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6 I The Best Online Education System in the world
THE VALUE OF HONESTY
Marian Baltazar
Class of 1980, University of the Philippines College of Manila
AB Political Science
Have we practiced honesty in our daily dealings in life or has it been too difficult for us to be open and talk in
candour to others to the point of missing the true value of honesty? A value is a belief th...at is something that
we subscribe to, and honesty like openness, tolerance, et al, is an example of a human value. It is
indisputable that every individual has experienced a heavy feeling due to suppression of one’s true emotion.
Oftentimes we are faced with a dilemma of concealing the truth and we tend to be dishonest in one way or
another. We put up that façade which do not really reveal who we are and what our true feelings are. There is
that tendency in us to always try to get off the hook of being truthful to others and most especially to our self.
This is where the value of honesty comes in.
What is the value of honesty? It is of endless value and it is a behaviour that transcends value and is made out
of love. People personally value honesty in their life and have set good examples not only in their jobs but most
especially in their own families. Take a child for instance, a parent can not and will not teach his offspring to be
a dishonest person. Instead, we teach our children the importance and value of honesty by setting a good
example before them so as to raise them up to be responsible persons and citizens of our society. The same
thing holds true in our work or whatever jobs we land ourselves in. We are almost always caught in between
doing our best when our employer is not present and we tend to be lax when they are not around. Whichever
the case may be, a person who is honest will do his best and perform well even to the confines of his “own
desk” alone without anybody observing. That person will not wile his time away for nothing. Honesty is
integrity defined. Yes, integrity is when you do the right thing even though no one is watching.
Honesty is not only being honest to other people but being honest also to ourselves by not denying who we are
what we feel and we believe in. As Spencer Johnson puts it, “Integrity is telling myself the truth and honesty is
telling the truth to other people.” Amidst life’s adversity and living in a world of “survival of the fittest”, honesty
proves to be the most important thing in the world. Let us make things easier and free ourselves of the burden
of being untruthful and deceiving in our actions. We can never survive life without honesty. It is time to
practice and value honesty for this is the only way to fully enjoy our lives and be who we truly are.
Questions for discussion:
1. Are you expressing your honest opinions to leaders, peers, or subordinates about what should be done to do
a job properly or better? How?
2. Have we been caught in a fix situation where our honesty is truly tested? How did we respond to it?
3. Are you willing to be honest with someone to the point of confronting a person about a behaviour that
offends you? How did you do it?
4. Are you honestly doing the best job you can even when nobody sees you? How often?
5. Are you handling an organization’s resources like information, time, hardware in the legal, proper and most
effective way?