I’ve learned through experience that people who say the following are not likely to be highly-authentic people.
- “To be honest…” or “To tell the truth…” Whenever I hear this, I always wonder why it is at that particular point in the conversation that this phrase comes out. Was the person lying before this point in the conversation? And if not, why is it important to affirm to me that he is not lying now? Has he suddenly become untrustworthy in the middle of a conversation? And if not to me, why to himself? Or is he just a cognitive miser who repeats this phrase because he has heard it from others, and without regard to whatever it is supposed to mean or what it might tend to convey (or to betray, even)? None of these possibilities speak well of his personal authenticity.
- “In my humble opinion…” Listen, son: If you have to tell me that your opinion is humble, I think you’ve missed the point of humility already. Just what are you trying to do here? Keep me from wondering about your humility by assuring me ahead of time that there couldn’t possibly be anything to worry about? If that’s the case, you’re doing exactly the opposite by bringing it up.
- “Just my two cents worth.” If it’s only worth two cents, why did you type a page and a half to say it, calling my honor into question several times? It’s fairly obvious that you think your opinion in the matter is a work of great beauty, yet you pretend to be humble about it with this anticlimactic retreat. And I’m supposed to respect you for it. Somehow.
- “Can’t we all just get along?” No, we can’t—not unless those of us who have conflicting convictions pretend that we do not. And in that case, we would simply be pretending that we are getting along, now, wouldn’t we? I know you well enough to know that you are not asking that we all roll up our sleeves and get down to the business of developing the same convictions all around, based honestly on fact and logic. No, you simply want to avoid obvious conflict. You’d rather not hear it, so that you can keep pretending the world is simpler than it really is.
- “Well, that may be, but I prefer to believe that…” OK, so you acknowledge the fact but choose to remain incorrigible in the face of it.
- “Well, I’ve always heard that…” What follows this phrase is almost always un-vetted hearsay. And it’s quite often wrong. Why not rather say, “I’ve studied this and my conclusion is…“? Or even, “I have no idea if this is true or not, but here’s what I’ve always heard…”? Well, that’s the stuff of which authentic people make themselves. But the hearsay artist is quite content to flit about on the currents of popular opinion without ever casting an anchor to see whether the solid bottom can be hooked into.
