Dr. Seth Stephens-Davidowitz and I got together to discuss what journal keepers (any anyone else) can learn from his book Everybody Lies – What the Internet can Tell us About who we Really Are.
We discuss how we can become more aware of their deception – to self and others – so they can live better lives. For journal keepers, please see refer to the self-reflective questions at the bottom of this article that you should ask write out in your journal to get the most out of this (you may notice that I was doing the same in the interview!).
The interview is broken up in the following chunks;
Table of Contents of Interview: Why Everybody Lies and How to Use Your Journal as a Shield
1:02 – Intro to Dr. Stephens-Davidowitz
1:30 – The 3 Learning Objectives
2:03 – 1. Understanding How we Deceive
3:15 – 1.1 – How we decieve on Social Media
4:05 – 1.2 – Negatively Comparing Ourselves to Others
5:51 – 1.3 Facing the Harsh Truths
7:00 – 1.4 Trying to Overcome the Harsh Truths
11:23 – 2. Making Improvements to our Behavior
12:04 – 2.1 More Compassion for Others
12:34 – 2.2 Fight Self-Sabotage
13:07 – 2.3 Don’t Take Others Too Seriously
13:48 – 2.4 Letting go of Inescurities
14:15 – 3. Forever Improving and Learning
Below are some highlights of the Interview:
Highlights for 2:03 – 1. Understanding How we Deceive
“We deceive ourselves and others. We deceive ourselves by;
- being too optimistic about the future. We over estimate how much we will go to the gym or read intellectual material.
- we lie about the past to appear better.
- we falsely tell ourselves the reasons we do things. For example, why we vote for someone.
- comparing ourselves to ideal portrait of others”
Highlights for 5:51 – 1.3 Facing the Harsh Truths
- racism is very real “If people are paranoid about their skin colour and think that people hate them because of it… Unfortunately, it does happen in large numbers”
Highlights for 7:00 – 1.4 Trying to Overcome the Harsh Truths
- “don’t compare your insides to other people’s outsides. Or 21st century equivalent is don’t compare your google searches to other people’s Facebook posts”
Highlights for 11:23 – 2. Making Improvements to our Behaviour
- have more compassion towards others because we are all in this together
- don’t beat yourself up
Highlights for 14:15 3. Forever Improving and Learning
Journal keepers, please take a pen and a paper and answer the following questions:
- How and when I am too optimistic about myself? Going to the gym, making improvements, changing habits etc.
- Now that I know the above, what can I do different to not fall in the same trap?
- Am I comparing my insides to other people’s outsides?
- Do I tend to self-justify why I do things without REALLY thinking about why?
- What are my views towards racism? What can I do to not make others of any colour feel insecure about themselves.
For those of you who want to read to book to dig deeper into the topic, you can do that here.
Special thanks to Dr. Seth Stephens-Davidowitz for taking the time to share his ideas not only through his book but for us journal keepers!
