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Relationship between Success and Integrity
Why should we bother about Success? Our concern about success dictates our lives. Then, is it necessary to maintain integrity in life? Is there a deeper purpose in maintaining Integrity? Does it add to our success or does it have any relation at all with success?
Integrity is a commitment to Truth. The word Success, especially material success related to job, career, promotions, owning property, becoming famous etc is a worldly term. What success can give us is just skin-deep satisfaction, that too fleeting. Success also requires a lot of compromises and one of the major values we need to compromise with, is our Integrity. When success is divorced from Integrity the direct by-product is dissatisfaction and loss of peace. Integrity is what we are when nobody is around us.
It is the ability to stare at ourselves right in our face just like when we are staring at a mirror. Integrity is to have a clear conscience at all times. What Integrity requires us to do is, not to lie to ourselves and follow the voice of conscience at all times irrespective of whether our career is going on the right track or not. This is recognizing Truth and living for it. This is a higher life, much above the standards of an average individual who is living for his mere survival and comfort.
Truth and Integrity are more important than success
When we are riding the wave of success, all that matters to us is our myopic view of success where Integrity takes the back seat. We enter into competition with others and in that heat, we compromise life values and ethics. When we are committed to worldly success we cannot be committed to integrity at the same time.
Success seems to kick us and keeps us motivated falsely. It has to do with the externalization of things where our appreciation of the public domain becomes more important. We lose our internal focus and look for fodder on the outside, to find our internal balance, which is absurd.
Success is temporary
Success gives us a high, where doing well in a job, getting incentives, and getting recognized at our workplace matters. However, we should see this major flaw in the success theory. It is all driven by the outside where we do not have control over the results. Our focus is on those things on which we have minimal control.
We may do the job well, to the best of our ability but whether we get recognized for it and receive praise is a subjective matter. Hence success has very little to do with your direct contribution. On the other hand, if we are more focused on the work at hand and do it with our soul poured into it, we call it Integrity. When we do not try to manipulate the results, it is integrity. When we contribute to society based on Truth, care and sincerity, it is Integrity.
Success can give you a temporary high, but it is Integrity that can grant you a peaceful night’s sleep and the zeal to perform. Success may even suck out the enthusiasm you have, if success has been received by compromising Integrity.
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Integrity cannot be compromised
Success can be compromised with, but not Integrity. This shall grant us the ability to be more creative and reliable as a contributor at the same time make us a role model for society in the long run. However, our goal should not be on society, self-image, or results of work. Our single-pointed goal is to perform the work with proper knowledge, ever-upgraded skills, and deep interest. Such performance of work can be termed as deep work that will bless us with instant joy and well-being. now lets also cover the topic of Loyalty and its connection with Integrity.
Relationship between Loyalty and Integrity
Loyalty towards a person or work is a direct manifestation of Integrity. When we are loyal to a committed person or a positive trait, it helps us learn better and improve ourselves with time. Loyalty directly adds to our experience and lets us grow organically. But then there is another diabolical angle to Loyalty which we shall learn.
Loyalty in different situations
What does it mean to be loyal, in a job or a relationship? Many times, we have a price to pay if we are too loyal. Sometimes you shall be required to strangulate the voice of your conscience and also require you to be on the wrong side of a cause. For example Bhishma Deva was loyal to the throne of Hastinapura. He had to pay a heavy price because that Loyalty was divorced from Truth. Nobody can doubt Bhishma Deva for his integrity, but such Integrity not based on Absolute Truth and Dharma ends in distress. Nobody is loyal today, to anyone unless there is an ulterior motive.
When the fulfillment of our goals and ambitions requires the help of another individual and our position is small, we begin our nefarious progress toward our ambition by becoming loyal to that individual, thus becoming an opportunist, without due diligence of what is fair and unfair or without caring for the underlying principles that govern our actions.
If the other individual is unfair, we become loyal to him in a mindless way, because this man is going to be our ladder to material success. So it is all a matter of suitability, whether we are going to profit out of the loyalty or not. Even, in a relationship we are only bothered about, what is there in it for me.
This is an outright animistic approach. We survive for profits and loyalty is being used not as a principle but as a tool of convenience. The Vedic scriptures have talked about lofty principles like surrender and loyalty as mechanisms for setting us free from bondage.
However modern man thinks otherwise because he does not care where he goes after death but is more concerned with immediate short-term gains and hence profit and success are high on his priority dashboard. Conscience is something that modern man has stopped worrying about. You can learn about this concept by referring to our Blog on Shreyas and Preyas.
Always listen to your conscience
Man has also invented mechanisms to submerge the voice of the “soul” whereby he could shut the mind chatter up with tools like alcohol and pills. Loyalty hence is not a virtue today but another weapon in the artillery that can be used to manipulate others.
Truth and its role in jobs
We go to work usually because we have a family and we have to support it. Having a job translates into the ability to provide money four our family’s support. In this process, we are more often governed by the instinct of survival. It may be a good idea for a start, however, what we tend to do, is to prolong this instinct as a lifelong process. Aren’t we missing out on something more vital?
Let’s face it, we have to lie in our jobs. I have never known anyone to be truthful and at the same time working for someone else. It takes great effort to be on the side of the Truth. Someone may ask, why do the scriptures make so much out of Truth? The answer is simple yet not evident.
How is truth related to us?
Truth is the nature of our inner being, the very stuff out of which we are created. The more we lie, the more we shall negate our existence, and the more we get cut off from our very source. It’s like this, if we are riding a bike and if there is something that thwarts the flow of gas, it’s a matter of time before the bike shall come to a grinding halt.
The more we lie about ourselves to others, the world, and to ourselves, the more it shall inhibit the supply of life energy. Our jobs are designed to provide us food, clothing, and shelter, and yet to get business, we are forced to lie to the customer, our bosses and so many others in an attempt to safeguard our jobs. In other words, if you are immaculately truthful you shall not have a job.
Our job demands us to be on the side of our employer, irrespective of his position, irrespective of whether he is on the side of Truth or not. You serve an employer who is a businessman, who considers profit to be his God and his success to be more dear than Truth.
Our Instinctive Nature Rules us
Our instinctive nature gets the better of our true nature. The lies that we build around our occupation infiltrate through to our relationships, our friends, and our neighbors. The falsity of our pretense poisons the very nature of our life.
Will it not be worthwhile to take up something that shall restrict lying as a survival mechanism, maybe a small business where we shall not have to lie to our customers or our employees? We should know that as per the scriptures, the more you are truthful, the more the world shall become livable, and the more there shall be trust and more commitment.
The task of setting up a Truthful surrounding is easier said than done, agreed. But don’t we have a duty towards ourselves and the society? The way to get this done is by adopting a spiritual practice, by performing acts of honorary or free service along with our jobs, where Truth is the premise of our service.
Slowly by the power of Truth in our transactions, we can easily turn our free services into full-time activity. Once Truth is accepted as the core of existence, it becomes the direct responsibility of Nature to support, maintain and make us grow in our onward journey towards the Absolute. What I am mentioning here is not only practicable but is a 100% guarantee towards making us reliant directly on Bhagawan, Truth and Nature, who manifest before us as our sole benefactors.
Truth is God
Truth is God and God is Truth. If we care about Truth, Truth shall protect us and nurture us. Is Truth not capable of taking care of us and our family? Is Truth just a word from the scriptures which has lost its magic? The answer is no. Truth continues to be the guiding factor of committed and sincere ones even today. The more the world population depends on Truth for all its needs, the better and non-violent society we shall attain for r now and for the future.
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