day 182: The Hard Truth

I was listening recently to the story of an executive in Hollywood who early in his career would go into script meetings and when the time came for him to pass his opinion he would look at each of the scripts and call them like he saw them; many times telling others that he didn't like one or that he didn't think the company should support one of the scripts, etc. After one of his early days meetings he was taken aside by another studio exec who told him that was not working the way that he was expected. He asked the question, "what do you mean?". He was then told that he was to not be as truthful as he was and that it would be better for everyone if he would just tell everyone what they wanted to hear in the meeting and that then later he could decide to not support a project in private. After he digested what he was being told, he said back, "thank you for that advice but I'm going to try it my way and see how it goes." All of these years later, this executive has risen up the studio ladder and he is now known as the person who people who seek out for advice and counsel before the meetings, a person who others can count on to give it to them straight so they don't waste time or money, a person who others can count on to tell the truth. We run into this all the time at work. It is hard to give people the truth when it hurts or when it runs contrary to what someone wants to hear, or when it might hurt their feelings. Yet, what we don't recognize is that by not giving the people the truth we are actually hurting versus helping them. In 1 John 3:18 we read; "Dear children, let’s not merely say that we love each other; let us show the truth by our actions." If we want to be people who really are showing that we love one another, we can start with allowing the telling of the truth to be the most notable action of all. Today, you may be faced with a situation where providing the truth may be hard and controversial. If in that moment, you can think that the true action of love is to let the truth be told, then you will find yourself feeling more confident and courageous to allow the truth to be spoken.

Reference: 1 John 3:18 (New Living Testament)