Now in its third edition, Mistakes Were Made has become a classic exploration of cognitive dissonance and the humorous and disconcerting lengths humans go to resolve incongruities.

It is interesting to watch the behavior of cults and how they handle predictions of Armageddon and apocalypse that, for one reason or another, have never materialized on schedule. When the clock reads 12:01 AM and the planet has not yet been incinerated, cult leaders never second-guess, lament their stupidity, or concede a mistake.

Take Marian Keech’s gang of faithfuls in the mid-twentieth century. (At least that was what psychologist Leon Festinger called her in his study investigating cult behavior.) Keech had pronounced that December 21, 1954, was the day the earth would cease to be. A UFO would save the faithful few, leaving the cataclysm light years behind. Some devotees had quit their jobs, sold their homes, and given their savings away. When midnight struck, the earth appeared much the same, and there was no extraterrestrial in sight. Thankfully, Keech had a new vision at 4:45 AM, in which divine powers informed her that the earth had been spared thanks to the unprecedented vibrancy of faith and goodness the believers assembled in her living room had manifested. They had saved earth. The growing despondency became euphoria. The followers called the press and let them know the good news, and began evangelizing with a renewed zeal.

Festinger developed a term to describe phenomena like the behavior of cult leaders and their followers: cognitive dissonance. When expectations and deep beliefs clash with reality, people desperately seek to minimize the dissimilarities. Everyone does this, not just occultists. We self-justify when we act in ways we didn’t want to believe we were capable of acting. We generously extend the benefit of the doubt to that politician or celebrity we admire. These justifications are attempts to alleviate unpleasant disharmonies.

Cognitive dissonance is no longer a term confined to the ivory tower. Plenty of non-academics discuss it in casual conversations. It’s become fairly ubiquitous. But as common as the term is, it is usually used to explain someone else’s delusions. Most of us are unaware of the extent to which cognitive dissonance shapes our individual histories and major world events.

Cognitive dissonance created a great deal of cognitive dissonance when the term was first introduced in academic settings. The concept challenged many of the dominant paradigms of the day: the economics axiom that people act in rational self-interest, the behaviorist premise that action is reward-oriented, or the psychoanalysis mainstay that aggressive behavior resolves aggressive urges.

Behaviorism, for example, fails to make sense of harrowing initiation rites, like hazing at fraternities. If we are so eager for reward and avoiding punishment, why are fraternities with the most brutal, painful initiations also the most coveted and well liked by their members? Why do more young guys continue to sign up? If behaviorism were accurate, those fraternities would dry up, and the fraternities with milder initiations would flourish. Punishments would be a deterrent. But the effect is just the opposite: frat brothers go through unpleasant rituals and speak highly of what they have joined.

Cognitive dissonance and self-justification can make better sense of the phenomenon. People seem to be happier with an accomplishment or reward when it comes through suffering and struggle than when it is simply given. Who is willing to say that, after all that pain, the decision was not worth it?

Obviously, people do not enjoy the pain itself or enjoy the accomplishment because it’s linked to pain. But when a person choses a goal of his own volition that involves struggle and hardship to achieve, that goal becomes more desirable. 

After observing groups from opposing political views convinced that their candidate had slaughtered the other in a presidential debate, humorist Leonard Bruce concluded that there was not much that a candidate could say to dissuade his supporters. A candidate could announce that he is a liar and a crook and his supporters would unflinchingly praise him for honesty.

As the Iraq War continued, a growing number of Republicans began screening out any reports or doubts about weapons of mass destruction (WMDs). Those loyal to the cause roved the press for facts or even rumors of buried stashes. The big find was always just around the corner, according to many Americans.

From Colin Powell to Condoleezza Rice, George W. Bush’s top advisors have conceded that WMDs were never discovered. In his memoir, Bush himself talked about a sickening feeling that is still with him whenever he recalls the fact that no WMDs were found. That gut churning discomfort he describes is cognitive dissonance.

Of course, the cognitive dissonance was on both sides of the political aisle. Ahead of the 2003 invasion, nearly half of Democrats supported the war, and 72 percent of Democrats believed Iraq possessed WMDs. The number of Democrats who remembered their original support and beliefs about WMDs dropped off precipitously just a few years later. To turn dissonance into consonance, many Democrats had to tell themselves, in essence, that they knew the whole time.

