When Lying is a Good Thing

Yesterday I was with a group of fine women. We were discussing my book, "Conquering Your Goliaths," and had come to the third stone, "Optimism."

I asked, "What does optimism mean to you?" I got varied responses, including "being positive when you feel like crap."

There are days I feel like crap and when someone asks me how I'm doing I want to spill it. You know what I mean. All of it. Of course, I know that most folks are only saying "How are you doing?" because they expect you to say "fine", and not have you dish out a half an hour of straight talk--negative stuff they really don't want to hear.

But the comment made me think. What if, when I felt like crap and someone asked that question, I said, "I'm wonderful," "I'm fantastic!" "I couldn't be better!"

What if I...lied?

Okay, usually lying is considered a bad thing, something you do to protect the feelings of others or secrets that enter your soul to protect yourself. Lying may even be considered to be a sort of black swarm swimming inside your soul, a swarm you don't want anyone to know about.

But in this case I'd like to think that lying will do something for you. Something for your view on life. Something for your character. Something to lift your day. And if you say it often enough to enough people, you just might discover that you feel terrific after all.

And what sort of lie is that?