Before the age of nine, I was pretty much dishonest about everything. Perhaps, I thought I could escape punishment by lying. That of course did not work. One day, my lying caught up with me. On that particular day, my parents asked if I had done such and such a thing. I had not, so I told them the truth. But would my parents believe me? No, they would not. The one time that I had actually told the truth, no one believed me. I probably spent ten or more minutes trying to convince my parents of my innocence. I even cried. There were tears streaming down my face. I pleaded with my parents, “please believe me.” But they would not. They said my crying was merely crocodile tears.

At that moment, my nine-year-old self decided that I would stop lying, for I had become the boy who had cried wolf one too many times. I told my parents of my decision, and probably for the first time in my young life, they saw that I was being truthful. Come to think of it, I am certain that Holy Ghost in them confirmed the truthfulness of my words. I repented of lying, and from that day onward, I started speaking the truth. And even when I knew that telling the truth would sometimes result in punishment, I still told the truth. If ever the urge to lie reared its ugly head, I recalled how I felt that day when my parents would not believe me even when tears were streaming down my face. That image of myself has emboldened me to “speak the truth and speak it ever, cost it what it will. [For] he who hides the wrong he did, does the wrong thing still.” My parents instilled in me these words, and from childhood until now, they have guided my life.

I am sharing my story because I want you to understand how harmful dishonesty is. My dishonesty destroyed the trust that my parents had in me and rebuilding that trust took time. I understand that dishonesty might seem like the immediate solution to your problems or the best way to escape punishment, but in the long run, you will come to realize that you have not escaped. You have merely delayed what was coming. For dishonesty has a way of catching up with you. Another thing to consider is this. The length of time that it takes to regain people’s trust is often far more than the length of time you spent being dishonest. What I mean by this is that you may have been dishonest only a few times, but you may have to spend years proving that you have changed. That is a lot of time. Think about this too. A lot of people forgive, but they do not forget. In their minds, you will always have a label that reads, “liar, dishonest, and so on.” Therefore, choose honesty!