why do we deceive ourselves? and how do we overcome it?

Self-deception:

Of all the problems in organizations, self-deception is the most common and most damaging.-Arbiter institute

While Most of us deny that we did self-deceit, we tend to ignore that we do it many times.

So what is self-deception?

Self-deception: as the name suggests, Lying to self, deceiving self, cheating self. It is defined as the act of lying to yourself or of making yourself believe something that isn’t really true.

“It is being in the box or insistent blindness,” describes Bud Jefferson, one of the characters in the book ‘leadership and self-deception.’

For example,

1. a mother may continue to lie to herself that her son is not involved in any kind of wrong activities. However, there may be evidence, or she may deny seeing the evidence that fingers at her son’s improper action.
2. A manager who has believed and wants to prove that one of his subordinates is doing wrong will never see the good aspects.
3. A student may be overly confident in his ability while he is not really. When he receives his grades, he may argue the reasons for it on the valuation or the circumstances and believe it to be true.

Self-deception is seeing the world the way we wish it to be rather than how it is.

When people have self-deception, they use their hopes, needs, desires, theory, ideology, prejudices, expectations, memories, and other psychological elements to construct the way they see the world.

Of all the deceit, the worst deception ever is Self-deception. Plato

Why do we deceive ourselves?

Have we?not heard of the?Emperor’s new cloth story, where the Emperor was made to?believe only clever people can see the clothes?and stupid can’t see,

Though the king could see him without clothes in the mirror as he wanted to?prove and believe he is clever, he illogically believes he is wearing clothes.

Why do we trap into self-deception?

We turn to self-deception when we deny the idea of change and want to keep our old beliefs and habits. We refuse to see the truth because We want to keep away the pain we get by changing our beliefs.

For example,

Suppose a person believes his particular employee is inefficient. In that case, he keeps away all the incidents where that employee has performed better. Because the employer does not want to hurt his beliefs.

People tend the deceive themselves in 4 ways.

1. IT’S TRUE IF I BELIEVE IT.

2. IT’S TRUE IF WE BELIEVE IT.

3. IT’S TRUE IF I WANT TO BELIEVE IT.

4. IT’S TRUE IF IT SERVES MY VESTED INTEREST TO BELIEVE IT.

Self-deception urges us to create the Blindspots to what we don’t believe;

Dunning Krugger’s effect is an example of self-deception. The famous true story of the thief who applied lemon juice on his face thinking lemon juice would disguise his face; he robbed banks without the mask. This is a classic example of how a person can deceive himself.

Overconfidence is also an effect of self-deception.

But self-deception can also be helpful sometimes.

Many pieces of research have shown that overconfident people have also successfully made other people believe they are much more efficient and can climb up the career ladder.

Sunday Adelaja Says

If you don’t want to deceive yourself in this new year, don’t be a miracle chaser.

But as there is a limit for everything, the more we trap into self-deception we start creating an illusionary world within us. Hence a limit has to be set on how much we can deceive ourselves.

The more we are aware of what we are deceiving ourselves and what are we ignoring, could help us see reality, thereby not attaching our beliefs, prejudice, and assumptions.

While facts do kill ignorance, ignoring facts does not kill them. Mokokoma Mokhonoana

How do we keep ourselves out of the box or out of self-deception?

Asking logical questions.

• Is it true?
• What am I adding to the facts?
• What is the lie I am attaching to it?
• How far am I saying and thinking about me true to myself?
• What are the consequences of deceiving? What are short-term gains and Long term losses?

When we ask these questions to ourselves whenever we are making a statement or thinking or giving judgment, we come out of the box and see facts as it is.

To summarize

Self-deception is a q personality trait or a mental state. It makes us develop Blindspots and distort our thoughts.

Though these Blindspots and distortion can be helpful to some extent, it is always better to see the facts as the facts.

Asking logical questions can help us to come out of the self-deception box.