Personal Integrity

Does Your Word (Personal Integrity) Mean Anything?
By Curtis Graham

Probably not! As disturbing as it is, are you proud of it? Give me one reason why I should take your word about anything! Is your personal integrity at risk? Are there any people around that actually keep their word about something?

When you hear the words, “I’ll call you right back,” what are the odds that they never will. Experience in today’s world tells us that one’s “word” is useless, or at the very least, unreliable. Glenn Van Ekeren in his The Speaker’s Sourcebook calls this antic “Famous Fibs.” It seems we live in a world of excuses. Or maybe just call it what it is---lies!

Is it a fear of commitment when you give your word that you will do this or that?

Being raised on a small farm by my grandparents in the 1950s, gave me a real view of what it means to place value on one’s word (it says—I promise). And how critically important the words are that come out of your mouth. Back then coming out of World War II was a time for reliance on one another. Farmers knew that relying on the neighbor’s help baling hay before the rain depended on the neighbor’s word that he would help—and he did!

Today, verbal promises are nothing more than tongue wagging appeasements to fill up the time when one should be speaking the truth. Wouldn’t it do your heart good to hear the real truth once in a while?