No B.S Friday: Integrity means so much more than we think…
Does this year have a flavour yet? (I mean, apart from chaos and uncertainty.)
I mean for you. Do you know what this year is about for you?
If you don’t, I’ve got a wish for you. I wish that this year is a year of integrity.
But I’m talking about a specific integrity here.
The usual definition of integrity is that it means that what you do and what you say are in alignment.
So if you say it’s important to care for the environment, but you don’t recycle, you’re out of integrity.
But I think it’s deeper than just that.
The way that I define integrity is that it is when what you do is in alignment with what you know to be true.
I think this definition allows us to go a little deeper.
So I KNOW it’s good to help little old ladies cross the street. If I don’t do that, I’m out of integrity. So that’s straight-forward enough.
But what else do you know to be true?
This is not just what you have been taught and are able to regurgitate. It’s not some inherited values like chastity and temperance.
Its about what you, deep in your being, know to be true.
So what do you know to be true?
What about, life is just too short and too precious to spend all you life working… do you know that to be true?
What about, the economic system is rigged to benefit the wealthy, and you’ll never get anywhere by following the normal rules?
What about, you are capable of so much more than being just another cog in someone else’s machine?
What about, it’s an insult to your spirit to spend your days miserably grinding away at a ho-hum 9-5 gig?
What about, sometimes there is no higher calling than to care generously for your children and the people you love?
Do you know these things to be true?
If so, what are you doing about it?
If working 9-5 is an insult to your spirit, but you continue grinding away at your day job, just hoping things will get better, then you are out of integrity.
Sorry. Maybe that’s a harsh call. But it’s true.
You’re out of integrity.
And the price of being out of integrity is a sort of dull cancer of the soul, that saps you zest for life.
So take stock of what you know to be true. What you know, deep in your body, that you want from your short and precious time here on the earth.
Take stock of what you know to be true, and then live it.
Just do it.
Because even if you fail (and you probably won’t), at least then you will have the satisfaction of knowing that you tried, and knowing that you honoured the nobility of your spirit.
This is what integrity is about.
Let it be a driving theme this year.
JG.