Lies We Tell Ourselves: The Risks and Benefits of Self-Delusions

Craig 00:01 

Do you really know your own mind? We all engage in self-delusions. Generally, these delusions get a bad rap, but they can actually be productive. Listen as I help you unravel the complexities, risks, and benefits of self-delusions -- the little lies we tell ourselves.

Welcome to Live Well and Flourish, where I help you understand what it means to live a flourishing life. I'm your host, Craig Van Slyke. If you're ready to think beyond material and external success, if you're ready to take control of who you are and the kind of life you live, if you're ready to flourish, this is the podcast for you.

Craig 00:50 

One of the reasons I got into podcasting is that I used to be a huge fan of classic talk radio. I often had fleeting fantasies of having my own talk show, picturing myself behind the big mic, taking calls from all over the world. I liked to think I could be the next Art Bell. (Art Bell had a huge and highly entertaining late-night talk show in the 1990s.) This was a nice fantasy, but the truth is that I lack the talent and the time to become the next Art Bell or Larry King. So, was I just lying to myself? …Well, yeah, kind of. Here’s the thing though, while self-delusions can be and often are harmful, they can also be motivating, pushing us to take risks and grow. Today, I want to dig into self-delusions … those little lies we tell ourselves, so that you can leverage their benefits … and there are benefits … and avoid their risks.

What is self-delusion? A self-delusion is simply the act of deceiving yourself. It’s self-talk that’s telling yourself something that really isn’t true. Self-delusions usually aren’t really lies in the strictest sense, because they’re not conscious acts of deception; we believe them to be true.

Craig 02:08 

The belief that self-delusions are true is the source of their power and their danger. Or maybe it’s the source of their power, which can be dangerous. Because we believe our delusions to be true, we act as if they are. In some cases, this can be beneficial. My parents instilled a delusion in us, it’s a common one and it’s served me very well. Any guesses? … My brothers and I were taught that we could do anything we put our minds to. I think lots of parents teach their children the same thing. Although this is useful for personal growth, that delusion simply is not true. No matter how hard I tried, I was never going to be a professional jockey, or an NBA center. Too big for the former, too small (and untalented) for the latter. But that didn’t stop me from working really hard to be the best basketball player I could be. (Much to the great relief of many fine horses I never pursued being a jockey.) Now, suppose I decided to drop out of college so that I could pursue a dream of being an NBA center. That would have led to some very painful disappointment and would have diverted me down an unproductive path of woe. The danger comes when the delusion leads to misguided decisions, unrealistic expectations or denial of the problems that need to be addressed. Such delusions can lead you to overlook risks, ignore evidence, and persist in counterproductive behaviors. Or, they can boost your confidence and motivate you to dream big, work hard, and be resilient. The same delusion can lead to very different outcomes. The trick is to recognize when self-delusions are harmful so that you can stop their effects. Not all self-delusions are aspirational though; some are about the hardest realities we face.

Craig 04:07 

I’m going to give you a very personal example here. As regular listeners know, I lost my first wife, Debbie, to cancer. She was at stage 4 when she was diagnosed with a rare, difficult to treat cancer. As soon as I read the research, I knew her time was short. I could have deluded myself that there would be a miracle and that she would be among the 5% who survived for five years, but I didn’t. I don’t know, maybe it would have been better if I had … we’ll never know. But, I didn’t delude myself, and I recognized that her time was short. Rather than filling me with dread, it gave me a purpose -- to make her remaining life as good as it could be.

I was never quite sure what Debbie thought though. She was realistic, but I suspect that she may have held onto hope against the odds, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Self-delusion in the face of serious illness can actually be a motivator, an almost existential motivator. After all, if you don’t think you’ll get better, why seek treatment?

Craig 05:14 

So, as we dive deeper into self-delusions, remember that they’re not just mental errors, they’re coping mechanisms, motivators, and sometimes the stories we tell ourselves to find meaning and hope in the face of adversity.

