Dear Friend, Sorry to take so long to get back to you on this. It was not because the item you focus on is small. Rather I think it is much bigger than you think. I have been pondering how to respond - what would be the best way. First let me share that I do not think lying is a good idea, nor do I think lying to yourself is useful. However, I have not yet found a person coming to my office who is not deeply involved with lying themselves in many many ways. The topic is very frustrating for people and I imagine, in your letter, that I can hear the tone of a lot of frustration. Still I have found that the position you seem to be in ("I've discovered that my partner lies to himself and he has to stop that before we can move on.") is a no-winner, as you seem to construct it. That quote you give, is fine for me -but how to achieve self-opennes?. Approaching lying as if it in a court case, seems always to make the lying deeper and deeper. I really, really believe the goal is to move toward more and more candid sharing of everything, and my experience is that this involves a lot of growth in both partners over quite a bit of time. Here's my definition. Lie – To knowing leave someone in a state of misunderstanding about something you believe is important to them. Active lying: to say that which is not so. Passive lying: to leave unsaid that which is important to someone. Most people seem to trivialize the discovery of lying in their partner and use it as a "stick" in the fruitless battle of "blaming" I find that they most often use it to "shame their partner" or to "justify" their own foolish reactions of angry attacks, self-justification, and giving up. Doesn't work! Besides, often lying is just the normal process of two people seeing different things about each other. Check out my papers on Validation and Making Sense. Growing into knowing myself required/requires me to relate to others who can share their views about parts of myself that I don't see, yet. And that growing involves lots and lots of Safety. Anger at a "liar" does not seem compatible with working toward candid sharing. Validation and PreValidation seems to work really well. Simply put, I believe people lie because they do not feel safe to tell the truth or they don't feel safe to discover things about themselves. People learn to tell the truth as the begin to experience that it is safer to share and explore themselves. And here we are back to the topic of becoming a source of safety to your partner. Good luck.