How does lying to others effect your karma?
Does it depend on why you are lying? Or how you feel about the lie yourself? If you don’t think it’s that big of a lie does it matter? But then what would determine a “big” lie compared to a “little” lie?
What if it is just omitting the truth, then is it a bit better? Especially if by omitting the truth you are saving the other person from pain and/or suffering.
Is it okay to use little white lies such as telling the people that just made you dinner that it was delicious even though you found it quite disgusting, just to save them pain? Or telling someone, that is very upset, that it’s all going to be okay?
What if it’s something like not telling your partner the truth about how you interact with certain others because you don’t see anything wrong with it but you know it would upset them? Does it only depend on how you feel about it?
Does it depend on your relationship with the person? Such as lying to a salesperson compared to your mother.
I guess what I’m really wanting to know is, if I have told a lie but I have forgiven myself for it and have let go of any constrictive thoughts about it, is it necessary to tell the person whom I lied to and obtain forgiveness in order to fully let go? Or is that up to me to decide depending on how I feel.
i think it is up to you, and why the lie was told. Sometimes telling a lie hurts somebody, and confessing makes them feel better, but other times confessing makes it worse because it brings up pain they had forgotten about.
I think it is more important to examine the tendency of the mind to need to deceive and try to figure out where that is coming from, rather than trying to analyze the karmic effects of lying (which i’m sure is beyond our comprehension anyway). I don’t think someone can really be at peace with a lie unless they have made efforts to understand and correct whatever it is in their minds that lead them to engage in the activity in the first place. As for the difference between “big” and “little” lies, I would say there is a difference. Lying about not liking someone’s food is quite a bit different than being involved in the cover up of a murder.
Hi Etherfish & Clear white light! Thanks for the replys!
@Etherfish,
Are you saying here that it depends on how it’s going to effect the other person? That if the other person is going to be really hurt by it then you shouldn’t tell them? What if telling them would make you feel better? Is that just being selfish?
Also, how are you supposed to know how much your lie might hurt somebody else? I can’t tell how the other person is going to react. Like if someone asked me to babysit their kids but I told them I was busy when I wasn’t. That’s seemingly a small lie but what if when that person finds out about the lie, they get really hurt and upset by it. Saying things like how you don’t care about them or their children. But to you, you were tired or not in the mood or had wanted to just veg out for a bit.
Does the way the other person feel about your lie make a difference? Or is it mostly just about you and your feelings around it?
@Clear White Light
So if your lying in order to protect someone from pain,(like about the dinner they cooked for you) then it’s okay because you are doing it out of kindness? But then it brings up again how the other person feels about it. How do you know if from there perspective, it was out of kindness or not? Maybe the person really wanted an honest opinion of their cooking and when they find out how you lied they were hurt. Then did you still lie out of kindness?
I agree. You do need to figure out why you were lying in the first place in order to correct it. Once you have discovered this reason you can work at not doing it again, if that is your intention.
What determines a “big” or “little” lie? Is it how the person who is lying sees it or the person being lied to? What could seem like a little lie to one person could be a big lie to another person.
Luci
I think this question is difficult because it basically comes down defining right and wrong in some universal way. Speaking relatively, the emotional distress imparted by a “little white lie” regarding someone’s food is very likely to be much less than the emotional distress likely to be imparted by cheating on your spouse. Beyond a generalization like that, I think it is very difficult to speak of things in terms of right or wrong. Some things are obviously more “taboo” from any particular vantage point. However, it may not be equally so from another vantage point.
This is a very murky subject. For instance, many parents intentionally “deceive” their children with ideas like Santa clause, the Easter bunny, the tooth fairy, etc. But are these not ultimately lies as well? Obviously there is some difference, since the deceit is done for the supposed enrichment of the child’s life. Does this mean that lying is okay if your intent is good? Well, that is for you to decide I guess. All that can really be said is that people do behave this way sometimes.
I don’t think there is any answer for this to be found on the level of the mind.
I think a simple rule you could follow is: If you are lying for your own benefit, it is bad; if you are doing it for someone else’s benefit, it’s better.
Have to make sure you are not fooling yourself about the real motivation though!
I have found that i habitually lie about some things, whereas I never used to about anything.
And that is when people are fishing for a compliment. I will always say it is good.
If I really mean it, I will go into detail, but if not it will be short. i used to always be honest, and hurt people’s feelings so many times that I decided to change that. But at the same time, I changed my perception so that i can find good in anything. So what i am saying is “good” might be a very small part of the whole, even though most of it is bad. That’s what they don’t need to know.
And it’s not to make people like me that i do that, as I don’t care. it is to make them feel good.
If I feel they will benefit at all from a negative comment, I certainly make it, but in a nice way.
The measure I use is: Do I feel any pain or guilt about telling this lie? I can’t know what words will hurt someone. I can only know whether I’m being true to myself or not. If the lie hurts, I try to avoid telling it.
This only works if you’re sensitive to the needs and happiness of others. A closed-hearted person could use this to justify hurting others, because doing so wouldn’t cause himself pain.
But that’s not what I’m talking about. This isn’t an excuse to only be concerned with your own feelings.
