"Integrity"

10/06/2012

Finally after a long delay I finally finish a book, "Integrity" by Dr.Henry Cloud

The ability to meet the demands of Reality

After reading it, and highlighting it now whats left is finding time to review it.

Basically the book covered 6 dimensions of integrity and it really took me a deeper study of the virtue integrity, and truly it is way more than just moral values. Also I got to know more of the idea of the word "integrate" for all you maths people. It basically means to make bits of irregular area into a whole. ( If I didn't get that wrong)

Manage to learn a lot of stuff and pretty much motivated and encourage by this book. Changes my view in life and also helping me focus on the areas in my life where change is needed. I'll probably list down some stuff which I highlighted which I thought were interesting.

Some of it may need the context to understand it further but yeah, just some little knowledge nuggets.
Everything that are written below are not my words and work, but all credits towards the Author of the book (Dr. Henry Cloud) and all of his other references.

1.  Character = The ability to meet the demands of reality.
2.  Strength turns into weakness without the other parts of a person to balance them out.
3.  People who are out of touch with their own feelings are limited in their ability to empathize with others.
4.  True listening and understanding occurs only when the other person understands that you understand.
5.  In leadership, this mean that you are for your people to do well.
6.  You will excel only by maximizing your strengths, never by fixing you weakness
7.  The fool doth think he is a wise, but the wise man knows himself to be a fool (Shakespeare)
8.  The character who seeks reality about himself or herself has the courage to embrace whatever reality he find
9.  The ability to control your thinking when your emotions are enflamed is huge for success.
10.  Cognitive and emotional flexibility is the key for fluid performance and negotiating reality.
11.  Why do the ones who do better do better?
12.  How many courses in college or business school instructed you in ways that you needed to grow as a person in order to make it in business?
13.  People do well when they do what they do well and stay away from what they do poorly.
14.  High achievers are the ones who spend their energies in the area where they are talented.
15.  You have to be in touch with who you are and not with "being" someone else.
16.  A person who lives life according to his fears is always limited in his identity, as he cannot step out to find out what is really him and what isn't.
17.  Humility is not self-deprecating, but real and honest.
18.  Successful people stick to what they are good at and find ways to make that larger.
19.  The ability to deny impulse in the service of a goal.
20.  To accomplish things, hard decisions are going to have to be made that have adverse effects on people.
21.  The ability to keep going when we hit an obstacle, believe that there is a way to get it done, and keep going until we find it is one of the most important character abilities that we can ever develop.
22.  Perseverance takes courage, stamina, emotional reserves, judgment, creativity, and other aspects of character to do.
23.  Winners lose well, and losers loose poorly.
24.  People's ability to make something work has everything to do with their ability to let go of something that does not work.
25.  Cut your losses and move one
26.  People who in in life look at their own contribution to failures and losses--and learn.
27.  The good is the enemy of the best, ( just like Jim Collins Good to Great, good is the enemy of great)
28.  Fruitfulness depends as much upon focusing on the "who" you are as much as the "what" of the work you do.
29.  No problem, no profit
30.  The ones who succeed in life are the ones who realize that life is largely about solving problems.
31.  The only way out is through
32.  Avoiding the elephant in the room not only allows the problem to continue, but erodes trust in the on who does and in the nature of love itself
33.  Recoverability.
34.  The results are the results, and the self is the self.
35.  A leader has to remain separate from how people feel when he is confronting them about performance, or and issue.
36.  Leaders take ownership of the results and do not try to excuse those or blame someone else for them.
37.  Blame is the parking brake for improvement.
38.  The most important implications for mature characters is solving the problem.
39.  There will never be enough accolades (An expression of approval; praise. b. A special acknowledgment; an award. ) to overcome bad feelings about the self.
40.  The cure is always to find acceptance and love in one's weakness and failure.
41.  "Being right" can never compete with " doing well:
42.  It is true that you get what you tolerate.
43.  If you fail to confront, you will lose. But, if you confront poorly, you will also lose.
44.  Hard on the issue, soft on the person.
45.  Honesty without love is no integrity.
46.  Care about the results of the confrontation.
47.  What do I want to have happen as a result of this confrontation?
48.  See confrontation and problem solving as process, not an event.
49.  You and I versus the problem.
50.  Forgiving does not mean not facing a problem. It means facing it and then letting it go.
51.  The character ability to say "NO"
52.  To change is hard work, otherwise everyone would grow.
53.  Hard life now easy later vs Easy life now HardER later
54.  The lack of use ushers in death.
55.  Falling down never stopped children from developing.  But getting yelled at, criticized, and put down can stop them for life.
56.  The hunger for more is a healthy sign of character.
57.  You have to get out there to get somewhere.
58.  For someone to grow, there has to be a connection to outside sources of energy.
59.  The need to feel good about oneself overshadows oneself to drive to grow.
60.  You will not grow without attempting things you are unable to do.
61.  The immature character asks life to meet his demand. But the mature character meets the demands of life
62.  Being Human, Superhuman, and Dysfunctional All at once.
63.  Every human being is to some degree unintegrated. We all lack integrity
64.  Change does not hit until reality does.
65.  The people who sees the truth are those who always scores.

It really feels like there is a lot, pretty much this are most of the stuff I highlighted, some you may not understand and some may not be able to take it deliberately without its context. Good to know this is up on my blog as its also more of a purpose for me to drop by and review at the same time others may view :)

-Ronald Foo-
We all lack Integrity one way or another