"At least in the matter of integrity, who you are is your word,
nothing more and nothing less. However in a very real sense, who you
are - period - is your word."
...
This essay,
My Word Includes Cleaning Up My Word,
is the companion piece to
Honoring Your Word.
It is also the twenty fourth in a group of twenty five on
Integrity:
Something happens, a transformation if you will, when I
differentiate between
keeping my word
and
honoring my
word,
and then allow that difference to
use me.
Accurately wielded, all distinctions have the innate power to
transform.
Keeping my word
has the power to transform.
Honoring my word
has the power to transform. What's critical is to get that they're
not interchangeable. And their difference isn't merely a matter of
semantics. It's a matter of power.
In defining being in integrity in a bygone era, I had it that
the way
of being in integrity was a matter of
keeping my word,
of keeping my promises, of doing what I said I would do. Then one day
in
a conversation with
Werner,
he introduced me to an idea (it was couched like a question) which
altered that notion forever: if you don't keep your word, if you don't
keep your promises, if you don't do what you said you would do, then
do you still have / can you still be in integrity? It's a
very disconcerting point. If your answer's no (and everyone
knows that
the way
of being in integrity is
keeping your word,
keeping your promises, doing what you said you would do, yes?) then
no one is in integrity. Stand up if you've never broken
your word. Stand up if you've never broken your promises. Stand up if
you've never not done what you said you would do. What!?
No one stood up??? That's right: given the proviso, none
of us can.
Clearly there's an integrity issue here. But the issue may not reside
in not
keeping your word,
in not keeping your promises, and in not doing what you said you would
do per se. The issue may reside in defining integrity only as
keeping your word,
as keeping your promises, as doing what you said you would do.
I may inadvertently not
keep my word
(I give my word that I'll meet you, but an earthquake blocks the road).
I may forget I promised to do something. Or I may simply change my
mind and not do what I said I would do.
Consider
there's
a way
I can be in integrity even when I inadvertently break my word, or
forget I promised to do something, or simply change my mind and not do
what I said I would do. It's in
honoring my
word
(that's as in
"honoring my wordas mySelf") instead of merely
keeping my word.
The difference is both simple and profound, and is also (as I suggested
earlier) a matter of power, as well as of leverage.
Keeping my word
(or not) has my word determining my integrity (useful, but with
reduced power and leverage).
Honoring my word
has me determining my integrity (useful too but with maximum power and
leverage).
Honoring my wordhas me wielding the power. If I
honor my word
then if I'm not going to be keeping it, I will say I'm not going to be
keeping it. That has integrity. Even if I gave my word and I don't keep
it, I'm still being in integrity.
It's in communicating I won't be
keeping my word
or (from the past) that I didn't
keep my word,
and cleaning up any mess it leaves in people's lives, that has
honoring my word
maintaining my integrity, even when I don't (or can't) keep it. So
my word includes cleaning up my word. That is why
honoring my word
has more power than merely
keeping my word.
It's why
honoring my word
is a more bankable harbinger of being in integrity than
keeping my word.
The bottom line
of being in integrity is it's a matter of
honoring my word
rather than only
keeping my word
- or it's
honoring my wordand alsokeeping my word.
In the matter of being in integrity, who I am is my word. It's more
than that actually. It's in the matter of who I am in totality,
who I am is my word.
Postscript:
The presentation, delivery, and style of
My Word Includes Cleaning Up My Word
are all my own work.
The ideas recreated in
My Word Includes Cleaning Up My Word
were first originated, distinguished, and articulated by
Werner Erhard.