Before going into more detail, I want to talk about you for a minute. If you’ve listened this far, you should feel really good about yourself. Most folks don’t go through the effort of listening to something like this so that they can improve and grow. You should take satisfaction in the fact that you’re one of the few who seek to live a truly excellent life. Even if you’re just getting started on your journey to excellence, you should feel great about yourself. Seriously, give yourself a huge metaphorical pat on the back, you deserve it.

Craig 06:00 

OK let’s dig into the details. I'm gonna do this first by talking about some common self-delusions, then I wanna discuss a couple of ways you can categorize delusions that may help you better understand their effects.

Here are some common self-delusions. Fair warning, this is going to be a bit rapid fire:

False consensus effect: This is a belief that most others think or feel the same way you do. (Students can be great at this. It's not unusual for students that failed a test to think, “Well, everyone failed the test so it must be unfair” while having no idea how others scored.)

The Halo effect: is when your justified positive view of yourself in one area colors your view of yourself in another area. For example, maybe you're really good at public speaking, and that makes you think that you're a great writer, even though you really aren't. Maybe you are, I don't know.

The Moral ledger: is when you think a good act compensates for a bad act.

Belief in a just world: Sometimes it’s comforting to believe that the world is fair, even though there's a lot of evidence that it isn’t.

Illusion of control: This is believing that you have control over events when you don’t. Like thinking that calling a cat does any good at all.

Learned helplessness: is this is kind of the opposite of illusion of control. It's when you believe that you have no control over events, but you really do.

Imposter syndrome: is when you feel like a fraud despite evidence of competence. This one is an epidemic among college faculty for some reason.

Overgeneralization of failure: is when you believe you ARE a failure just because you’ve failed before.

The Self-fulfilling prophecy effect: is an interesting delusion. It starts with a false belief, which leads to acting in ways that lead to that outcome.

Underestimation of personal growth: Many people don’t realize how much they’ve grown or changed for the better. This delusion is especially unfortunate because it means not giving yourself credit for the growth that you’ve achieved.

Craig 08:12 

I could go on and on. Seriously. The list of ways we delude ourselves is almost endless. It can be a bit overwhelming. So let’s see if we get a handle on the vastness of self-delusion by putting them into categories. I’ve been thinking a lot about this and I’ve concluded that it’s useful to group delusions into three categories, avoidance delusions, adjustment delusions and motivating delusions.

As I go through the categories, keep in mind that delusions, regardless of the category, can be constructive or destructive. A constructive delusion is one that is ultimately beneficial to your well-being. My talk show host delusion led me to pursue podcasting, which has been terrific for my well-being. Similarly, an avoidance delusion can also be constructive. Holding on to hope against overwhelming odds offers comfort and boosts resilience. In addition, there’s pretty good evidence that positive thinking, which is sort of adjustment delusion, can improve your well-being. As I go through each category, I’ll give you a constructive and destructive example to help you understand what I’m talking about.

Craig 09:22 

Avoidance delusions help you escape or deflect unpleasant realities or emotions. These can involve denial, projection, rationalizations, those sorts of things. For example, when you tell yourself a negative situation will resolve itself without your action, you’re avoiding what may be unpleasant experiences or tasks. These kinds of self-delusions can help you maintain psychological comfort despite underlying problems, which can be constructive, at least temporarily. But thinking that your health is fine when your cholesterol and blood pressure are through the roof can be tragically destructive.

Adjustment delusions involve adapting perceptions to match desired self-images or social expectations. An example is telling yourself that “I’ll start that diet tomorrow” right after buying a bag of cookies, or telling yourself that you’re always a good person, even though you’re often unkind. Adjustment delusions include positive illusions about your abilities, selective memory, or certain cognitive biases, such as confirmation bias. Giving people the benefit of the doubt can be constructive delusion since it may help strengthen and maintain relationships and foster trust. Fatalistic delusions like “I’ll never be good at math” can be unnecessarily limiting and destructive.

