ONE OF THE MOST SHATTERING BLOWS an individual can sustain is to have his sense of reality distorted or denied. A correct perception of reality is central to a person's well-being. To mislead him or confuse his perceptions of the world around him is extremely destructive, yet this action is carried out thousands of times a day in families everywhere.

It has been shown by numerous researchers studying the origins of severe mental illness or psychosis that it is not simply rejection that severely harms children. It is denying and hiding rejection with double messages that has the most damaging effect. Having this sense of reality fractured by parents whose words they trust and believe literally drives children crazy. Rejection and emotional deprivation are serious enough issues in young children's lives, but if their parents also pretend that they are not rejecting them if they tell him one thing and do another they may cause more harm than most children's egos are capable of handling.

On a larger scale, our society is so permeated with these same kinds of double messages that one can predict a corresponding effect on a social level. If our sense of reality is being subtly twisted and distorted, if our perceptions are constantly being confused, then we must expect drastic consequences. Mixed messages where we are told one "fact" yet see something else happening are prevalent in our society and do have a devastating effect on all of us. It is important to our emotional well being that we be aware of the contradictions that every day impinge on our sense of reality.

Many of us are aware of how many times we have started off with the best intentions toward loved ones, somehow gotten sidetracked, and then just could not reconnect with those feelings. Many of us can remember how good we felt at the beginning of our relationship with our mate, and we wish we could recapture those feelings.

Many of my patients have complained to me about their husbands or wives. When I reminded them that they had chosen their spouses, they would universally say, "Well, wasn't like that when we first met & dated. To a large degree these husbands and wives were telling the truth. Their mates had increasingly backed off from the loving way they were at first.

For some people this backing away starts even before closeness has a chance to develop. Many people find it too difficult to tolerate even more than one date with someone; they feel doomed to go from one person to another, making little contact. Many people cannot bear feelings of both friendship and sexual attraction for the same person, although this combination of feelings makes for the happiest kind of relationship.

People Maintain That They Really Love Each other Long After the Romance and feelings Are gone. The man and woman who are still together yet have retreated from closeness and genuine affection for one another are in a truly unhappy position; this basic dissatisfaction is at the core of their emotional life. These individuals have formed a strong dependence on one another and at the same time will not accept the true reality of their lack of feeling for each other. This loveless dependency increases the destruction between them.

The same man who has described an awful and hopeless situation with his wife, when asked, "Why don't you leave her?" invariably answers, "Because I really love her." It requires a great deal of imagination to see love between these warring couples. By this time they may be habitually treating each other with insensitivity and disrespect, yet they do not want to see that long ago they ceased to be friends and are now substituting a pretense of love and loyalty. This deception may go on for a long time as the members of the couple attempt to cover up the fact that they have lost the real feelings of love they once had.

Ronald and Sharon, for example, had a fantasy of being in love. They both felt that they had one of the nicest relationships among their circle of friends. Almost immediately, however, Sharon took it for granted that Ronald was hard to please and critical of the way she looked and spoke. She had forgotten that he had once been attracted to her looks, the way she dressed, and her soft voice. Ronald didn't seem to mind very much that Sharon was too tired at night to make love and that she didn't seem very happy to see him when he came home from work each night. They had been married for only three years, but the romance was completely gone.

Sharon thought she had discovered other ways to please Ronald. She was a perfect hostess and an immaculate housekeeper, and she took pride in keeping the checkbook balanced. But Sharon had only substituted serving Ronald for being affectionate and sexual with him. Both Ronald and Sharon were deceiving themselves about their relationship. They were no longer in love with each other but were caught up in role playing.

The Denial of Truth Within the Couple Is the Fundamental Dishonesty Within the Family and the Society. The need to protect these untruths leads to hostility toward anyone who might see and expose the truth; an outsider's point of view must be suppressed to protect the illusions. We often feel angry toward the people who might reveal our own destructiveness. All of us feel ashamed and even paranoid when we are rejected or are destructive and rejecting to others. We would feel humiliated if we were overheard fighting with our mates.

By the time a child is born, very often the couple has hardened into a dishonest style and has long since retreated from basic feelings of love for one another. It is likely love will be progressively withheld from the child as well. When these feelings are withheld, there is a great deal of shame and covering up. The myth of family love and closeness must be upheld. The family will cling to one another desperately and dishonestly, attempting to prove the lie of its closeness. It is terrified of exposure and distrustful of outsiders, though family members often treat each other with less respect than they would a stranger on the street.

Form (the roles and routines of family life) is substituted for substance (the real feelings) when friendship is gone. This substitution can occur because parents feel that their children belong to them and because the parents are so defended that they cannot allow real acknowledgment, positive or negative feeling of their feeling. The contradictions of family life and the cover-up of this basic dishonesty are present in society at large. All of us are drastic influenced by the contradictions we see around us, by the discrepancy between what everyone says he wants and what he really thinks or how he really acts.

Cynical Attitudes Abound in Our Society, Yet Personal Happiness Is the Stated Goal. We all say we want happiness and act as if we are seeking it. Yet if happiness were achieved, it would interrupt one of our most prevalent defenses: the thousands of cynical thoughts we have about the world, about ourselves, and about members of society.

"All women are bitches."

"Men only want sex."

"Women are just after security and want to tie you down."

"You can't fight city hall."

"Men are always trying to keep women down."

"There are no honest politicians."

"A woman's place is in the home."

"Men aren't supposed to cry."

