Question: I am interested in a person who is intelligent but seems to me to have a series of complex behaviors. It amazes me how often he deceives himself and doesn't realize how he hurts himself. Can it be that someone deceives himself? And because? Thank you.
Mariela José Delvone, from Balcarce
Lying is consciously missing the truth and
lives with us in daily life:
at a family, social, work, affective, political or economic level.
On the contrary, self-deception refers to phenomena related to lying to oneself and is one of the great traps of the mind.
The difference between lying and self-deception is that
in the lie the person is aware that he is not telling the truth.
In self-deception, a reality that is false or wrong is accepted as true
without being aware of it.
Whoever deceives himself does not realize that he is doing it
, or does not always realize it, and therein lies the sick power of self-deception.
Whoever deceives himself does not realize that he is doing it.
/ PhotoShutterstock.
It is one of the most dangerous lies that one practices on oneself.
According to Sigmund Freud,
"we only see what we want to see" in order to avoid pain
, for which unconscious defense mechanisms are used trying to hide painful thoughts or experiences from oneself.
If lying is a conscious process,
self-deception is unconscious and its purpose is to avoid facing a sometimes intolerable reality
that produces psychological pain.
Jean Paul Sartre said that it is "a lie without a liar" and added that
man is free and the only one who is "condemned to choose".
In other words, self-deception is a flight from the responsibility of having to gamble for the values by which one might choose to live.
In self-deception, the image that must be shown to others is what matters most.
Photo: Shutterstock
What hides self-deception
In essence, it reveals that you are dissatisfied in your inner self and hides weaknesses, defects, fears and prejudices.
The central thought revolves around the fact that
the image that he must show to others is what matters most and he must take care of it
in such a way that he forces himself to hide everything about himself that seems impossible to face.
Some examples are
avoiding going to the doctor, not asking a loved one for fear of the answer, avoiding conflicts
, not ending an unsatisfactory relationship, or quitting cigarettes.
An example of self-deception is not being able to quit smoking.
/ PhotoShutterstock.
When self-deception is very marked,
it is expressed with an intransigent inability to recognize mistakes, with arrogance
, claims to power, rejection of criticism, narcissism, boastfulness, disqualification of the other, and a constant claim to appear to be perfect.
Whoever deceives himself distorts reality to always justify his attitudes and interpret as he pleases situations that for others would be signs of weakness.
If lying is a conscious process, self-deception is unconscious and its purpose is to avoid facing a sometimes intolerable reality that produces psychological pain.
Norberto Abdala, psychiatrist
Although self-deception can be a useful survival strategy at times and can help get you through difficult situations,
if used as a rule rather than an exception it can become unhealthy
and detrimental to the practitioner.
In such a case, it forces us to live distorting reality, prevents us from overcoming the fear of failure,
denies facing our own emotions, makes it difficult to change our lives
and lives in permanent anxiety before the negative judgment of others.
Persisting in self-deception inexorably limits the person to live with mental ties, from which they
can only free themselves if they allow themselves to admit what they consider their defects
, an essential step to straighten the course towards a healthier and more authentic life.
MS
look also
Why do we have self-destructive behaviors?
Sibling relationship: how to maneuver between love and jealousy
Why pleasure routes can be dangerous
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