“Our integrity is the basis of our confidence in ourselves and the confidence we inspire in others. ~ Self-awareness involves deep personal honesty. It comes from asking and answering hard questions.” Stephen R Covey

What feeds great personal self-esteem? What brings great personal peace of mind? Surely the answer MUST be the firm confidence that we are acting absolutely in keeping with our self-expectations and, where there is no conflict, where we are acting wholly in accordance with the expectations others have of us.

What undermines self-esteem, peace of mind and self-confidence are the doubts that arise when realise that we are not acting with integrity or we are not producing the results we, or those we serve, expect from us – and that the reason those expectations aren’t being met is entirely down to us.

We aren’t doing what we promised. We aren’t making the calls we said we’d make. We aren’t supporting someone as indicated. We aren’t exercising, we aren’t producing the results we know we can.

When those things happen we undermine our self-confidence, we reduce the ability and willingness of others to trust us, and as a result we lose any hope of having inner peace. Integrity and inner peace are intertwined. The one feeds on the other. And self-esteem is starved if integrity is lacking. It’s the vitamin that makes you healthy of mind. Enough of that metaphor.

What will you do this week to make sure that you act with integrity and achieve peace of mind? What results will you promise to make – tacitly or implicitly – that your integrity and conscience will demand of you? Will you exercise 6 times? Will you speed up your actions? Will you have those conversations you would otherwise avoid?

Get to it – work hard at achieving peace!