Words matter. These are the best Pamela Meyer Quotes, and they’re great for sharing with your friends.
Lying is the rule, not the exception.
Studies by several different researchers have shown that the number of lies we’re told each day is anywhere from 20 – 200. To many, that will seem shockingly high. Yet it isn’t, in light of humans being ill-suited to detect lies. The average human can detect a lie only 54% of the time.
It’s counterintuitive to take a long time to hire someone, but it will save you enormous amounts of time and money later. Our biggest mistakes in hiring stem from speed.
Any normal candidate who mocked the disabled or made crude reference to a woman’s menstrual cycle or dabbled in 9/11 conspiracy theories would be out of the race. Trump’s fans remain. And wait for more.
Truth in our society often takes a back seat to securing gainful consequences.
As someone who specializes in deception, I’ll tell you this much: When someone insistently implores, ‘Believe me,’ don’t. Pleading ‘believe me’ or ‘trust me’ – insisting to people that you are telling the truth – is a tell-tale sign that you probably aren’t.
Study after study shows that people are much less likely to lie to a person they consider to be honest.
Pay attention to science and not myths: We think liars won’t look you in the eyes, but it turns out an honest person will only look you in the eyes about 60 percent of the time.
Nothing is certain in life but death and taxes. And in Donald Trump’s case, lies.
Truth-tellers who expect others to believe them tend to speak naturally and un-self-consciously. But if they don’t expect to be believed, they may try too hard to seem honest. Unfortunately, the result makes them sound less believable. Obviously, then, not every oddly phrased statement is a lie.
The more you talk about – and live by – your principles, the harder it will be for others to treat you in a morally ambiguous manner.
Deception can cost billions. Think Enron, Madoff, the mortgage crisis. Or in the case of double agents and traitors, like Robert Hanssen or Aldrich Ames, lies can betray our country. They can compromise our security. They can undermine democracy. They can cause the deaths of those that defend us.
Liars do look you in the eye. They do not always stutter, stammer, blush or fidget.
Contempt is the only asymmetrical expression in the muscular facial system: Disgust, fear, happiness, surprise and anger typically express themselves symmetrically. Contempt is marked by one lip corner pulled up and in a dismissive sneer.
White lies keep social dignity intact and are far more prevalent than most people realize. Several studies have found that an average person is lied to from 10 to 200 times a day – mostly just to keep a conversation going, to avoid conflict, or to establish a connection with someone.
Maybe Trump isn’t a racist in private. But he’s sure acting like one in public. And his body language is corroborating the evidence.
Breaks in trust are infuriating and hurtful, but they don’t entitle you to flame out, throw a fit, or stomp around rolling your eyes. Try to keep the steam from coming out of your ears.
Trump is a master obfuscator. Like an octopus escaping a predator, he releases a cloud of ink when called to the carpet on one of his many lies. His strategy? Obfuscate, then reference others. ‘Millions agree,’ ‘everyone knows,’ ‘many have done it.’
Con men look for human frailty to exploit. This is most often greed. Trump found a different vice: anger. The emotional are always the most susceptible to manipulation.
For the liespotter who knows how to listen well, the random words, sounds, and phrases in a person’s speech are never as random as they seem. They offer a clear sightline into the liar’s psyche.
Pummeling an answer out of someone never works. You cannot intimidate someone with aggressive language and think they’ll be more forthcoming… that’s a caricature of interrogation, part of the TV culture of what it looks like.
Research indicates that a pause tends to be a signal that a cluster of deceptive cues is on its way. This is a key reason why voters routinely associate Trump with authenticity: He rarely pauses.
One-year-olds learn concealment. Five-year-olds lie outright: they manipulate via flattery. Nine-year-olds – masters of the cover-up. By the time you enter college, you’re going to lie to your mom in one out of every five interactions.
Speaking of trust, ever since I wrote this book, ‘Liespotting,’ no one wants to meet me in person anymore – no, no, no, no, no. They say, ‘It’s okay. We’ll email you.’ I can’t even get a coffee date at Starbucks. My husband’s like, ‘Honey, deception? Maybe you could have focused on cooking. How about French cooking?’
Cultists do not want to admit they have been manipulated by charisma. Nigerian money scheme victims do not want to accept that they had been swindled. To accept those realities is to accept their own faults. Denial of our own weaknesses is something we all suffer from time to time.
Business is a battlefield. You need to be able to go to battle with your team members. Like the military. Know them, trust them, and know who you’re working with.
Tales of cheating on school and college tests are rife. There have been instances where teachers have given students test answers in order to make themselves look good on their performance reviews. Mentors who should be teaching the opposite are sending a message that lying and cheating are acceptable.
Not all lies are harmful. Sometimes we’re willing participants in deception for the sake of social dignity, maybe to keep a secret that should be kept secret, secret. We say, ‘Nice song.’ ‘Honey, you don’t look fat in that, no.’
Lying is a cooperative act. Think about it. A lie has no power whatsoever by its mere utterance. Its power emerges when someone else agrees to believe the lie.
A narcissist like Trump must constantly inflate and exaggerate in order to keep the supply trains running. He has to brag about how, ‘I have a very high IQ’ or concoct stories about people agreeing with him.
