Who you are when no one is looking

I've been thinking a little bit about my post title of 'who you are when no one is looking' which is one of the phrases that has been deeply etched in my soul from many years ago when I read Bill Hybel's book by the same title.

He talked about the fact that the world and it's people were suffering from an epidemic of endangered character qualities.  Delayed gratification, discipline, courage, integrity, endurance to name a few.

It's a little phrase I remind myself of when I have a choice between good and bad or in a simple way, the easy road or the harder yet more rewarding path.

It has dawned on me recently that I have held other's to account by this list of admirable character traits yet somehow my own accountability had faded into the distance.  In the place of the beautiful striving for character growth was a darkened and skewed expectation that these were demands and expectations of everyone but me.

I feel so grateful for the opportunity to re-set, take stock and move my perspective to the only place it should be, my own pursuit of these eternal qualities.

I am going to give myself a personal challenge to re-ignite the quest for character evaluation, growth, refining and perhaps dig out that dusty copy of Bill's book.

One final thought is a reflection on the definition of one of my favourite of the above mentioned traits.

Integrity is a personal choice, an uncompromising and predictably consistent commitment to honour moral, ethical, spiritual and artistic values and principles.

In ethics, integrity is regarded as the honesty and truthfulness or accuracy of one's actions. Integrity can stand in opposition to hypocrisy,

 in that judging with the standards of integrity involves regarding internal consistency as a virtue, and suggests that parties holding within themselves apparently conflicting values should account for the discrepancy or alter their beliefs.

Now there's something to think about and embrace in the hope it can be shared with the other three lives that are so heavily influenced by me.