Craig 10:42 

Motivating delusions can serve as catalysts for positive action and growth. Motivating delusions involve aspirational beliefs, optimism bias and other constructive illusions that drive you to pursue goals or growth that might otherwise seem unattainable. My “I can be the next Art Bell” fantasy is a good constructive example. It wasn’t true, but it did push me towards podcasting. However, that same delusion could have turned destructive if I quit my job to make a living in podcasting, which is really tough to do. Here’s a more serious destructive motivating delusion, thinking that the ends justifies the means. This is rarely true and is almost always damaging to your flourishing.

Keep in mind that the categories aren’t as neat as I’m making them out to be. The boundaries can be fuzzy and a delusion can fall into multiple categories. The categories are just intended to give you an idea of the range of common self-delusions.

Craig 11:44 

Here’s a critical point; don’t forget the golden mean, the idea that both too little and too much of something can be bad. There’s a need for balance. This idea applies to self-delusions. My talk-show host delusion is a good example. Not believing that I have talent at all would have prevented me from podcasting, but too strong a belief in my talent would have led to financial disaster. Giving somebody the benefit of the doubt is another example. Doing this in small doses can build trust in relationships, but go too far and you’re in an abusive relationship. Be sure to keep this in mind when you think about your own self-delusions. If you want to learn a little more about the golden mean, check out episode 76, which applies the concept to self-discipline. It’s available at livewellandflourish.com/76

Craig 12:41 

Now let's turn our attention to how you can manage your self-delusions so that you can leverage their constructive effects and avoid their destructive effects. This can be pretty tricky. Self-delusions are largely unconscious, which means you don’t even know you have them. The first step, then, is to bring self-delusions into your awareness. Then you can reflect on whether they’re helping or hurting you. Alright, let’s get to three things you can do this week to uncover your hidden self-delusions.

My first suggestion is to consider uncovering your delusions through self-reflection. This works especially well after big decisions. After some big decision, ask yourself whether you’re at peace or kind of uneasy. Unease is a sign of potential self-delusion. There’s this nagging feeling that you might have fooled yourself. Pay attention to that feeling, but don’t take it at face value. Think through potential delusions, especially those that involve possibly ignoring evidence against your initial preference. Here’s a trivial example. When ordering breakfast, you decide to go for the meat-lover’s omelet along with biscuits and hash browns. Later, you think back on this and realize that you told yourself that your blood pressure problems were hereditary so there’s no point in worrying about your diet, which is a classic learned helplessness delusion. Although after the fact, it’s too late to do anything about your breakfast choice, realizing that you deluded yourself can help you with the next decision.

Craig 14:20 

You can also confront cognitive dissonance, which is the internal tension you feel when you hold two contradictory beliefs or when your actions and beliefs don’t match. To confront dissonance, think about times when you tried to rationalize or justify your actions. For example, maybe you cut someone off in traffic or didn’t let somebody merge. Did the action match your values and beliefs? Probably not. By the way, traffic-related moral missteps often involve the delusion of a moral ledger … at least they do for me. I let that other person merge, so that balances out not letting somebody do it this time. Again, the key is to bring the hidden delusion to the surface so that you’re more likely to recognize it in the future.

Finally, consider the opposite. This is useful for counteracting the destructive effects of delusions. When you’re about to make a decision, think about what would happen if you took the opposite path. Instead of the meat lover's omelet, what if you ordered the oatmeal? Well, let’s not go that far, what if you ordered a nice tomato and cheese omelet instead? What would be the benefits of that particular choice? Here’s another example. When you’re consuming content that aligns with your views, seek out reputable content that offers a counter-argument. Think critically, but fairly about the contrary views, don’t just dismiss them out of hand. Remember, the truth is often in the middle. 

Craig 15:54 

I’m going to close with a quote from Eric Hoffer, “We lie the loudest when we lie to ourselves.” To this I would add that the most harmful lies are the ones we don’t know about. So, take some time and understand your self-delusions so that you can use them to help you flourish.

Until next time, be well my friends.

I produce Live Well and Flourish because of my dedication to helping others live excellent lives. I don't accept sponsorships and I don't want your money. The only thing I want is to help you and others flourish. If you've received some value from this episode, please share it with someone that might also benefit from listening. The best way to do that is to direct them to livewellandflourish.com

Until next time.