Building Blocks For a Stronger Nation

Honesty

Depending on how old you are, you may have forgotten that you were born honest. This world taught you how to lie. Honesty is not a choice like an optional tactic to use only when it serves your purpose. It's who you are. It is a state of existence. Not to get too metaphysical, but being honest is simply the experience of being alive. Everything that happens to us, we experience honestly. What comes out of our mouths in response to these experiences is a different story. A lot goes on in our heads before we say or do anything and this is when a decision is made. Dishonesty is a choice. Honesty has no become a decision not to lie because it is our default setting like every other living creature on the planet until we learned that being this way in a human-made world created by those who came before us is not always a good idea so we had to learn to constantly calculate and figure out what to be honest about and what to hide to survive in this world. As we were becoming young adults, some of us who tried to remain honest longer than most may have even been told by those older than us that we will soon learn how the world really works. What they were really saying is that they had given up on being honest and we will, too. As a result, even at a young age these circumstances turned us into clever little strategizers who must figure out how to get what we want thinking that this is the way to happiness or, at the bare minimum, how to stay out of trouble. This is not a good blueprint for a society. If being honest is detrimental to one's success within a system that system is going to fail because it was created dishonestly. The answer isn't to learn when to be dishonest, too. It's to make a better system.

Ya, ya, ya, this all sounds nice, but these are just ideas. There is no way of fixing this mess of a system that we're all trapped in with simple honesty. It's much more complicated than that. A person can't even drive down the road and pull into a gas station without someone trying to trick them. One second the price on the sign says one amount, a second later it says a different one. Great, let's try to trick people while they're operating heavy and dangerous machinery. This is where dishonesty has gotten us. I won't even begin to discuss the widespread dishonesty in business, politics and on the internet. How can trust survive in a world like this? Where do we even start making positive change? On an individual level, it's simple. With ourselves. On a larger scale, we start by changing our system to reflect our values. Whatever is the most important priority in a society dictates how people treat one another and the planet. Money is the most important thing in our country and in our world. Disagreeing with this fact and claiming that family, friends and community are more important is admirable, but it doesn't make it true within our system. You can't fix a problem until you're willing to acknowledge it exists. Try living without money in our society and see how far you get. The problem is that it's an invention. It has no actual value. Money doesn't care if you're honest about how you make it or not. A dishonest person can make money just as easily as an honest one can, maybe even easier. How can it not matter how we acquire the most important commodity in our society? I'm sure a lot of people know that family, love, friendship, the environment and other human values are more important than money, but we can't serve two gods. If money isn't the most important thing to us then it's time to put something else above it, something that will improve how we treat one another and the planet because money certainly doesn't care nor do those who have the most of it.

Is this an impossible change to make? Do we really have a choice? Look where we are headed if we don't. It's not impossible. Those who say that it is are often the ones benefiting the most from this dishonest system and they need you to believe it's impossible so they can keep getting their sweet deal while we continue doing all the real work. Those who try to live honestly in their personal lives already know that change is possible. We grow and learn from our mistakes every day. This is because honest people are stronger than dishonest ones. It's harder to be honest in a world full of dishonesty. Anyone can lie and cheat. That's the easy way out. This is what weak people do. It takes strength to be honest and the more you do it the stronger you get. This is something dishonest people will never understand because the more they lie the weaker they become and the more entrenched they become in their lies. Dishonest people are, also, less intelligent. Being sneaky and clever is not the same as intelligence. They're dumb enough to think that they can outsmart life. No one has ever explained to them, or they've never listened to, the fact that you can cheat people and you can even cheat the system, but you can't cheat life. Lying is a human invention. Life isn't. Lies only work when you can convince other people to believe them. The truth speaks for itself. Stop the lies and the truth always reveals itself. This is why liars are constantly bombarding us with conflicting information. A truly intelligent person knows that it's simply wiser to be honest which is another example of strength in the form of having faith in something stronger and more intelligent than ourselves. Humility is a sign of intelligence. Over confidence is a precursor to someone about to make a lot of mistakes.

None of these words are meant to convince or persuade anyone into believing anything. This entire website was created for those who already know. This is why people who have given up on honesty think it's a lost cause because they can't see what an honest person can. It is a lost cause to them because they're living in a system built on lies. Give up on honesty and you give up on yourself. If a person has done this, they won't think twice about giving up on anyone else. An honest person lives according to their conscience despite these facts. Doing the right thing is a daily battle, one that makes them stronger with the passing of each which is why it is so important they know that they're not alone.

We can't get rid of money all together. Our entire system would implode, but imagine a world where doing the right thing made you millions and doing the wrong thing left you broke. The next step in the maturity of our civilization and as a species is to link money, a valueless concept, with honesty and being a good person. This is the challenge for future generations. When this happens, the result will be immediate. How we treat one another and the planet will improve on every level. Anyone saying that it's impossible has already given up on their own souls and wants us to join them. We will not. An honest person's conscience, soul and this planet are far too valuable to them. The strong always manage to find a way when no way seems to be visible. The non-believers can stand back and watch.