Integrity Is Closing Open Circuit

Integrity is commonly associated with ethics and morality, which are “mental constructs.” As such, no one ever (from Plato to George W. Bush) has agreed upon on a common definition of “ethics”, “morality” OR “integrity”.

Politicians and ministers preach about it. If you were to press leaders to define what they mean by ethics, morality or integrity, you would likely get a lot of squirming. If Socrates were alive, he would be the pesty gadfly that unveil our incompetence.

In business terms, there is no operational (or workable) definition for “integrity”. Because there is no agreed upon definition, discussions are philosophical meanderings that stimulate the mind and right/wrong conscience but are of little practical value. Any discussion of “integrity” as a mental construct is arguable and does little to help the average person grow.

ALIVENESS

However, there IS one way to approach “integrity” that works better. When “integrity” is aligned with aliveness and congruence, which can be operationally defined and measured by a person, it is no longer a mental construct.

Aliveness and congruence are somatic experiences anchored in our bodies, not just in our minds. For example, when I lead a teleconference, I often ask people at the beginning to rate their aliveness on a scale from one (lowest) to ten (highest). Then, I usually ask them to rate their aliveness at the end of a session.

The moment when aliveness drops or increases is often quite obvious to the person and even to the entire group. By having a feedback system anchored in your body, you notice patterns and take responsibility for generating your own aliveness or stopping it. This most often does include the mind. However, measuring increase or decrease in aliveness is anchored in the body-mind. In other words, you have an actual body-centered sense of generating or stopping your own aliveness.

CONGRUENCE

Similarly, integrity may be viewed from the perspective of congruence. A polygraph test, for example, uses physiological signals – blood pressure, pulse, respiration and skin conductivity - to indicate when a body is “at balance.” This is the norm; this is congruence. When a lie is told, the signals show a discrepancy somewhere in the sympathetic nervous system. This is an indication of being “out of balance.”

ALIVENESS GAUGE

Integrity can be aligned with feeling fully alive and congruent inside and out. Outside-expression matches inside-experience. By noticing either when your authentic aliveness drops or an imbalance occurs somewhere in your somatic-psychological system, you empower yourself to know when you are out-of-integrity. In essence, you create your own inner "aliveness gauge."

When you get back-in-integrity and align your inner experience and you outer expression, you create balance. My personal and professional experience shows that there is a direct correlation between coming back into integrity and increasing my authentic aliveness.

CLOSE THE OPEN CIRCUITS

Four ways I've found to close the open circuits of being-out-of-integrity the fastest are:

1) Find feelings that you are numb to.

2) Look for significant truths that you have not spoken.

3) Locate where in their lives you see yourself as a victim.

4) Unearth any agreements that have been broken.nn