ABOUT THIS EPISODE
What does it actually take to get someone to tell the truth?
In this episode of We Should Write, I sit down with Brad Beeler—former U.S. Secret Service Special Agent, polygraph examiner, and author of Tell Me Everything. After 25 years in the Secret Service, protecting President George H. W. Bush and conducting more criminal polygraphs than anyone in the agency’s history, Brad has built a career on one thing: getting people to open up. He’s trained FBI, CIA, and intelligence professionals around the world on how to read people, build trust, and uncover the truth—even in the highest-stakes situations.
But this conversation goes way beyond lie detectors.
We get into the psychology of why we lie (and why we don’t), the subtle ways we edit ourselves in everyday life, and how words like “I’m sorry” can lose meaning when we don’t actually mean them. We talk about why we confess things to hairdressers, bartenders, and Uber drivers, what alcohol really does to honesty, and whether telling a “better story” is ever the same as telling the truth.
We also explore something deeper—how our perception and lived experience shape the stories we tell. Is there such a thing as objective truth, or are we all just telling the version our nervous system can live with?
This one is part psychology, part storytelling, and part real-life human behavior—told through the lens of someone who’s spent decades sitting across from people with everything to hide.
In this episode of We Should Write, I sit down with Brad Beeler—former U.S. Secret Service Special Agent, polygraph examiner, and author of Tell Me Everything. After 25 years in the Secret Service, protecting President George H. W. Bush and conducting more criminal polygraphs than anyone in the agency’s history, Brad has built a career on one thing: getting people to open up. He’s trained FBI, CIA, and intelligence professionals around the world on how to read people, build trust, and uncover the truth—even in the highest-stakes situations.
But this conversation goes way beyond lie detectors.
We get into the psychology of why we lie (and why we don’t), the subtle ways we edit ourselves in everyday life, and how words like “I’m sorry” can lose meaning when we don’t actually mean them. We talk about why we confess things to hairdressers, bartenders, and Uber drivers, what alcohol really does to honesty, and whether telling a “better story” is ever the same as telling the truth.
We also explore something deeper—how our perception and lived experience shape the stories we tell. Is there such a thing as objective truth, or are we all just telling the version our nervous system can live with?
This one is part psychology, part storytelling, and part real-life human behavior—told through the lens of someone who’s spent decades sitting across from people with everything to hide.
English
United States
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