Alyssah: Mamma smell my hair
me: (smells her hair)
Alyssah: What does it smell like?
me: meat?
Alyssah: No! (runs out of the room then back in with a tube of leave in hair conditioner, opens the lid and says) like this!
me: it smells pretty, like you after a bath.
Alyssah: Yuss!
I'm an extremely honest person. If you don't want an honest opinion, don't ask me. However, if I would've known her motive for asking this particular question, I might've answered differently in the first place. It's not that I would've lied. Dishonesty is such an ugly thing. Knowing people's motives helps us to better understand them and their behavior. My family has very thick hair. Everyone's hair retains strong scents easily. One of my daughter's hobbies is cooking. She was making lasagne. She had been browning ground beef and spicing it. Her sisters and cousin were teasing her about smelling like meat after she put dinner in to bake and had changed clothes. She was feeling a little sensitive. I should've responded with empathy instead of confusion. However, I'd been busy and was unaware of the situation. I responded honestly without knowing her motives. Sometimes brutal honesty isn't the best policy. It's of benefit to learn motive first then respond accordingly in life and in business. A simple "why do you ask" would have sufficed. In this situation the outcome wasn't tragic or painful and had no negative repercussions but that isn't always the case. It's always advantageous to use your best judgement in how to respond with integrity after learning the motive for the inquiry.
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