Christopher D Larson in Your Forces and How to Use them once wrote, “Promise Yourself: To be so strong that nothing can disturb your peace of mind. To talk health, happiness, and prosperity to every person you meet. To make all your friends feel that there is something in them. To look at the sunny side of everything and make your optimism come true.”

Before you can even accept this quote as something to live by; you should ask yourself where you get your strength from and I do not mean what gives you strength nor do I mean physical strength. I mean mental strength.

What strengthens you so nothing can disturb your peace of mind?

Mine? Honesty.

When I’m not being honest I become weak as I’m driven by my guilty conscience. My mind literally doesn’t work as it should; it’s foggy and grey. When I lie to myself and others I feel guilty and then I feel guilty for feeling guilty and feeling guilty makes me even guiltier…I think you get my point.

I remember once, waking up in the morning (okay, that’s not true… I hadn’t slept because I was feeling guilty) and accepting that I needed to be honest with myself firstly and then those around me. By simply accepting the way forward, before any action, I already felt a huge weight lift off my shoulders.

Sometimes you have to face difficult truths and you know what you need to do but you struggle to take that first step. I once read a quote that said, “You’re afraid to tell people how you feel because it will destroy them so you bury it deep inside yourself where it destroys you.” The truth though is that lying to people destroys them even more. And if you gain the courage and take that first step forward you immediately start believing that everything will be okay. You cannot control the other person’s actions or feelings; nor do you want to anymore, but whatever it is, it’s the real deal, based on the truth and it’s not a reaction to a lie.

This allows for you to trust the way forward and there is no longer this desire to control everything. You cannot help yourself; the optimist takes over and the pessimist gives way. And you know that even though it isn’t okay immediately, it will be okay eventually.

Now being part of being honest is knowing that you cannot always be honest all the time nor always tell the whole truth. Yes, what a contradiction. But not every lie will keep you awake at night. Or rather it will not keep you awake past the first night. You’re human. Accept it. Keep trying. Keep paying attention.

The other important factor to take into consideration is the notion that lying to yourself doesn’t matter. I feel that as hard as this is to believe, I need to emphasise it. YES, it does matter. In fact, lying to yourself is a thousand times worse than lying to other people. Sometimes when people lie to me and I don’t question them (If they’ve convinced themselves of their own lies, only they can believe their own truths), I often wonder how long it took to convince themselves of their own lies and I hope they have enough strength to deal with the outcomes when they are forced to face the truth.

Live life on your terms – your honest terms -remember, you’re human so here’s to accepting, trying and paying attention.