Today, I chose integrity

Today, at work, I messed up some very expensive equipment. It was a complete accident, but I was still faced with the choice of coming clean and admitting to my mistake or putting the broken instrument back up where it belongs like nothing was wrong with it, and when the next person went to use it, well who would know who broke it or what happened to it. Telling the truth was obviously the “right thing to do” but then I would be taking the risk of having to pay for instrument or in the worst case scenario lose my job, and if I acted like I had no clue what happened to it whenever it was found broken, then I would be off the hook, after all no one saw me break it. So why would I risk getting in trouble for an accident? Everyone always says because you feel good about yourself when you choose to do the right thing. I do not know about you guys, but for me the warm, fuzzy feeling after coming clean only arises when the situation happens to work out and you either do not get punished because you told the truth or it is not as bad as you thought it would be, but when I tell the truth and I get punished, I am always left thinking “why did I do that?” I could have lied and nothing would have happened but I try to do what is right and now I am facing consequences for it. That resentful feeling only multiples when you throw someone else into the mix and they get away with doing the exact same thing you are punished for. People also say that if you take the easy way out, you will not feel good about yourself. Severity of guilt varies from person to person, and from action to action, but when you’re in a situation where lying or hiding something will not hurt anyone else or really effect anyone else that much and telling the truth will bring on major consequences for you, and there is extremely low risk of getting caught, does anyone ever really feel that bad on the inside? In some cases, you might feel accomplished for mastering the art of doing what you want and being able to out smart everyone so that you can get away with it. For instance, I had final exam week coming up, but there was a party I wanted to go to, so I went, and I procrastinated studying. It was the night before the test when I realize there was no chance I could learn the material in the amount of time I had left. Instead of having integrity and taking responsibility for my mistake, I found an easy way out. If I would have taken the test when I was supposed to I would have failed it and then gotten a bad overall grade for the course, lowering my chances of getting into graduate school, which would leave me with a job I was unhappy with in the future. By emailing my teacher at 1am saying I was throwing up and violently ill, I would not have to fail the test, I could take it on makeup test day giving myself more time to study and possibly get some information about the exam from people who did take it, there was low risk of getting caught, I could conjure up some details to make my story believable, and no one gets hurt. I passed the test on make up day, maybe I didn’t feel as awesome as I would have if I would have passed it on the actual test day, but I surely didn’t lose sleep over it. In this instance I learned how to perfect a lie, I didn’t learn from my mistake, which would have bettered myself in the future.

Today, I chose integrity. I took the bullet and admitted to breaking very expensive equipment. This time, it worked out for me. I didn’t get in trouble just a mere, “be more careful next time” and I went about my business. Today, I had that warm, fuzzy feeling, thinking to myself I am so glad I did the right thing, it all worked out because I decided to be truthful. Then I started thinking, it didn’t work out because I decided to be truthful because people get punished for telling the truth all the time. It worked out by chance. After contemplating the idea of integrity and wondering why I chose to do it knowing that the good feeling I got could have just as easily been the opposite, I realized that it is not so much about the feeling you get, it is more about what you learn from the overall experience. By choosing to have integrity you with either get the warm, fuzzy feeling inside because everything worked out, or you will get punished but you will learn from that punishment and decrease you’re chances of making the same mistake in the future. If you take the easy way out you might not feel that guilty and you might never get caught and you might not being harming anyone else, but when a situation does arise in which telling a lie could seriously harm someone else, what are you going to do? LIE. You are going to lie because by taking the easy way out of situations that seem meaningless or hold low value, you are training yourself to lie or to get out of any situation that comes up. When in a novel situation approaches with a lot at risk, the principle of automaticity arises and you will do what you feel most comfortable doing, which is what you have done the most often.

Today, I could have easily gotten away with accidentally breaking the equipment and at the time it would seem like it wasn’t that big of a deal. Instead I ran that risk of facing consequences for telling the truth. Even though this act of integrity was relatively small, it was not insignificant. The more I choose integrity when not much is at risk, the more likely I will be to choose integrity when something big is on the line, like someone’s life.

What will you choose today?