"The rich and powerful must be corrupt."

These attitudes, supposedly based on extensive previous experience, serve as self-fulfilling prophesies attribute to a natural feeling of helplessness. It is hard to imagine that people really believe they could find happiness in the harsh world described above thoughts. They are deceiving themselves about seeking happiness, just as many couples pretend to still be in love.

Personal Freedom Is a Cherished Value in Our Society, Yet It Terrifies Most People. Everyone says that he wants the freedom to live his life to his fullest potential. Yet most people run from freedom as they would from the plague. They prefer to feel victimized by the political system rather than live freely in a democratic government. They use these attitudes to support their feelings of powerlessness. Their search for personal freedom is doomed because of their fear and cynicism.

What people do with their freedom often proves that they are really terrified of it. A prominent professor had achieved a certain amount of prestige in his field and felt that his career was successful. Having reached this happy situation, he found himself more open to the reality of his miserable relationship with his wife of twenty years, who was severely mentally disturbed. He felt restricted by this insanely controlling, domineering woman, and now, with a spirit of determination, he decided to obtain his freedom. He divorced his wife and slowly began to make some new friends. For a few months he enjoyed the exhilaration of his freedom. Soon, however, this usually sober man could be found in the cocktail lounge of the university faculty club, drinking heavily. Within two years of his divorce he was fired from his position and admitted to the alcoholic ward of a local hospital.

In this extreme example a man essentially destroyed himself after gaining the freedom he had so longed for. Even though he had become externally free, he was still a prisoner of his defenses. It would have been very difficult for this man of intelligence to admit that he was terrified of freedom. Even today he is probably unaware that he ran away from the life he had said he wanted all during the confining years with his wife. His desire for freedom and his actions after gaining his freedom constitute a strong mixed message.

Mixed messages and cynical attitudes are capable of having an insidious effect on you because they interlock with your defense system. There is also a strong social pull to go along with these contradictions, to imitate other people. You can help yourself resist this social pressure by becoming aware of these mixed signals. Becoming more observant of the discrepancy between people's words and their actions can clear up the confusion you feel when receiving this kind of mixed communication. Also, if you learn to trust your own perceptions, you will dilute some of the effect of these conflicting messages.

A young couple I know had been dating for several months. They usually met three or four times a week for dinner and then spent the night together. One evening after they had felt very close to each other, Paul expressed some deep feelings. He told Alice that he was starting to care for her a lot, more than he had for any other woman. He said that she had the qualities that he had always fantasized about in the woman he hoped he would someday meet. He said he wanted to spend more time with her, and perhaps they could live together someday.

Alice was happy to hear all this, but her good feelings didn't last. In the weeks that followed, Paul stopped calling for dates as often as he used to. After a few weeks Alice realized that they had only spent one evening together during the previous ten days. When she asked Paul if he was pulling away, he became angry and offended, denying the true message of his behavior. She felt terrible and confused. Until then she had believed her lover's words and hadn't noticed that his actions had been the opposite for a long time. She would have been better off if she had paid more attention to his actions.

You can practice a similar kind of scrutiny on yourself. question habitual patterns of behavior that contradict your supposed goal How many times have you said you want love in your life and then pushed others away? How many times have you pretended that others were denying you what you wanted when in reality you were probably denying yourself?

In relationships it is vital to be honest with yourself and others about those times when you are not feeling love . More than anything else, try to be honest with your children. Deceiving them with white lies in the name of protection confuses them and tends to distort their sense of reality. Children read your actions anyway, and it is your behavior that they imitate, not your words. It is far better to tell a child that you can't feel much for him at the moment than to try to avoid the pain of that honest statement. One of the most destructive things you can do is confuse and deceive a child about your feelings toward him.

If you attempt to live a life of integrity, where you make your behavior correspond to your stated goals, you will gain in confidence. And you won't be contributing to the damage inflected on others that mixed messages create.

"The Truth is a provocative and understandable adventure into life. It is both profoundly simple and simply profound."

—Robert S. Hoffman, M.D.

Assistant Professor of Psychiatry UCLA

Director, Westside Mental Health Group

Diplomat, American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology

... I am impressed by the value it holds for all persons in the helping professions."

Richard H. Seiden, Ph. D., M.PH.

Professor of Behavioral Sciences

University of California, Berkeley

The refusal to recognize the difference between what one believes about oneself and the objective truth is the basis of neurotic behavior. As children, people develop defenses to protect them from pain, but clinging to them in adulthood keeps them limited, insulated, and incapable of experiencing genuine love and happiness. Yet most people would rather accept the way things are rather than risk the anxiety inherent in change.

In this unusual book, Robert Firestone and Joyce Catlett examine these defense mechanisms so common in most adults' lives. Using detailed case histories and step-by-step explanations, they discuss such problems as reliving the past; withholding affection or natural talents; playing the victim; manipulation of others; the use of emotional painkillers such as alcohol, food, sex, or drugs; and jealousy.

Yet The Truth also describes in detail ten important, realistic steps to take towards reversing these destructive tendencies. And to help make the best choice towards professional help, if desired, the authors discuss key types of therapy and how to choose a competent, compassionate therapist.

The Truth is a positive book that maintains that any symptom or habit can be changed if one really wants to change it. The secret is establishing - and living with—the truth.

Robert Firestone is a psychologist in Los Angeles with a Ph. D. in clinical psychology from the University of Denver. Joyce Catlett is an educational therapist with a degree in psychology horn UCLA.