FireLie

The lie is a curious creature. It starts so small, so subtle, much like a pebble tossed into a still pond. At seven years old, you tell a small lie — perhaps to avoid a scolding, or to protect someone’s feelings. And just like that, it’s done. Or so you think. But no, you’ve put it into your backpack. You see, the lie doesn’t vanish. It sits there, tucked away in the dark recesses of your being, growing heavier with each passing year.

You might think it’s harmless — after all, what’s a little white lie? But as the years go by, that small pebble grows into a stone, and then into a boulder. Each lie you tell, whether to others or to yourself, adds weight to your soul. It is a burden, a shadow you carry through life, unseen by the world but ever-present within you. And each time you tell another lie, that backpack becomes heavier.

The weight of those lies doesn’t just reside in your body — it resides in your spirit, in the way you move through the world. The longer you carry them, the more they distort the truth of who you are, like a lens clouded with years of dust. The only way to lighten that burden, my friend, is to take those lies out of the bag, one by one, and expose them to the light. Truth, like the dawn, has the power to dissolve the darkness. You must bring the lies out and let them be seen for what they are.

And why do we lie? It’s almost always because we don’t want someone to be upset with us. We don’t want to face the discomfort of a momentary confrontation. So we lie, hoping to avoid the pain of the present, but what we fail to realize is that by doing so, we exchange that fleeting discomfort for a lifetime of weight. It’s a trade-off most of us make without even thinking. But the consequences — ah, the consequences — they follow us like shadows, growing longer with each year.

But there’s another, far more insidious form of lying: the lies we tell ourselves. This is where it gets really dangerous, for we are not just deceiving others, but deceiving the very core of our being. We lie about who we are, about what we want, about what truly makes us happy. We’re fed these lies by the world, by advertisements, by expectations, by all the forces that pull us in directions we do not want to go. And we swallow these lies whole. We might think we need that expensive car, or that fancy house, or that fleeting status, thinking that it will bring us fulfillment. But deep down, we know it’s a lie. The truth is, we don’t need it. We never did.

Yet the lie pushes us forward, like a meteor hurtling through space, just a little bit at a time, until one day, we wake up. We look around and realize we don’t care about any of this. The things we thought would bring us happiness are nothing but empty shells, and we wonder, “How did I get here?” It’s the slow, steady march of lies we’ve told ourselves, creeping into our consciousness over time, until the truth is buried beneath them.

This, my friends, is why Benjamin Franklin said, “Speak with sincerity in every word and action, in both your thoughts and your conversations with others.” To speak truthfully, to live truthfully, is to live without the weight of those hidden lies. It’s to walk with ease, with lightness, free from the burden of deceit.

So, let the lies out of your sack, like fireflies in the night. Let them scatter into the light of day, and watch as they dissolve, one by one. You’ll find that with each truth you embrace, the weight will lift, and you will come closer to the freedom that lies beyond the mask of illusion. The truth is not something to fear; it is the path to liberation. And when you stand in that truth, you will find that it is the only thing that can truly set you free.