Integrity is said to be weighted as the highest characteristic in leadership. But what is integrity?
Most people act on integrity by being honest, trustworthy, keeping their word, and doing what they say they will do. Isn’t that just basic reliability? Extraordinary people act on integrity by being intentional in choosing their thoughts and actions based on their personal values. The core of integrity has more to do with clearly defined personal values and acting in alignment with those values. Let us serve our integrity by being in harmony with our personal values and use ourselves as our personal role model today. We can look at our work in three stages:
1) work from paycheck to paycheck, 2) work from one job to the next job, or 3) work while playing from one adventure to the next. “Life is either a daring adventure or nothing at all.” An adventure may be an experience that brings a surprise. It may expand our perspective. It may be a touch that alters our perception about love and life. It may be an inner shift of mindset that makes us come alive. Whatever it is, let us play in our work and find more adventure in today. What is money? Money is energy. It doesn’t have value. The value comes from the energy we give it. Value comes from our dreams that we hope money will help us attain.
No doubt, having money makes us comfortable but it never makes us whole. Money can’t fix relationships. Money can’t buy a family. Money can’t bring us peace of mind. Money can’t make us healthy. Money can’t make us feel rich if we don’t value our self-worth. Let us use the energy of our money to flow freely without attachment today. If only. If only what?
If only we didn’t have to work. If only we had more money. If only we had the relationship of our dreams. If only we had our dream job…. If only is only the gap between where we are now and where we wish to be in the future. Sure, we plan, we dream, we work hard, we do our best but there’s never a time to not immerse ourselves in the now or wish our lives away. Let us turn “if only” into “what is” and enjoy every second of what is today. What would our day be like if we didn’t have a dream to make it exciting? Just the possibility of our dream coming true makes life more interesting.
Why would we risk not dreaming just because of our current state? It’s easier to lift our spirits to dream about what we want rather than fret about what we don’t have yet. Even if we don’t see our dreams coming true today, we know our dreams are seeds that will grow into a reality one day. Let us keep dreaming about the power of our dream today. When we invest in ourselves, the universe magically invests in us. The investment may be time, effort, money, resources – any energy that is going to contribute to our growth.
Any personal investment, especially in our success, always pays the best interest. Why not make the investment BIG? Let us invest at the level of our future self today. We all wake up hoping to see the light of day. The light means we are alive. We are given the gift of energy.
Even if it’s light outside, sometimes we need more light. The best gift we can give is to share our light or shine brighter. Sometimes that means pulling others out of their darkness or to increase our own light. It’s easy to be a beacon of light. All we need to do is focus on positive emotions in our interactions. Lift ourselves and others up. Be grateful. Smile. Let us see ourselves and others in a better and brighter light today. When something unfortunate happens during the day, a common response is, “why me?”
What if our consistent response is “why not me?” regardless of if it’s something unfortunate or fortunate? If it’s unfortunate, we can say, so what, not everything turns out perfect. Or what can I learn from this? Why wasn’t it me? If it’s fortunate, we can say, why not me? No one works harder than me. No one is better prepared. No one cares as much. Why would it be anyone else but me? Let us stick to “why not me?” no matter what happens today. Do we really need validation from others about what we do or accomplish? The way to find out is to ask ourselves, would we still work as hard and seek to achieve our goals if we never told another person about them.
When and if we do seek validation from other people, why would we care about anyone that doesn’t have the same values, or someone that we don’t respect or care about? There’s something refreshing about others that don’t care about needing approval from others. Let us not apologize or justify why we need approval for the things we want today. How do we become the type of person we want to be?
The easiest way is to start believing it and behaving like it. If we want to be a successful leader, believe it. Behave like it. If we don’t know how to behave like it, seek someone out that is already it. We can then ask ourselves, what would “it” do? “How would “it” respond? How would “it” behave? Why not go ahead and behave like we want to be treated and perceived by others? Let us believe and behave in the ways we desire to be today. |
TransformationsTransformation Archives
September 2023
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