Honesty means many things to many people, with each of us have at least an understanding of what it means to be honest, however, whether we live up to this ideal of honest is an entirely other matter.
Honest is more than telling the truth. In fact, I would argue that it’s closely aligned to being authentic and genuine to who you really are.
For many of us the concept of honesty was formed as part of set of values and beliefs from an early age, mostly forged by our parents and close family.
But what does honesty really mean to you?
Honesty is different than telling the truth and the whole truth. Sometimes telling the whole truth is impractical or can be hurtful if not closely aligned with context and the right conversation.
I know for a fact that we are not honest with ourselves in many respects and often fool ourselves into believing that you can look the other way from time to time to get around uncomfortable truths or enable us some advantage is okay.
Or are we honest to the point of always, no matter what sticking to being honest and accepting the consequences?
Likely, a bit of both – although this can become a slippery slope. We draw that line at some things, yet not others…
Why – if we believe we are honest people then why would we not be honest with ourselves?
Human behaviour is an interesting thing as our minds can pretty much talk ourselves into believing whatever best suits our interests at any given time.
Turning a blind eye when it’s to our advantage is somewhat universal although as with all things there are degrees of honesty that we all accept as part of who we are.
Authenticity is the transparent alignment between what you say, your actions and your values. Hence, your authentic self supports your values and beliefs which include honesty.
I think my best role model for being authentic and genuine was my dad. He believed in the concept of what your see is what you get – an honest man. He had no issues with telling it how it was, but he was also somewhat deliberate and discerning in terms of providing his thoughts or input, on things that perhaps did or did not involve him.
He kept his thoughts to himself for the most part unless you were really offside, and then certainly we wasn’t afraid to give his input. He wasn’t obnoxious about providing his input but chose his battles wisely…
His genuineness shone through as you always got the same version of him, irrespective of who you were or what status you had in life each time you interacted with him. This level of integrity was refreshing and observing him over my lifetime helped me immeasurably in terms of being grounded to who I am.
Dad had a way of grounding you no matter how important you thought you were…
I remember on a visit back to Australia in the mid 1990’s when I was working my way up into a Directorship at one of Canada’s largest banks and thought I was a hot commodity, but Dad soon brought me back to earth pretty quickly.
Having arrived after a 42-hour, multi-leg flight to surprise my brother at his wedding the very next morning at 6:00 am had him knocking on my bedroom door and rousing me from a deep sleep to help him cart in a large load of wood from his block in the bush (10 tonnes) and cut it up on the saw bench.
No breakfast, no niceties, just “you’re looking soft and we’ve got work to do”.
We spent the remainder of the day until 6:00 pm, yes, a full 12-hours loading, unloading and cutting on the saw bench 30 cm blocks of wood for storage in the shed and the impending winter.
Admittedly, he worked as hard if not harder than me that day, and by the end of the day I was tired and sore from the lifting, carrying and cutting on the noisy saw bench.
All through the day I could sense him watching me to see if I’d falter or need a break, but like him I was stubborn and kept up to his relentless pace all day. At the end of the day his only words were “not bad for an office worker”.
I was completely spent but my pride wouldn’t let on, but I’m sure he knew it.
He was the most honest person I’ve ever met, there was no sugar-coating anything with him. With every aspect of his life his authenticity and genuineness was front and center and shone through.
A man born of hardship and a tough life living in the bush, never deviating from the person who he’d always been until his last breath.
When you think of honesty – who comes to mind immediately? What is it about them that makes them top of mind when think of that word? What have you learned or take away from them as a life lesson?
Great topic to reflect upon and to better understand yourself.
Until next week.
Ciao!