Have you ever found yourself agreeing with someone while inside you know that you do not agree at all? You may have justified it by thinking you were maintaining peace and harmony with the other person, while what you were really doing was warring with yourself.

When you actions and/or words do not ring true on the inside, you are out of integrity and in conflict with yourself.

The word integrity is related to integrate, which means to make whole or unify. When we have integrity, we have harmonized and integrated our outer behavior with our true inner self and its values.

It is easy to see how lack of integrity began. When as a child we were disciplined to follow parental norms (often for safety and other very good reasons) and avoid our instincts, we may have also learned how to behave according to expectations (in front of parents) while disagreeing with them on the inside. This is the origin of the "shadow" that Carl Jung spoke about, the realm of rejected instincts and other supposed "bad" parts of ourselves.

However, now that we are adults and conceivably know when our outer behaviors are in conflict with our inner values, the path to wholeness lies in paying attention to when outer behaviors are not true to the values of our inner self. Be aware of when you are not being truthful as you interact in the world.

"What is the price of bringing harmony between my inner values and my outer behavior," you may say.

I used to justify my lack of integrity by thinking I was being nice to others. I didn't want to create problems with them. In effect, I decided whether the other person could handle the truth. I thought it was all about their ability to accept my opinion.

In reality, I was just deceiving myself. The true reason I was often out of integrity and misrepresenting my inner truth was my fear of the other's reaction. You see, I had given them the power to determine whether I was right or wrong, good or bad, just as I had given that same power to my parents as a child.

Now, fortunately, who I am, what I value and believe is no longer negotiable. I have regained authority over my life by establishing my own values and beliefs as the measure of my behavior and no one else's.

I now speak my truth most of the time. Sometimes I fall short and on those occasions when I slip back into pleasing someone else, I don't beat myself up. I just recommit to living from my own inner authority.