When a belief is deeply ingrained and the belief holder is intransigent, even the most robust research presented in the most rhetorically brilliant way will fail to convince someone that they have been wrong. Sometimes it only further ingrains a mistaken belief. This is the “backfire effect.” It is the brain's way of avoiding the hard work of revising a deeply held opinion. Instead of changing one’s mind, it is easier to double down on the original beliefs, and explain away the mounting evidence. This is common in politics among leaders and citizens. Our fiercest convictions are the most susceptible. It is easier to paint a bedroom a different color than redo the house’s foundation. It is the same for the brain as it processes information.

This doubling down on positions without evidence shows up in politics all the time. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s appalling policy decision to round up Japanese Americans and put them in camps was based on rumors more than evidence, as General John Dewitt later admitted. The idea that some Japanese were hellbent on destroying the United States, and that Japanese Americans had no such intention was too dissonant. It was easier to double down on a baseless hunch than hold the dissonance of violent and peaceful Japanese.

Memory is trying to save you excess embarrassment and make you feel like the hero of your life’s story. This tendency can express itself in interesting ways. When host Tom Brokaw interviewed the novelist and social critic Gore Vidal on the Today show, host Brokaw wanted to talk about bisexuality, a recurring theme in some of Vidal’s writing. According to Vidal, Brokaw broached that subject multiple times, and each time, Vidal rejected that line of inquiry, telling Brokaw he would rather talk about politics. Eventually, Brokaw relented and the pair discussed the policies of Jimmy Carter, who was president at the time. When Time interviewed Brokaw years later, they asked him if he had ever had a difficult time with a guest. Brokaw mentioned the Gore Vidal interview: “I wanted to talk about politics and he [Vidal] wanted to talk about bisexuality.”

Vidal felt he had been vilified, but it is more likely that Brokaw switched their lines unconsciously. He probably believed, very genuinely, that he was recalling the story correctly. Our brain has a way of airbrushing the details of memories that cast us in a less-than-flattering light.

Social psychologist Anthony Greenwald describes the ego as “totalitarian.” A totalitarian ruler fools the masses and posterity; the totalitarian ego fools the self. Just like Nazis burned books and documents that incriminated the regime, the ego is intent on removing inconvenient data that fails to promote the self. We would like to think of ourselves as utterly different from dictators but just as victors get to tell their version of history, we like to have the final word on our own personal history.

Why do we do this? It has a lot to do with the structure of memory—a subject that we have failed to understand well. If you follow the conversation over the past centuries about human memory, you will see that the imagery thinkers lean on to explain it is always technological. Memory has been compared to a wax slab that experiences imprint memories on, or a blank slate to be etched on. After Gutenberg invented the printing press, memory became commonly compared to books in a library. In our own time, we use metaphors from film and computer technology. We talk about the tapes we play, or our limited mental storage space. We think of memories as files that are saved and can be retrieved whenever. Unfortunately, none of these captures the mechanics of memory well.

The truth is that we do not remember everything. We can not retrieve any memory on command or by selecting a key word to narrow the search. The best we have are highlights. We take it for granted, but the process of forgetting is as vital as the process of remembering. If we remembered everything, we would go insane trying to sort and figure out what is most important. The brain has to keep the most relevant and helpful details at the fore.

Moreover, those moments we manage to remember are far from static. They undergo their own complex evolution over time; they can change based on our feelings in the moment, how we perceive ourselves and others at a given time.

Memory is less like a seamless film reel and more like a few jumbled frames that need elaboration to make any sense of it. You can recall a chorus from an old song perfectly or a string of dialogue from a childhood movie. But most life events are far too multifaceted for us to recall perfectly. There is no mental security camera that can play a scene back for us.

If you remember a childhood birthday party, you may not be able to tell what is the result of your own memory, and what you have woven into the memory through photos and anecdotes from others. Memory specialists call this "source confusion."

When we tell stories from our past, we usually count on them being received without question. Especially when the stories center on sensitive material. Most people do not say in response to a story, “I bet your dad didn’t really hit you that hard or that often” or “I’m sure your mom wasn’t that cruel when she was drunk.” Sometimes it was that bad and people have remembered correctly, but many other times the memories we have are incomplete and have been embellished around an emotion we feel very strongly.

Consider the way many people talk about an ex. On the heels of a break up most will tell a story that is pretty damning—of the other. People usually share the saga from the position of the moral and rational high ground, that they got out just in time, and almost ended up with a monster. Self-doubt does not often enter into the equation. Is it possible that person has forgotten some of the moments and their own habits that contributed pain and annoyance to the relationship? Most people cannot face that until the relationship fades from the rearview. Some never own up to their part at all.

A good rule of thumb is that if the way you tell the story and represent people changes with your mood and what is going on in your life at that time, it’s probably on you, not them.

