Have you ever met a guy who gave off a suspicious vibe? It was like you couldn’t quite put your finger on it, but you knew that something seems off. It’s hard to pinpoint exactly where a person may be disingenuous. And sometimes you wish you had a lie detector, but you don’t, so we have to look for other clues on how to tell if a guy is lying to you. Yep, straight-up lying. You don’t need to be a trained FBI agent to decipher if he’s being honest or not. This comes in handy if you’re in a relationship, at work, or just talking to your friends. So, let’s take a look at these 10 signs.
1. He has a reason for everything.
You catch him in a white lie, he has a reason for it. You ask him about something in his story that doesn’t add up, he has a reason for it. You could catch him in a straight-up, 100%, no-getting-out-of-jail free card kind of lie, and – you guessed it – he would come up with a reason for it. The thing is, these aren’t real reasons, they are EXCUSES, and they don’t make the cut. Unless he was doing it to literally save your life or hide a surprise party from you, a lie is a lie, period.
Check out: 6 Types of Liars
2. Follow his gaze.
Everyone has different tendencies when it comes to their gaze. Some people make consistent eye contact, while others may avoid it on a normal basis due to shyness or nervousness. The important thing to look out for is a change from their baseline. If they start the conversation with consistent eye contact, then start looking away or at other things when you question them about a lie, this is a sign of a liar. The opposite could be just as true. If they often look away, but suddenly stare at you more intensely than a shark, then they’re trying too hard to cover up that lie.
3. He starts sweating.
Our sweat glands can respond to exercise, temperature, or stress. When someone has to lie, their brain is going into overload to make sure they lie successfully. As you get nervous, your body temperature increases and it activates your sweat glands. Unless someone just changed the thermostat, a sudden increase in sweat is likely to point out the liar in the conversation.
4. He changes the subject.
A liar won’t want to focus on the lie any longer than he has to. It takes a lot of effort to keep the lie going, and his goal is to have you accept it and move on from it as quickly as possible. This will cause him to steer the conversation towards another topic. He may suddenly stray off into another subject, or elaborate on a part of the conversation that wasn’t really that important, to begin with. He may not commit a lie yet, but if he continues to talk about the same subject, he’s about to lie, so in order to get you off his back, he’ll have to change to a different subject.
5. He has the jitters.
The jitterbug isn’t just a dance your grandpa might know. It seems to be an illness that spreads to liars. Check for signs of the jitterbug within his arms or legs. Are his legs pointed towards the door? Does he get up and walk around, or touch his hair excessively? Is he shaking? All of these jitters are signs he’s covering something up and wanting to run.
Check out: 10 Signs you’re becoming toxic
6. He puts the spotlight on you.
Lying goes hand in hand with manipulation, especially if you’re a well-practiced liar. Remember how he might change the subject? Well, his new favorite subject may turn out to be you. Liars will often manipulate the conversation to shift the blame onto the accuser (AKA you). It started out with you trying to clarify his actions, but it turned into him bringing up an issue he has with you. You’re left blindsided, and possibly even apologizing. The question isn’t how this happened, but why. The liar knows how to shift the spotlight to get himself out of a sticky situation.
7. He says too much.
A liar will seem jumpy, but it’s not always physical. What may start moving without stopping are his words. Look out for a liar who seems to go into too much detail in his responses, especially if he seems to be stammering or tripping over his own words. It’s like he knows he’s lying so he’s trying to cover it up with extra words just in case.
8. His tone is off.
Let’s say you’re just having a normal conversation, using your normal tone of voice. Then when something is off, or you get triggered, or when someone you like walks in, you sometimes unconsciously switch to a different tone, right. But let’s say you ask him a question that really got to him, observe his tone of voice, is there a change? Maybe it’s deeper, or a higher pitch. Now of course, just going off by this won’t work, and it’s best if you couple it together with other signs as well.
Related: He’s not that into you (5 red flags)
9. He touches his face.
Body language speaks more than our mouth, so pay attention to this. Liars will often touch or block off parts of their face with their hands or hair. They might even turn to face away from you. This is a subconscious defense mechanism to “protect” themselves from getting caught. Most won’t even realize they are doing this… until you call them out on it.
10. He uses vague words.
You usually get either the over-the-top liars who say too much or the ones who never say enough. If you have the latter, the guy will make everything seem “fuzzy”. It’s just enough to sound believable, but he doesn’t mention the emotional, involved descriptions that a genuine storyteller would. Basically, it’s good enough, and hoping his lie can fly under the radar.
Check out: 10 Warning Signs of a player
Conclusion:
Overall, we might have all been in conversations that have made us nervous. But that doesn’t mean that we have all lied in those conversations. If this guy just shows one or two signs above, that doesn’t make him a liar. If he’s showing more than a couple, though, you should definitely do some more prying to figure out what’s going on. The most important thing of all is to listen to your gut… you might not have a lie detector but you have your basic human instincts to protect you. After all, if he told you one thing and at a later date, he tells you something else, then you obviously should know he’s lying. Because the stories don’t match. So there you have it 10 signs on how to tell if a guy is lying to you.