{"id":7399,"date":"2016-10-17T00:15:47","date_gmt":"2016-10-17T06:15:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/?p=7399"},"modified":"2016-10-17T00:16:38","modified_gmt":"2016-10-17T06:16:38","slug":"the-essence-of-honesty-and-integrity-is-not-the-words-you-use-its-the-message-you-convey","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/the-essence-of-honesty-and-integrity-is-not-the-words-you-use-its-the-message-you-convey\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cThe essence of honesty and integrity is not the words you use, it\u2019s the message you convey.\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Honesty. It\u2019s something that has always been of extreme importance to me in life. Perhaps being raised by a father who was in the FBI and who valued absolute honesty without exception had something to do with that, but I know that I was raised to value honesty and integrity above all else. I tried to raise my children with that same value for honesty as well. The rule in our house was that as parents we would forgive anything if the kids were honest about it, but if they were dishonest with us the consequences would be far more serious, and trust, once broken, would take years to fix. We also talked a lot about what it meant to be honest. \u00a0When my kids were growing up I showed them a 2-minute video clip of a very famous former high school rugby coach named Larry Gelwix as he was explaining what it means to truly be honest. He shares, &#8220;The essence of a lie is not the words you choose, but the message you convey.\u201d That is such an important distinction for all of us to remember. Watch this quick clip and you will see how powerful his short message is:<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/7tu4Rll6xic?list=PLLynYLIE3SSY-UIIH6s_dBPM4EOwedgBB\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>It is so important for us to set an example of honesty in our own lives, and it\u2019s important to raise our children to understand the importance and value of being honest in their lives. I feel so blessed that I was raised to value honesty and I feel even more blessed that my children chose to embrace and value honesty and integrity in their own lives because it has turned them into incredible adults who are respected by all who know them.<\/p>\n<p>We should never discount how valuable our integrity is \u2013 it is our most valuable asset in our professional lives and in our personal lives. We can\u2019t allow ourselves to ever rationalize being dishonest, even on the little things in life. The more we are honest in all of our dealings, both in the words we say AND in the messages we convey, the more genuine confidence we will have, and the more confidence others will have in us. I have said it before and I will say it again, \u201c<a href=\"http:\/\/www.forbes.com\/sites\/amyanderson\/2012\/11\/28\/success-will-come-and-go-but-integrity-is-forever\/#e06859761414\" target=\"_blank\">Success will come and go, but integrity is forever<\/a>.\u201d So never trade yours for anything.<\/p>\n<p>Have a great Monday everyone!<\/p>\n<p>~Amy Rees Anderson<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Honesty. It\u2019s something that has always been of extreme importance to me in life. Perhaps being raised by a father who was in the FBI and who valued absolute honesty without exception had something to do with that, but I know that I was raised to value honesty and integrity above all else. I tried [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":6466,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[11385,4615,395,5332,46,11386,63,240,11374,224,163,96,2424,2186,1227,18,11389,11373,11380,6586,11390,11377,118,2341,494,34,11372,11392,335,11376,2559,349,1517,3097,11382,11381,254,120,9306,11391,112,149,11375,483,11378,11379,7487,11384,11383,11388,11387],"class_list":["post-7399","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-a-lie","tag-adults","tag-amy-rees-anderson","tag-asset","tag-attitude","tag-being-honest","tag-blessings","tag-children","tag-coach-gelwix","tag-confidence","tag-courage","tag-culture","tag-dishonest","tag-embrace","tag-fbi","tag-forbes","tag-forever-strong","tag-gelwixism","tag-genuine-confidence","tag-gerald","tag-highland-rugby","tag-honest-in-our-dealings","tag-honesty","tag-importance","tag-important","tag-integrity","tag-larry-gelwix","tag-liar","tag-lie","tag-most-valuable-asset","tag-parents","tag-peace","tag-personal","tag-professional","tag-raise-honest-children","tag-raise-our-children","tag-rees","tag-reputation","tag-respected","tag-rugby-coach","tag-self-improvement","tag-success","tag-success-will-come-and-go-but-integrity-is-forever","tag-teach","tag-the-message-you-convey","tag-the-words-you-say","tag-valuable-asset","tag-value-honesty","tag-value-integrity","tag-what-it-means-to-be-honest","tag-years-to-fix"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7399","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7399"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7399\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7400,"href":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7399\/revisions\/7400"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6466"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7399"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7399"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7399"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}