Hope you find some clarity 
The trouble with that is you could argue that lying for the benefit or protection of another could also be to your own benefit as well. To go back to the much used food example, if I lie in order to avoid having to say that I don’t like the food that someone spent time and money preparing for me, that still works to your own benefit in some ways. If you told the truth, then the person may become angry at you and your relationship could temporarily suffer. So it’s a very slippery slope.
If anything, I think all this just shows how much better it is to find ways to express yourself in the world without deceit.
How can anyone ever really lie? God “knows” and is all.
If I lie then I have no choice but to accept the consequences of the deceit I create.
If an innocent one’s life is spared because I utter a lie, then does that fall in the same category of other kinds of lying?
When I find it necessary in my experience to lie in order to prevent suffering for myself and/or a loved one, because an act of mine revealed would likely be judged as negative, then how can I possibly find a correct label for that? I may have acted out of selfishness, or out of innocence, but feel it best to let the act “lie”, or leave it lay, rather than reveal it and cause suffering.
Stepping out of the karmic play must surely bring an end to lying. If there are no fruits to be coveted, there is no-one for which any kind of deceit or lying occurs.
Isn’t lying, even to be nice, about making the ego/mind feel better or stronger?
Namaste, Jeff
Not always. I used to think so, and never lied at all. Then I tuned in more to what people felt when I said certain things, and decided to change the way I interact. I used to habitually get looks of disappointment or distaste from people.
Now I either get nothing, or smiles, or people feeling good about themselves. I think that’s better. I don’t really care how they feel about ME, I just like them feeling good in general.
I do make an effort at finding a true detail to boost them with, and if not make up something rather general like “good job”. Why don’t you try this next time. . . Before I would say it sucks because you didn’t do this. . .
So I am just as much modifying my perception as I am lying to them. I am taking into consideration my habitually negative judgement of people, and molding it into habitually positive. So I don’t strictly see it as lying. i am thinking it’s my bad perception, and maybe later I will see the positive, so I will fake it now for their sake.
It has really made it much easier to communicate with people.
I’m sorta rising above my own faults.
Lies and deceptions are generally used as a protection or a defensive barrier against being fully open. Often that is not healthy and generally does contribute to stress by not being able to relax into openess. That said, at times lying may not only be alright but downright necessary and being truthful may be the easy way out that feels good but can cause great suffering. An example being lets say you are in nazi Germany and you are hiding jews in the basement. The gestapo knocks on the door “are you hiding anyone here?”…
That is an extreme example and in my opinion lying is generally and usually not advised and is generally and usually done to avoid conflict which would cause personal or selfish stress.That said, the inability to lie would seem to me to be a rather serious character flaw unless of course one is habitually silent (such as some yogis are). Habitual silence would certainly be preferable to telling falsehoods, but if someone is habitually open and respomnsive but then becomes suddenly silent under questioning that would tend to signal guilt or concealment. One of the yamas is Satya with does mean truthfulness. In my opinion though it means clinging to the understanding of reality and that compassion or Ahimsa should take priority.
It is interesting to note that in the Ten Commandments the commandment is that one shall not bear false witness against ones neighbor (which is significantly different than telling general falsehoods). In that case one is accusing or doing harm to another with falsehood.
So anyway, it is not cut and dried in my opinion although in my case in daily life I rarely ever lie and feel very uncomfortable if I feel the urge to.
Lying only affects the one who lies. The judgement “I have told a lie” is the point at which the guilt, shame and hurt begin. Without that judgement a lie does not exist.
Therefore if you are prone to judging yourself it is better not to lie.
I’m beginning to think what i was talking about is not lying. There is never shame or guilt, whereas I am super sensitive to such things.
I think what I am doing is pushing my negative tendencies aside for a moment for the sake of others.
In effect, lying to yourself, which is the same thing. You judge yourself negative and become opposite for the sake of yourself.
There is no positive or negative, only carrying out an action which feels inherently against your true nature. If it’s against your TRUE nature then it must be a lie because it is false.
Neither can you do anything for the sake of others, although it seems like it. You do it for your own sake, to avoid conflict, keep things calm, feel good about yourself etc.
Karl wrote:
“There is no positive or negative, only carrying out an action which feels inherently against your true nature. If it’s against your TRUE nature then it must be a lie because it is false.”
I think my habitual negative judgement is against my true nature. So stopping that is stopping lying!
It feels that way, anyway. Sometimes doing what is easiest and seems natural is not what is best, especially if you have an addictive personality.
So rather than following what seems easy, I found that watching how other people react makes me better at communicating.
This is after many years of constant rejection, weird looks, people being disgusted, misunderstanding what I say, and self destructive behavior.
Then you have answered your own question.
Does this clarify things for you ?
No, the path never seems clear. But I have found ways to know how to follow the right path, and just follow those self-made rules! That is working very well.
Well, lying has nothing to do with right or wrong or ones true nature or not. Lying is the telling of fiction as if it were fact. There rest is how you feel about it or interpret it. In that case ones personal judgements about the reason for the lie or its necesity are really the issue