Personal Capital

A recent occurrence has had me thinking about integrity. Without going into much detail, I'll say that out of all the things in the professional (and the personal world, too) world, the one thing that counts the most is something loosely tied to how others view you.

I would never say that integrity is how others see you. Integrity is first how you see yourself. It's something you project onto others' opinion of you. You, first and foremost are in control of your integrity. You are decidedly not in control, for the most part, of how other people see you. People come with their own hang ups, pre-made, handled with care, and should they decide to project them on you, there's not much you can do besides the usual humanity that is out of reach for most.

Integrity on the other hand is a much stricter code. Ben Franklin could be called an authority on the subject, writing in his autobiography about only spending what you need; not hanging out in the bars with women of ill-repute; being genuinely kind to others. Your reputation should walk ahead of you. People should meet it before they meet you. Depending on what career you choose, your integrity may be all you have on which to stand.

And yet, our personal and professional integrity are not things we often think about or take stock of. Where do you stand? Is integrity important in your job? Dealing with money all day, I only have my integrity and my left-brain to prove myself with. If I did something questionable, my entire position would be questioned. Even the act of being open to question-ability (even if you're innocent) is sometimes enough to sink integrity. And what about with your friends? Are you beyond repute with them?

Why don't we think about this more often? For something so important to our lives, why do we not sit down every week and rethink our activities to see if they've built up or torn down our stock and integrity? Perhaps it's so important that we're afraid to take stock of it (like my bank account). Maybe we refuse to believe in its importance. Peradventure, we simply forget.

(Sorry about using 'peradventure'. I ran out of synonyms for 'maybe'. Ah, who am I kidding? I wanted to use 'peradventure' all along.)

The key is to live a life as cleanly as possible. To be above reproach. To be looked upon by our projection of ourself, for when we project our own image, there is less room for others to fill us up with their own. It solves the problem of having others' opinions of us be suspect, and leaves us less vulnerable to others influencing us with ease on how to be human.