There are more similarities than one might expect between the enraptured, newlyweds married for three weeks and the crotchety embittered couples married for three decades. It is likely that both are taking drastic cognitive measures to reduce dissonance. The content is different but the form is the same: A young woman might tell herself, “He can be petty and jealous, but he loves me, so we should stay together.” In more seasoned acrimony, perennial slights and cruelties can be justified with “Every marriage has its issues and we have already been together for so long, so we should stay together.” In one case, finding consonance means ignoring signals that he actually is not Mr. Perfect. In the latter case, it is the refusal to listen to signs that you have been stewing in a toxic witch’s brew after so many conversations and attempts to make it work. In both cases, couples can fail to entertain and consider the dissonance, opting instead for platitudes that resolve it.

To a certain degree, this helps. In marriage, you have to learn to overlook a lot and still affirm the good in someone you know well—the pretty and the gritty. But that same self-justification can prevent someone from honestly facing high levels of dysfunction in their relationship. In some cases, the optimism and willingness to focus on and affirm the best in the other leads to greater closeness and stronger connection. Other times that optimism leads to growing estrangement.

Contrary to popular belief, it is not conflict, high emotions, or personality differences that lead to marriages disintegrating. Self-justification is the killer.

There is a tragically large corpus of case studies involving couples who understand each other’s position, can explain the dynamic accurately, but they dig in their heels and justify their own half of the story and reject their spouse’s, even at the cost of closeness and affection.

There are some kinds of self-justification that are fairly innocuous: competing versions of an old story or song lyric, debates over who left the water running, or whether or not that exchange at the restaurant was awkward. The more pedestrian forms protect us against the feelings of incompetence. The more pernicious forms of self-justification, with marriage-tanking potential, are less about what happened or what someone did and more about who someone is. “I am right. She is wrong'' or “This is just how I am.” These are identity statements. They are spoken with a tone that is resolute. The subtext is a refusal to change. Why would you change, if you are the kind of person who is good and right, and anyone who cannot accept that is blind? Problems are attributed to the other person’s intolerable nature and that person’s failure to appreciate your goodness.

Self-justification has sharpened the self-concept in a way that no one can change the way the person views himself. It blocks questions like, “Is it possible I have been horribly wrong?” or “Am I missing something?” or “Does this person have something to teach me?”

In a marriage marked by two people self-justifying, each partner develops a narrative of why the marriage is failing (the other person's fault, naturally) and every interaction is filtered more and more according to that implicit theory. They stop looking for evidence that challenges that theory, and only have eyes for the evidence that confirms it.

Happy partners privilege the positive qualities in the other and make those qualities statements of identity. (“He got me flowers again. He is such a thoughtful guy.”) Unhappy partners privilege the mistakes and shortcomings and make those central to the person’s identity. On the other side of the coin, happy couples extend the benefit of the doubt in moments when the other is moody. They chalk it up to circumstance or a bad day. Unhappy couples do the same thing, but they excuse their own moodiness or unkindness—not their spouse’s. If their partner does something kind, it is a one-off or hiding a more sordid motive. These implicit theories tend to expect the other to be indulgent toward their cruelty while refusing to be tolerant themselves.

Happy and unhappy couples could be presented with the same scenarios and respond to them differently. Dissonance is resolved in a distinct way, either in a way that brings the pair together or moves them apart. Successful couples have found ways to rein in self-justification, and craft implicit theories about the other that are generous toward the other. Criticisms are about what is done, not who the other is. The default is empathy for the spouse before staking a personal claim.

The adventure of life is walking between the extremes of over self-justification, which leads to a calcified, set-in-my-ways intransigence and an inability to self-justify at all, which leads to guilt and shame for offenses real and imagined.

Soldiers who have served in active combat are more likely to tend toward the under justifying extreme. Whatever their orders might have been, whatever the horrible impossible, kill-or-be-killed circumstances in which they found themselves, however noble their mission, some simply cannot resolve the dissonance between their internal ethical system and what they feel was a gross violation of those morals when they took someone’s life. They live in that state of cognitive dissonance with the inability or refusal to make their experiences consonant with reality. It is a limbo most people reflexively avoid, but for those with post-traumatic stress disorder, they live in that limbo of incongruity.

Whether someone tends toward under- or over-self-justification, both are mires that keep us stuck, and close us off from opportunities for change and transformation. They both say, “This is who I am,” whether the label is “a pretty good person free of bias” or “a monster.”  More than some hifalutin psychological theory, it is imminently practical and vitally important. When we decide to come to terms with our particular self-justifying pathways, we begin to switch the tracks that lead to stagnating dead ends and head toward unprecedented growth and self-awareness.