Why you should lie to your partners

Poly Means Many: There are many aspects of polyamory. Each month, the PMM bloggers will write about their views on one of them. Links to all posts can be found at polymeansmany.com

Captain Bluntschli: You said youd told only two lies in your whole life. Dear young lady: isnt that rather a short allowance? I'm quite a straightforward man myself; but it wouldnt last me a whole morning. - Act III, Arms and the Man by George Bernard Shaw

If you're reading any "how to" guide to polyamory, you're going to be told (in a variety of words and ways) time and time again that you should talk honestly about everything. I broadly agree, but I think this zeal for being honest and communicating about everything can be taken too far. In fact, one of the key skills in communication is knowing when not to communicate and when not to be honest.

All good parents lie to their children sometimes. Unless there are people out there who are genuinely never bored by reading the same, sodding five page cardboard book a dozen times in succession, or who really enjoy standing around in the cold to push their child on swing for twenty minutes, we all do it. We all want our children to feel that their parents love spending time with them, and that their feelings and interests are important to us. So we read the book again (doing the voices, of course), and we laugh and smile and sing and play, even when we'd rather not. Even when we're bored, frustrated or even on the edge of losing our tempers.

Usually, these lies are really just moments when we push aside misleading or counter-productive thoughts and feelings, and choose to act out of love instead. Losing my temper, or denying my daughter my company might feel satisfying in the moment, but once that moment has passed, I'd not only feel guilty, but I'd have hurt someone I love. When I'm able (and I'm not always able) to push aside these destructive thoughts and force myself to act out of love, even when I don't feel it, I feel better about myself than if I'd succumbed to cheap honesty.

Dr Laura Markham, who writes the amazing Aha! Parenting describes this process as mindfulness. She says that "Being mindful means that you pay attention to what you're feeling, rather than just acting on it," and so taking a pause, allowing the emotion to pass through you, and not acting until you are more in control. It's a key skill in parenting, she believes, not least because it's a skill we should all want our children to have. It's a myth that you should express your anger expressing anger actually makes you more angry. So if you express your anger to someone you love, whether that is a child or a partner, not only might you have thought of a better way of dealing with it if you'd just waited a moment, but you've made yourself more angry, and probably upset or riled the other person up as well. Honesty - not always useful.

On rare occasions, the best way to communicate is to lie. Or at least, to keep the truth to yourself for now. Suppose your partner is about to go out on a date, which you have had plenty of notice for and have happily agreed to, but just before they go, you have a pang of jealousy. You're not okay. You don't want your partner to fall for this new person. You don't want them to kiss or hold hands. Do you call them up to say this? Or perhaps you hear your partner and their other lover's sex noises, and although you said it was fine for them to stay over, you feel left out and lonely, and just want them to stop. Do you interrupt?

If you pause and allow the emotion to pass through you, you might find that dealing with the feeling yourself is the best way of handling it. Do you really want your partner to go on their date thinking that you are unhappy? Will you be glad tomorrow if they've cancelled the date on your behalf? Do you want your metamour to feel awkward and unwanted in your house? How would you want them to behave if the situation was reversed? It might be better to generously lie and say that you hope they have a lovely night, or to distract yourself with a hobby and play music loudly. You might find that once the emotion has passed, you really do want them to have a good time, and you're glad you didn't spoil it for them. Or maybe you talk about it later, when your emotions have cooled, and you are better placed to rationally consider what you want them to do differently next time, if anything. You don't need to bury your feelings, just find a better time and way to deal with them.

Analysing your own thoughts and feelings in this way is hard. That's why toddlers can't do it: they are relentlessly honest with their emotions, screaming with rage, hitting people who annoy them, throwing things they don't want and weeping at temporary separations from the people they love. I don't expect my daughter to be able to manage these difficult feelings based on how they might make me feel yet, but I do think it's fair to expect adults to be at least try to do this for each other. So when I find myself tempted to say something hurtful or selfish, my goal is to push that aside and to think, instead of being honest, can I act out of love instead?