually / Or every man be blind.

No legacy is so rich as honesty.

Nothing in this world is harder than speaking the truth, nothing easier than flattery.

The first principle is that you must not fool yourself—and you are the easiest person to fool.

Honest and courageous people have very little to say about either their courage or their honesty.

Self-deception . . . blinds us to the true causes of problems, and once we’re blind, all the “solutions” we can think of will actually make matters worse. Whether at work or at home, self-deception ob...

I used to advertise my loyalty and I don't believe there is a single person I loved that I didn't eventually betray.

We are not very good at recognizing illusions, least of all the ones we cherish about ourselves.

What I like about experience is that it is such an honest thing. You may take any number of wrong turnings; but keep your eyes open and you will not be allowed to go very far before the warning signs ...

There is not any thing, relating to men and characters, more surprising and unaccountable, than this partiality to themselves. . . . Hence it is that many men seem perfect strangers to their own chara...

When Quentin Rowan published his first spy novel, Assassin of Secrets , it was initially received with glowing reviews. But five days after its release, it became clear that the novel had been al...

Our race would not have gotten far, Had we not learned to bluff it out And look more certain than we are Of what our motion is about.

We may find it hard to believe Jeremiah’s words that the heart is “deceitful above all things.” We would rather look outward and think, Yes, others may be quite foolish and misguided. But I have a ...