“Telling the Truth”

by Dr. Larry Morris

Albert Camus said we should always tell the truth, but we should never tell more than the truth. It is easy to deceive or mislead both ourselves and others by exaggerating or blowing things out of proportion. As human beings, we have the tendency to exaggerate both cur gains and our losses. We say, "Oh, this is the worst ever" about some momentary experience of frustration or disappointment. And no matter how insignificant an apparent profit, we can oive it undue importance. It is helpful to tell things as they really are rather than exaggerating them. A movie producer once stopped by the box office and asked the attendant how ticket sales were going on his new movie. "Oh," moaned the attendant, "this is the worst movie ever. We've only made $8.00 in ticket sales!" Deeply depressed, the producer went home. A friend called him and asked how the new movie was doing. “I don’t want to talk about it," said the producer. "Oh, come on, how is it doing?” "Don't ask." "Come on, tell me." "Well if you must know," said the producer, "It's made $16.00."