THE ART OF LYING TO YOURSELF AND TO OTHERS

"No lies are told!" How many times have our parents reminded us of this? Who has never lied to family or friends for good? How many of us have never kept quiet about certain uncomfortable or unspeakable secrets from our partner or, on the contrary, sworn an eternal and unrealistic love? “In love, sincerity in small doses is dangerous, in large doses it is deadly” said Oscar Wilde. In short, absolute sincerity is a pious illusion. We lie all the time, and above all to ourselves, convincing ourselves that reality is not as it is, but as we would like it to be.
On this side of all moralism and avoiding a rigid logical or ethical contrast between "true and" false ", lying should not be condemned in absolute terms, but only in its fraudulent or criminal manifestations: lying is not only a physiological perceptive process, but a intrinsic behavior in every form of communication - affective, professional, political - of which we should become aware and exploit the potential.
Giorgio Nardone proposes a realistic and pragmatic attitude, for which a lie must always be evaluated in the light of the circumstances, intentions, objectives and effects. Each of us should learn the "art of lying", know its tricks and their correct application, transforming it into an important relational resource. Then yes we will be able to admit serenely, and in the truest sense of the expression, that we have told a lie "for a good purpose". Ours and that of others.