Honesty & Integrity
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What is the difference between Honesty and Integrity? I have been pondering on this for weeks but haven’t found a suitable answer; almost all the dictionary lists them as synonym. I will try to develop upon this based on my experience of life till now.
Honesty to me is the concept of being truthful, adhering to ethics, refusal to lie, steal or deceive. Integrity to me is conduct in terms as demanded by honesty while having holistic approach to the both requirement and result of the conduct. Is there any difference ? Can you be honest without having integrity, can you have integrity without honesty? The answer to the former is yes, you can be honest without having integrity. This can happen when you are not able or willing to act in a manner as demanded by the standards of honesty. Honesty is the concept and integrity is the realization of the concept. The answer to latter question is ‘no’, you can’t have integrity if you are not honest; it is simply out of question. You can’t realize a concept without having the concept.
I have seen people who were always honest, having right and ideal views but when time came to carry it out they were not able to do so. Some were not able to withstand the pressure of doing the things in right way, or some were not able to bear the result of honesty. Every one would agree that result of honesty is not always fruitful in materialistic terms. Frankly speaking I find no use of such honesty; at best it can be used to deceive oneself, something is better than nothing does not fits here. But larger proportion of people are those who are neither honest nor have integrity. I know they feel good about it or don’t have time to think about it, they are happy, enjoying the fruits of their dishonesty and hoarding up the materialistic benefits. Dishonesty is quite enticing if you see the results so that may be the reason for more proportion of these types.
I want to ask them, do they ever think on their act of dishonesty?
What is the difference between Honesty and Integrity? I have been pondering on this for weeks but haven’t found a suitable answer; almost all the dictionary lists them as synonym. I will try to develop upon this based on my experience of life till now.
Honesty to me is the concept of being truthful, adhering to ethics, refusal to lie, steal or deceive. Integrity to me is conduct in terms as demanded by honesty while having holistic approach to the both requirement and result of the conduct. Is there any difference ? Can you be honest without having integrity, can you have integrity without honesty? The answer to the former is yes, you can be honest without having integrity. This can happen when you are not able or willing to act in a manner as demanded by the standards of honesty. Honesty is the concept and integrity is the realization of the concept. The answer to latter question is ‘no’, you can’t have integrity if you are not honest; it is simply out of question. You can’t realize a concept without having the concept.
I have seen people who were always honest, having right and ideal views but when time came to carry it out they were not able to do so. Some were not able to withstand the pressure of doing the things in right way, or some were not able to bear the result of honesty. Every one would agree that result of honesty is not always fruitful in materialistic terms. Frankly speaking I find no use of such honesty; at best it can be used to deceive oneself, something is better than nothing does not fits here. But larger proportion of people are those who are neither honest nor have integrity. I know they feel good about it or don’t have time to think about it, they are happy, enjoying the fruits of their dishonesty and hoarding up the materialistic benefits. Dishonesty is quite enticing if you see the results so that may be the reason for more proportion of these types.
I want to ask them, do they ever think on their act of dishonesty?
posted by greensatya @ 4:10 PM
1 Comments:
At 8:51 PM,
Anonymous said…
Interesting. I think you're right when you say that honesty can exist without integrity. You can be honest and admit that you have no values and are unscrupulous. You can honor honesty as a value and cherish it as a high standard that you unfortunately fail to adhere to, that's when you're lacking integrity. Integrity is the implementation, the realization of your values.
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