Link Soup :: Integrated With Integrity

Link soup is where I dig up some good material from the blogosphere and add my two cents.

Integrity

Whenever I really need a kick in the ass, I tend to visit the site of self-proclaimed blunt, offensive, politically-incorrect blogger Craig Harper. This week, he really did the trick with his article The Art of Completion.

He points out the uncomfortable truth that most of us don’t do what we say we are going to do. We don’t use the gym membership that we paid for, we don’t call our friend back when we say we will, and we don’t start that business we have been talking about starting.

I learned from Stephen Covey that having integrity is just as simple as keeping your promises to yourself and others. Sounds easy, yet the quality is so rare that Craig Harper calls those who possess it gems.

Having integrity means that what you say and what you do are integrated. The thing about integrity is that it doesn’t matter how big or small your promises are; what matters is that you hold true to them. Something as simple as returning a book you borrowed without having to be asked shows integrity.

Hey, I’m not the only one who believes in integrity. True You Success agrees with me.

Laziness vs. Hard Work

Fellow paradox enthusiast Julie at The Truth Curve breaks down the duality that showed up in a post called Productivity Blog Showdown on Slack Manager. Our favorite blogger Steve Pavlina squared off with Fred Gratzon over which is a better strategy for success: hard work or laziness.

I’ve always been a big fan of hard work, having grown up with a strong work ethic; but, I have also found in my life that hard work alone is not a formula for success. You can paddle your heart out, but if you are heading up the wrong stream, you won’t get where you want to go.

To be more productive, it helps to master the art of leverage. By leveraging time, money, or a skill, you multiply the effectiveness of hard work. When you use leverage, less work gets you more results. To me, this isn’t an excuse to be lazy; it’s all the more reason to work harder.

The Secret Attracts Attention

Everyone is talking about The Secret, especially since Oprah has been featuring it this week on her show. Steve Pavlina gave it some extra attention this week in a discussions about how to make it work.

If you haven’t seen it, you should. The movie is a collection of views describing The Law of Attraction. One of the contributers who seems to be popping up everywhere is Dr. Michael Beckwith. He has been on Oprah twice and appeared on Larry King as well.

Dr. Beckwith is the leader of a spiritual center here in Los Angeles called Agape. When my girlfriend first suggested that we check it out, I have to admit that I was very suspicious.

We had been feeling the need to connect to a spiritual community for awhile, but finding a place where we felt at home was proving to be difficult. We didn’t desire to be judged in an ultra-conservative church, but at the same time we didn’t feel comfortable with ultra-liberal new-wave ideas either.

The feeling that Dr. Beckwith created in Agape is unlike that of any other place I have been to. The energy is the complete opposite of judgement. Everyone carries a smile and I always walk away energized.

I was concerned at first that it would be a weird experience, but I never feel pressured to buy into something that I was uncomfortable with. It’s not the church of Dr. Beckwith, with rules and his own brand of religion. It’s a place where people of all religions come together to find common ground.

The congregation is extremely diverse in ethnicity as well as religion. It’s really a beautiful thing to see this kind of unity. Instead of preaching his own doctrine, Dr. Beckwith draws on the wisdom of all of the major traditions. Instead of scaring people, he focuses on the positive with a large dose of the power of the human mind.

It’s the only spiritual center I know of where an atheist could sit next to a person of faith and walk away with a similar positive experience.

The place is a self-determinist’s paradise. I never thought that I would see such a place in my lifetime. It’s the type of place I talk about in Religion vs. Sciece :: Who Will Win Our Faith?.

That’s all I have for this episode, stay tuned for more nuggets of knowledge!

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