One Week Zero Lies

Could you go one whole day without telling even one tiny lie? Writer Dolly Alderton tried it for seven.

- Dolly Alderton

How often do you lie? I’ll go first. I lie to the doctor about how much I drink (who knows what a unit is anyway? Why can’t they just say glasses or shots?), I lie about work deadlines to friends (when really, I’m just too tired to go out) and, of course, I lie on social media (that selfie had more takes than an entire Steven Spielberg movie).

Here’s the sobering truth: research says that we lie up to 200 times a day. A day! There’s this quote by Stephen King I think about all the time: “We’re only as sick as our secrets.” If that’s true, it would seem we’re all dying of terminal dishonesty. But it’s not the whoppers that intrigue me, it’s the daily details we exaggerate to tell a good story.

To highlight just how many of these little lies are woven into my daily existence, I set myself the challenge of telling zero lies for seven days. Trust me, when you’re as keen for an easy life as I am, the thought of laying myself completely bare was incredibly scary. Still, I wanted to see what, or even if, anything changed. Here’s my diary of truth.

Monday

I’m gutted when I receive an email from a journalist telling me she was offended by something I said in my podcast, The High Low. It was about the terrorist attack at the Ariana Grande concert in Manchester, England, last May, where 23 people, the majority of them children, were killed and 500 attendees were injured. She feels the way I expressed myself could be misconstrued and encourage Islamophobia.

Normally, I’d switch into grovelling mode. Instead, I construct a reply in which I thank her for her honesty, and explain why I said what I said. She thanks me for my message, recognising one of my points as valid.