How to catch someone of a fantastical tale (lie)?

People with a histrionic personality disorder need to lie to other people in order to appear interesting to them. This is not about money but rather about a deep-seated belief that they are not interesting enough if they stick to the truth. They have a somewhat childish worldview in which they entertain people with a game-play-type story, an imaginary tale that is not really supposed to hurt anybody, but it’s supposed to entertain them.

I’m saying the motivation is not necessarily Machiavellian. They may believe this is somewhat expected of them, to live a larger-than-life existence, especially if they’ve been through something traumatic like surviving the war. Then, people ask them if they experienced any horrors, and if they didn’t, they may start making up things to fulfill expectations, not to be a disapointment, and then the story can get bigger and bigger as it goes on.

Don’t take it personally, and don’t let them in on the fact you’re suspecting a lie.

It is important not to take it personally if you find yourself being lied to. This has nothing to do with you. It’s their insecurity, not your gullibility. You also don’t need to let them know you suspect they’re lying. It doesn’t matter. You need to know for your own sake whether they are spinning a yarn or not, but they don’t need to know you know. You just don’t want to make any life decisions based on their version of reality.

When you know someone is lying to you, you just effectively cancel their input out of your life; you listen to them as if they were a fictional character on TV, and that’s it. Entertaining, maybe, or completely insignificant, although you have to take into account that not everybody knows how to tell a liar is lying.

Open opportunities for them to lie more, not less.

Open every door you can think of for them to lie more. “Were you assaulted? Once? Twice? Three times? Surely not more than 10?” The purpose is to give them an idea how far they can go that is within what you’d consider a “realistic expectation.” This is how far they feel safe to stretch their story. Keep making suggestions, see how many “correct guesses” you can clock, and how often they stop making the story bigger when you flag a “this sounds far-fetched.” Do they ever turn down an opportunity to tell a bigger lie? Especially if you sound astonished and like you admire them, the story should get bigger and less credible by the minute.

Rather than point out parts that don’t match, silently make a mental note of them and invite them to share more parts that don’t add up. Especially if it’s a group situation, play gullible. Simply raise an eyebrow at the other listeners as you invite more and more crazy details so the others will notice what a fantastic tale you’re being fed.

If you want to stick it into the man, once you’re done, thank them for the entertaining story. Drop the emotions and treat it as if it had been a work of art rather than a true story.

Tell them impressive true stories and see if they need to one up you.

You stick to the truth and see how much a need that person has to one-up your stories. A histrionic personality disorder makes a person tell a taller tale, a narcissistic personality will try to discredit your story or to disvalidate it’s importance (compared to theirs).

No point demanding a liar to stop lying or a person to know something they don’t know.

A person won’t start knowing something they don’t know if you keep beating them up. They can start lying tho. Also, a liar is likely not going to stop lying if you try and demand for the truth, they’ll simply change the story.

What you do is to give them an opportunity to lie to your face and then you decide they lie, and the truth is rather irrelevant. That person’s story is rather irrelevant. They can just as well choke in their own lies, unless you’re a police detective.

People pleasers lie differently; they change their opinion rapidly when they clock your stronger opinion.

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