Each of these eleven principles apply to the matter of honesty and to the creation of Ligato.
Quad One Honesty
First, within quadrant one we find the capacity and willingness of us to be honest with other people regarding our beliefs, perspectives, assumptions and practices. As noted in these principles, it takes energy to hide what we are feeling or thinking (principle one). And our communication with other people fails to be effective (principle seven).
However, we are also taking risks when we disclose everything that resides in our psyche about ourselves or about other people. It is often a struggle to determine what is to be shared and what is to be held in our hidden or private self (quad two). Nevertheless, as noted, this hiding requires energy and often diverts attention from what should be the focus of our attention. It is often a matter of not whether we should be honest; it is more a matter of what should be our focus at anyone point in time. We can easily be distracted by the matter of disclosure and honesty.
Quad Two Honesty
There is also energy being dispensed by other people when they hold off disclosing their reactions to us. They are not being honest, and this leads them often to not pay attention to what we are saying or even how we are relating to them at any one point in time. Luft’s third principle suggests that under conditions of threat, the levels of disclosure and honesty tend to decline. Quad Two (Blind Self/Unaware Self) grows larger, at the expense of the other three quadrants (principle one).
It is in this interactive dynamic operating in the Johari Window that we find the complexity of true honesty. It is not just the matter of one of us being honest; it is also the matter of the other person’s desire (and ability) to be honest (quad two). It is a matter of mutual trust and willingness to be honest that is key (principle three). Furthermore, this honesty can’t be forced (as has often been done in many human relations workshops) (principle four). Enforcement produces threat, which in turn reduces the potential for honesty.
Quad One and Two Honesty
As Joe Luft proposes, honesty is not just an expression of higher order values as the self-help books extoll. Honesty and the expansion of quad one leads to interpersonal learning (principle five). We learn by sharing with others (quad one) and receiving their feedback regarding what we have said and done (quad two). Honesty in quad one also leads to more productive work being done by two people or an entire group (principle six).
Quad Three Honesty
It is in this third quad where we find the most challenging and most intimate of all demands for honesty. The question arising from this quad is: how honest can we be with ourselves? As noted in the first part of Luft’s principle nine, there are covert aspects of behavior in quad three (as well as quads two and four). Parts of ourselves are not only disliked by other people; they are also disliked by us. How honest are we all the time about these less desirable aspects of ourselves? What about the least aspects of ourselves (such as our envy of other people’s success)? What about those aspects that tend to emerge when we are frightened (such as our retreat from the current scene)? And how do we appraise (and hide) those behaviors in our repertoire that are reserved for people whom we don’t like, whom we fear, or on whom we are overly dependent (such as our lashing out in anger)? There are so many ways in which we want to hide ourselves from ourselves.
