If you have integrity nothing else matters. If you do not have integrity nothing else matters!
Ralph Waldo Emerson said, “I cannot find language of sufficient energy to convey my sense of the sacredness of private integrity!”
US president Eisenhower stated, “The supreme quality of leadership is unquestionably integrity.”
Ronald Reagan said he was proud to be called a P.I.G.! To him it meant …. Persistence… Integrity… Guts!
Oprah Winfrey has expressed what many others have tried to say to explain integrity. It is that real integrity is doing the right thing, knowing that nobody is going to know whether you did it or not!
Everywhere in our culture integrity is viewed as a supreme quality. Maslow put it at the very top of his hierarchy of needs pyramid. Much has been written about the idea of integrity and the above are just a few of myriads of examples.
What is integrity anyway? You might think it is easy to define but in reality it is a little more complicated than we might think. We use the term in various ways. There is for example a self integrated kind of integrity. This involves keeping ourselves intact and being harmonious in a prioritized system of values and desires. In this scenario we define our own kind of integrity and seek to live consistently with it in every area of our life.
We also speak of integrity in terms of remaining true to a commitment. This commitment might be to promises, to people or institutions, to ideals or principles, or projects. If a person remains consistently supportive of a particular athletic team whether it is winning or losing, we say such a person has integrity. A person whose word is good has integrity. Someone has said that it is better to have an enemy who keeps his word than a friend who does not!
Some like Cheshire Calhoun describe integrity as a social issue. Here integrity consists of being true to one’s community. Therefore a terrorist or any kind of fanatic has integrity because he or she lives passionately for his community, maybe even to the point of being willing to give his life for his community. There is no moral code as such in play here.
Perhaps the most common understanding of integrity involves morality. Elizabeth Ashford calls this objective integrity. A person with integrity is one who shares our moral values. A question I would raise here is this: Who defines moral values? On what are they based? Can they change with time?
The word “integrity” has Latin roots. The word speaks of wholeness or completeness. Other dictionary definitions declare integrity to involve a firm adherence to a code of moral values, an unimpaired condition or purity.
I enjoy theories but basically I am a practitioner. I like to get to the basics.
So, can we talk about integrity in very simple terms? I think so.
Let me make it a little simpler! The definition I like most is that we have integrity when what we THINK… SAY… and DO are aligned into wholeness.
The closer these 3 qualities line up with each other, the more integrity we possess. If these 3 circles are not superimposed one over the other we do not have integrity. The farther apart they are the less we are practicing integrity.
Want to do a little inventory of your life and see what kind of integrity you have? Look at this list of some common virtues. Think about your life. In each of these areas is what you THINK, the same as what you SAY? And, do these 2 also line up with what you DO? The more you are able to answer, “Yes!” , the more you can be certain that you are practicing integrity!
Honesty.
Courage.
Fairness.
Sensitivity.
Humility.
Adaptability.
Communicativeness.
If you are concerned about being more “whole” or if you would like to develop a more complete lifestyle of integrity, give me a call or send me an email at rick@icarecoaching.com. I would love to talk with you!
Dr. Rick Penner
Copyright, 2007
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