No Lie

Being honest shouldn’t carry a price of shame

By Dr. Justin Altschuler
April 2026

Think about the last time someone started a sentence with, “I have to be honest with you.” Did anything come next that made you feel good? Or were the words critical?

I can guess the answer. “I need to be honest” is code for this is going to suck and you won’t want to hear it.

Similarly, we say, “Be honest with yourself” to denote hard, unpleasant truths. When we talk about being honest with ourselves, what we are really talking about is difficult internal work.

It’s a funny observation that honesty has such painful connotations. Why should telling the truth be painful?

When we talk about the difference between reality and what we perceive as reality, we highlight the gap between what we believe about ourselves and what our behavior indicates. When talking to others, “I have to be honest with you” points to misalignment between what we say and what we do.

We tell ourselves and others we will stop using drugs. But we take no concrete steps to do things differently. We tell ourselves and others we can’t stand this job. Then we take no action to find a new one.

Confronting the fact that we are not who we want to be is painful. Whenever “be honest” gets pulled out, it’s really a conversation about misalignment. No wonder “be honest” is bad news.

When we look at the gap between words and behavior, we usually don’t stop at observation. We escalate to judgment. We don’t just notice we haven’t gone to the gym. We conclude we are lazy.

Behavior is data. But it feels like judgment because we link the two in our mind. If we pause long enough to see data and judgment as two different things, honesty feels less like a courtroom and more like a lab.

In a lab, we observe what is happening so we can adjust variables. Experiments are about getting information. When we look at our lives as a lab, the gap between intention and action becomes useful. It tells us something about motivation, fear, skill, environment and readiness. It gives us material to work with.

The irony is that self-attack widens gaps we want to close. When we label ourselves as deficient, we trigger defensiveness or avoidance. This causes us to turn away from information that could help us change.

If we want honesty to become a regular practice, we have to separate clarity from condemnation. We can say, “This is what I’m doing.” We don’t need to add, “Because I am fundamentally flawed.”

If honesty is going to be useful, it has to be paired with compassion and kindness. Compassion is not indulgence and not excuse-making. It’s recognizing that we are human, that behavior reflects a complex mix of habit, fear and reward.

There’s another layer. We treat honesty as if its primary purpose is to expose our failures. We pull it out when something is off or needs correcting. But honesty is not inherently negative. It’s simply alignment.

When we pair clarity with kindness, honesty stops feeling like bad news. It becomes stability and integrity and the relief of not having to pretend.

Dr. Justin Altschuler, a physician certified in family practice and addiction at Sequoia MD, can be reached at (916) 668-7164. Previous columns can be found and shared at InsideSacramento.com. Follow us on Facebook, X and Instagram: @insidesacramento.