Fictional Life

Have you ever sat in a room with someone telling a story about their life, or read a Facebook posts by someone, and suddenly found yourself in a pause that made you scratch your head and say HUH??? When did that happen?  Was it in an alternate universe or something? I do NOT remember that!

People seem to rewrite the history of their lives....a lot.  The stories grow and change and new details emerge that weren't there before. People are suddenly more interesting, more educated, more traveled. They are kinder, more generous, and more successful. Sometimes I read or listen to people spin their tales and it's like reading a fairy tale.  They have created a fictional life in which they are happy and impressed with themselves and they are hoping others buy into it.

Sadly, reality and truth always have a foundation and miraculous way of creeping back in.  The smoke and mirrors can be wiped away easier than they were created.  False lives fall apart and have more holes in them than the strainer you use to drain your top ramen.  That "college" you attended has no record of your enrollment; That job you had "managing" a team of five, says you were a clerk; You confused the geography about your trip to "Paris" and now we know it was Paris, Oregon; You've never met the "President", unless you count the president of your neighborhood watch group; and that "Two Caret Diamond" your wife wears is really a Cubic Zirconium, but boy does it sparkle.

The only way for you to pull off the hoax of your Fictional Life rewrite is to cut ties with everyone who has ever known you  and start fresh somewhere else where there are no computers or telephones or technology of any kind that would allow for others to perform background checks or contact references. You would have more luck discovering oil in your backyard or devising an economical and commercial way for  interplanetary space travel in your life time.

Your better option is to be honest. About who you are, where you've been, and what you've done. Even the smallest white lie about education, family, work experience, or money will eventually bite you in the ass. Big Brother knows more about you than you know, and so do all the people who knew you "when". 

Success is to be measured not so much by the position that one has reached in life as by the obstacles which he has overcome.

Booker T. Washington

Time to Be Real.  Leave the Fiction for the books you read and the authors who make it believable.