On this week’s episode of The Wednesday Call, Andy Albright and Jeff Bright continued their series covering The Alliance’s 8 Core Values with the third value, Integrity.
“Truth never damages a cause that is great,” Mahatma Gandhi.
Integrity: Telling myself the truth
Honesty: Telling the truth to other people
Character: What God knows of us
Reputation: What others think of us
Integrity is the mother of all virtues. It is a firm adherence to a code of moral values. It is incoruptability. It begins when we deal justly with ourselves. Integrity is the light that shines for a disciplined conscience.
Integrity comes when you take disciplined conscience and add it to an authentic mindset and an ethical competence.
Disciplined conscience and discerning judgment
Assists in distinguishing right from wrong.
Guilt plus Loyalty
Guilt – realization of your responsibility to yourself not to violate internal moral code creating a moral compass. Acute awareness (remorse) and restitution (forgiveness)
Guidance system: allows you to be able to explain your actions and discover the reason for the thought.
Intuitive feelings vs. subjective emotions.
Loyalty – strong feeling of support and allegiance (heart of all virtues). Unwavering commitment. Requires priority thinking. Devotion and faithfulness. Obligation and adherence to a creed or promise.
“When we judge our own heart guilty, if we treat it gently, in a spirit of pity rather than anger, encouraging it to amendment, its repentance will be much deeper and more lasting than if stirred up in vehemence and wrath. This being forceful irrational emotion and revengeful anger.
Moral: Our gentleness toward ourselves. What we want is a quiet, steady, firm displeasure at our own faults. So then, when you have fallen, lift up your heart by humbling yourself without marveling that you fell.
“Is it money? Is it fame? Is it coming down with the loud pipes and the rain? Big chillin’, only for the power in your name. Tell me who you loyal to. Is it unconditional when ‘rari don’t start? Is it love for the streets when the lights get dark? Tell me when your loyalty is comin’ from the heart.” – Kendrick Lamar
Moral: Damned or blessed; depends on who or what you’re loyal to.
Authentic Mindset (conscious self): true to one’s personality (act who you are/behavior). Spirit (like who you are/attitude). Character (know who you are/awareness).
Transparency and Sincerity
Transparency is needed to create trust and dialogue. Lack of hidden agendas and full disclosure defends insecurity.
Openness (accessibility)
Predictability (legitimacy)
Sincerity meaning free from pretense, deceit and hypocrisy.
Real (genuine)
Proven (factual)
“Sunlight is the best disinfectant.” William O. Douglas
“Evil is nourished and grows by concealment.” Virgil
First hint of trouble: “don’t tell nobody” or “this is a secret.”
In Flames song “Transparent”
“Consume all the obsene
Persuade the most hideous and ugly
Under every pile and stone
A rebirth, for you to find
Freedom is to be able
To go in any direction
So take the uncertain path
One foot in the open
Ten feet ahead
don’t lie to yourself
“When pure sincerity forms within, it is outwardly realized in other people’s hearts.” Lao Tzu
“Sincerity is moral truth.” George Henry Lewes
Sincerity: “The road we need to travel for a better way of life; an attitude we need to take if we want to survive. Come on give me sincerity. But we’re always saying we don’t have the time. We really sympathize, well, maybe another time; don’t think about tomorrow; do it wile you’ve got the chance: sincerity.” Lisa Stansfield
Ethical Competence: Practicing a code of conduct that ensures honesty (avoiding deceitful behavior) and promotes consistency (creating the prevailing standards of decency).
Honesty plus Consistency
Honesty: It can force any dysfunction in your life to the surface. It is our true moral compass.
Truthfulness: There are different shades of truth telling. When we tell little white lies, we become progressively color blind. It is better to remain silent than to speak lies.
Wisdom: Cannot realize your wise potential without producing honest thoughts.
Consistency: Conformity (being norm compliant) leads to becoming uniform (creating regularity) which causes accuracy in our beliefs and our conduct. Beliefs, and your word. Conduct and your reputation.
“Honesty is the first chapter in the book of wisdom.” Thomas Jefferson
“No legacy is so rich as honesty.” William Shakespeare
The Billy Joel song “Honesty” talks about this subject.
“If you search for tenderness
It isn’t hard to find
You can have the love you need to live
But if you look for truthfulness
You might just as well be blind
It always seems to be so hard to give
Honesty is such a lonely word
Everyone is so untrue
Honesty is hardly ever heard
And mostly what I need from you!”
“If a man vow a vow unto the Lord, or swear an oath to bind his soul with a bond; he shall not break his word, he shall do according to all that proceedeth out of his mouth.” Numbers 30:2
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