I definitely feel like my consciousness leveled up when I realized that my faith that you are always better off knowing the truth was just that : faith.

Not reason or logic or any sort of rational belief. Logic does not support this very foundational belief of mine.

After all, anyone with an imagination and a IQ above room temperature can come up with scenarios where you are definitely not better off knowing the truth.

For an off the cuff example, imagine that someone has been in a terrible accident and the only thing that will save their life is a risky and terrifying operation.

Like, they are going to take this guy’s entire brain out of his head, or something.

Then the patient regains consciousness, which is fine as long as they stay calm. Any rise in blood pressure, however, could kill them.

Are you going to tell them the truth that will probably kill, or lie and say that everything is fine and that they are just going to go back to sleep for a while and after that everything will be back to normal?

I get the feeling most people’s examples would be less imaginative and less gruesome.

Ah well, c’est la vie, c’est la guerre.

Anyhow…. my point (I do have one) is that my belief that I was always better off with the truth was not based on reasons so much as hope. Hope and a vague sense that I was probably better off knowing the truth more times than not.

That is a logical model known to statisticians as “guessing”.

In fact, in the final analysis, it seems to me that my faith in the truth was based mostly on the fact that my personality and cognitive style leaned in that direction anyhow, so I might as well spin that as a good thing.

I have always had a very analytical mind that relentlessly sought answers. I was, after all. the kid who found out Santa didn’t exist by bombarding my siblings with so many highly on-point questions that there was no way they could maintain the illusion and had to admit Santa was not real. It was just Mom and Dad.

To be honest, that was a huge relief. The world made sense again.

So no matter what, I was going to relentlessly seek the truth like a shark on the hunt. My belief that I am always better off with the truth, then, seems like that selfsame shark grandly proclaiming that the best food in the world is sushi.

Well what else was he gonna eat? Barbecue?

This error of faith seems relatively minor. Our society favours truth, at least in the abstract. Honesty is a virtue. We tell people to be realistic about things. Most people would agree that you’re better off with the truth than a lie most of the time.

And taken in that context. it is minor. But there is an underlying truth that represents something far more dire.

A inability to ever shield oneself from the truth.

I have made noises before about how a truly rational, logical person must be naked before the truth, without reservation or defense, and that sure sounds noble and brave and exactly what Western society teaches us to believe.

It’s also how someone like me boasts about what an intellectual badass they are.

That’s almost adorable. Sad, but adorable.

But for the most part, it’s feckless bullshit. All volts, no current. Sure, it sounds good, but any serious attempt to implement it will fail.

The human psyche is simply not capable of living like that.

That’s why most people have a certain amount of bullshit in their lives. Things that are not strictly true but that they have to belive in order to keep their psyche stable and their self-worth in functional shape.

This universaility of bullshit is something I have known all my life. To me, with my unusual mind, it was obvious that people protected themselves from the sharp corners and rough edges of life with beliefs that were not supportable by reason.

Of course, they didn’t know this. That would have defeated the whole purpose of it. This only worked if the person’s metaconsciousness could fool the conscious mind into accepting the beliefs without questioning them.

And as far as I can tell, that works perfectly well for most people.

But then there’s mental mutants like myself. I was born with that relentless hunger for the truth and the constant demand that thinjgs fit together and make sense before I can accept them as real.

This temperament makes self-delusion like I have been describing quite tricky. I think it’s the main thing that has kept me from developing the psychological defenses I see in others, and I think that has hurt me terribly in the long term.

Turns out that when you’re naked before the truth, you get real cold. Go fig.

I have little to no ability to shield myself from the dark truths of the world. I don’t have that little shard of consciousness that intercepts information on the way in and deflects, diffuses, or even destroys the stuff that will be injurious to the psyche.

I soak it all up like a sponge and add it to my worldview, without exception.

And sure, that leads to an interior world that’s cold as hell, but I have taught myself to ignore the cold, or see it as a good thing.

It just proves how much better I am than other people. You know, that I am not a delusional wimp like them.

And that’s all well and good, right?

Except, oh wait, I am crazy and miserable and full of pain.

Kind of suggests there might be something I have overlooked.

Like that sometimes cold comfort is just plain not enough. And that this hard edged mind of mine cuts me up and cuts me down far more than it hurts anyone else. And that the path to feeling truly alive and real is not one that can be predicted or planned, and it definitely cannot be verified.

To recover, then, is to risk believing things which are not “true.”

Now I am going to lie down and think about that for a while.

I will talk to you nice people again tomorrow.