Is Your Integrity For Sell?

It is a story of a chapter in my life that taught me a valuable lesson about the value of integrity.

I was 21 and I feel at the top of the world. Packed a few months ago, I mean jeep and I started looking to change my life. After I succeeded, I now prepared for the greatest adventure of my youth. To put it mildly, I was full of anticipation and excitement. I had no idea how my personal integrity would be tested.

But wait, I am before the story. So let me go back a little and fill in some details. I left college and became a major construction company doing custom interiors on high-rise buildings in Los Angeles. Ten weeks ago, with a thousand dollars in his pocket, I invited my jeep and I went north to seek my own vowed land.

My search had a purpose

I went with the intention of locating and securing the property in the forests of southern Oregon. I spent two glorious in remote areas to move, and I tried to let myself go in the direction of my vision. I knew where I was, I just needed to find it. Now guess ...

I found it, and they all met like a bitch. Soon I went to Southern California to prepare the great movement. After living for two months in the woods, I found it almost impossible to work in the big city. Finally I was so broke I had no choice. I finally came to work, and I started to loose end to clean up in spring.

Everything was just perfect, or so I thought,

On a Friday afternoon, I was working, but my mind was somewhere else. I was happy to spend the weekend and run on Autopilot, a new life dreaming waiting for me. Given this afternoon, I have a tool called Ramset. It uses 22 white steel pins to pull into concrete.

Now, this tool requires a special license that I had. It was also necessary to wear protective goggles that I had but not. Can you see where this is going? Let us look at the facts. I knew what I was doing, but I did not pay attention. I needed an eye protection but I did not perform it. The stage was set for the greatest integrity test of my youth.

Wham, I was hit into the eye by the concrete flight

Now I was careful, but it was too late. Either way, I had hovered in the room and I lay on my back to look at him. I felt it was bad. Then a colleague ran and said, "Let me see your eye." His next words had no worries at all. He said, "OMG not moved, I'll get the foreman."

Can you feel the tension of the moment? Although it probably took them a few minutes to come back, it seemed like hours. I had plenty of time to think about the situation. I thought about how I should not wear these glasses. I wondered if I lose my eye. And I was too afraid to see my hand débroucher, if I can see.

My integrity would be tested

When they returned, the foreman answered very quickly. He looked at me, ran to the tool box, grabbed a pair of goggles and said, "What eye is it, I'll take a hole in the glasses, and you should never go back to work. You can continue your butt and you will be rich. "

Have you ever noticed that the tests of our integrity usually come to us, try, if the chips are really down? Suddenly I had the choice to make, and he had to act quickly. If I were with his plan, I would probably have a large insurance settlement that would have been justified if the glasses had not succeeded. But there was a problem! The integrity of the goggles was not responsible. It was my own negligence that gave me my integrity.

Sometimes, keep your integrity costs!

In this case, my integrity retained and honest personal responsibility for my plight involved, even if it cost me the eye and a large insurance settlement. Everyone who stood, even my boss told me to enjoy the moment. For them, the profit was a fair price for my integrity. What would you do like this in a situation? Think about it after a minute. What would you do?

Some believe that it is good to take advantage of insurance companies. They believe that the integrity of the different standard applies when it comes to large companies. They seem to work in a way to scale integrity of sliding. How do you feel about it? Did we play for other rules when it comes to faceless Megacorporation? Does their lack of integrity justify the adoption of a similar attitude? These are good questions for us before our integrity or online.

So, what have I done?

I did not tell the foreman with his face. I knew it was a valuable lesson in this experience. I also realized that if I had not learned then, it could pay an even higher price for the road. They took me to an ophthalmologist who said that while the eye was filled with blood and looked like a ball of red golf. He said he had to clean the blood before they could assess the damage. It would take about two weeks.

I spent the next two weeks with a patch on my eye, waiting and asking. You know, I never raised this patch to see what looked like the eye, I just waited.

The day of the report

As it turns out, when it is an injury, the body reacts through the nutrients to exhaust the affected area. Sounds good, is not it? Unfortunately, one of these nutrients is calcium and too much calcium in the eyes can be a problem. By accident I now have what is called a traumatic cataract. It looked like a white map of the United States on the lens in my eyes. My gaze was good, but the vision was gone from 20/20 to 20/400. I could see shapes and blurry colors, but that was all.

When you lose sight in one eye, you have a dramatic effect on your depth perception and balance. It took some time to adapt these changes, but we are incredibly adaptive creatures. I asked my thoughts to find new ways to triangulate, and he replied. After all, I was able to even fly planes, although landing is difficult if you can not judge accurately. But that is a story for another day. Let's go to ...

Maintaining integrity

No matter who we are, our integrity is tested. Look around and you will quickly find that a lot of integrity has been bought and paid for. They were sold at the test. Their integrity was to sell and someone or something has their price. It's a personal decision, but my advice is not! Once you lose your integrity, it is difficult to return.

Yes, keep my integrity cost me a unique opportunity, but that is a myopic view. What we gain in the long term is to meet our values ​​and ethics is something that is worth more than money. You can sell your integrity, but you can not buy it. Integrity is a personal treasure, which seems to be very limited during these days. Self-respect and integrity go hand in hand. Remember that under certain circumstances - your integrity will sell it?

How important is integrity to you?

Has your integrity already been tested?

The lines are open!