History Main / MotivationalLie

* Played for laughs in VideoGame/{{Portal}}. [=GLaDoS=] constantly promises Chell cake as motivation to continue testing.

* An unintentional meta-example: One of ''VideoGame/{{Starcraft}}'s'' developers says that the original game was very much ''VideoGame/{{Warcraft}}'' in space, [[http://www.codeofhonor.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/Starcraft-orcs-in-space.png down to the graphics.]] At a con, they saw a rival RTS called DominionStormOverGift3 with much better graphics, gameplay, and all around better quality, the gameplay demo of which inspired them to start again and create the game we know today. Years later, the author learned that the game was in fact just as unprepared for the con as they were-[[http://www.codeofhonor.com/blog/starcraft-orcs-in-space-go-down-in-flames they were watching a pre-made video with the demo guy pretending to play]].

* Attempted by Teatime in ''Discworld/{{Hogfather}}'': when PsychopathicManchild Banjo demands to know if Teatime hurt the Tooth Fairy, Teatime says Susan did it so as to get Banjo to attack her. Unfortunately for him, Banjo WouldNotHitAGirl.

* In ''Discworld/InterestingTimes'', Rincewind gets out of a pursuit by running into a room of sumo wrestlers, yelling that one of his pursuers has a sandwich on him, and ducking out of the carnage.

* ''VisualNovel/DanganronpaV3'' has a lot of fun playing with this trope in Chapter Five. Kokichi shows the remaining students [[spoiler:the secret of the outside world]] and tells them he is the mastermind, making them too apathetic to continue the game. His being the mastermind was a lie of course, as part of his plan to end the killing game. Unfortunately, the real mastermind created a Flashback light giving the class, save for Kokichi and Kaito, memories of being symbols of hope and Kokichi being a [[spoiler:Remnant of Despair]], reigniting their drive. This also lead [[spoiler:Maki]] to hunt down Kokichi to kill him.

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Avatar: The Last Airbender}}'' Aang lies about the source of the conflict between the two tribes to get them to make up. When he admits such to Katara and Sokka, they're floored.

* ''VideoGame/{{Dissidia}}''. When the heroes are pondering whether they'll simply fade away even if they defeat Chaos, Cloud Strife says that their actions will save the worlds they each came from, and that those will be the homes they return to when it's over. He immediately admits he just made that up, but everyone else agrees that it sounds pretty nice and are willing to believe it.

* ''[[https://archiveofourown.org/series/717477 Second Chances]]'' reveals that Mjolnir's OnlyTheChosenMayWield is a lie Odin told Thor both to make his son feel better about himself and to motivate him into becoming a better person. Mjolnir was always keyed to Thor and Thor alone; Odin's spell mostly amounted to making Thor take some time to reflect on his actions. The reason Vision could wield it is because having an Infinity Stone embedded in him made the being an OutsideContextProblem for the hammer.

* The ''Film/OsmosisJones'' cartoon had Jones telling Drix about some sugar pills he knew that cured cancer in an effort to motivate him. This exchange happens a bit later:

* In the fifth ''ComicBook/ScottPilgrim'' book, Scott is on the receiving end of CurbStompBattle while trying to rescue Kim from the Katayanagi Twins, when Kim's phone starts ringing. By this point he and Ramona have hit a serious snag in their relationship and it looks like Ramona's broken up with him, which the Twins proceed to [[BreakingSpeech mock him about]]. So Kim tells him it's Ramona calling to cheer him on and let him know she's waiting for him to come home so they can patch things up, which immediately boosts his morale enough to kick the Twins' asses. In reality, it's just Kim's phone dying.

* In the fifth ''ComicBook/ScottPilgrim'' book, Scott goes to fight [[SingleMindedTwins the twins]] and rescue [[TheSmartGuy his friend Kim]] who is being held hostage, but struggles because he's demoralized due to the serious argument he just had with his girlfriend Ramona and the fact that their relationship seems to be on the edge of a breakup. [[BreakingSpeech As the twins mock him about this]], Kim's phone beeps because the battery is dying, but Kim tells Scott that it was Ramona calling, and that she's cheering him on and waiting for him to get back so they can patch things up. Scott immediately kicks the crap out of the twins.

** In the "My Three Suns" episode, Fry accidentally drinks a planetary Emperor with a liquid body, which results in a YouKillItYouBoughtIt situation. That is, until it gets revealed that the Emperor is still alive in Fry's body and the Emperor's subjects start trying to get the Emperor out. Violently. As an alternative to letting the watery beings kill Fry, the gang tells Fry that Leela is dead to get him to cry the Emperor out instead.

** [[http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0139.html Later]] he uses a similar trick on both Belkar and Haley. He wanted them to join him in his sidequest, which they refused, so he made up that there were giants which are worth a lot of XP to make Belkar come with him. He told Haley that they are king giants because she cares more for gold than XP.

* In ''Webcomic/SneakyGoblins'', Dank [[http://www.tolcraft.com/comic/page-43/ does this]] to Bog to convince him to take on the wizard at the mountain pass.