Being human is great, but it is obvious that it doesn’t make us perfect, far from it actually. Everyone makes mistakes and everyone tells a white lie or two in their life. We are taught at an early age that lying is bad. What about all the lies that we are told as children? Santa Clause, The Easter Bunny, The Tooth Fairy. Even some of the bedtime stories we heard are elaborate tales. These white lies are harmless, little, white lies though. A little white lie can become a black hole, meaning it can spiral out of control.
Let’s compare it to “The Gruffalo” that I had just watched on Netflix. The little brown mouse made up a lie about a big monster. He told all the animals that were wanting to eat him, that the Gruffalo would come after them. Well, that is all fine and well until our little brown mouse meets a real Gruffalo who is hungry himself. His tummy is growling for our little brown mouse friend also. I won’t tell the whole story, but you can head to Netflix to see how the story goes. It’s one of the many great kid’s titles that Netflix has in their collection.
Now, back to the subject at hand: lies. When our kids lie it can be a reflection of their environment, or to put it simply, a reflection of our behavior. We work diligently to enforce the negative aspects of lying, but still resort to telling little lies ourselves. We never want our children to tell a lie so nonchalant that they don’t recognize that they have even told a lie. That is when things get out of hand.
Though there are little white lies, we have to be careful what we are considering to be harmless. For instance, here is a funny story about my youngest niece. She just recently had her birthday and decided to stay home from school and enjoy a day off. She kicked back and played all day and waited for her party later that night. Well, that evening, her Aunt, who is also her teacher, came to her party. She asked our little birthday girl, “And why weren’t you in class today, young lady?” Instead of telling her the truth that she didn’t want to go, she lied. She told her Aunt/Teacher that she was sick all day.
Though it was a harmless lie, she had no reason to tell it. I told the birthday girl that she shouldn’t lie about things like that. I’m sure she was worried that she may get in trouble for missing school, but she is too young to plan out a fib like that! That was the moment when I realized I needed to think twice about some things. Raising kids is a constant learning experience, even for an Aunt.
And in that scenario, I learned that I needed to slow down on my white lies or little fibs. My niece is too young to understand some of the humor and too young to differentiate a joke from honesty. It all reminded me of the story of “The Gruffalo” that I had watched on Netflix. Even small lies can cause problems. They start small and grow, snowballing into dangerous dishonesty. Let’s be aware of what we say, how we say it, and what we deem harmless and what needs to be addressed with honesty from the get-go. Simply put, you don’t have to lie, so don’t lie, because no one benefits in the long run.
This post was made possible by Netflix #StreamTeam. All opinions and statements are 100% my own.
