Integrity - the state of being whole and undivided.

I heard this definition and it made complete sense to me.

Integrity is about how you feel inside.  About doing, saying and being in harmony with your truth.

Integrity means, you have to do what you feel, or be divided inside.

Integrity means it isn't at all about the outside or the folks who live there.

It is all about your heart, mind and soul.

Often, I think we think of integrity as doing what you said you would do; an accountability to someone else. 

I had never heard it defined as being whole and undivided.

I love this.

I live this.

Integrity has brought me peace.

I am undivided and whole.

We often hear talk about being whole.  And, it is a fuzzy idea of what we should be. Rare is it said, that being whole is being undivided.

We don't even speak of being divided.

Of knowing our heart and soul want one thing, and that our mind is dictating something else and how divided our inner world is.

Being undivided is a peace unlike anything I have ever experienced.

Its value is something I am unwilling to negotiate.

In the early years of cultivating this, I would write out my dividedness, the tug and pull of the waring mind.

And, I would follow the road that brought me peace inside.

Each decision towards a peaceful inside, expanded the peace inside of me.

I still weigh decisions by how it would feel to me.

This is huge coming from a past people pleaser. 

I love that the road to integrity is to be whole and undivided.

 

The other definition of integrity is - "the quality of being honest and having strong moral principles - moral uprightness.

This part, I believe, comes after the war of becoming undivided.  It is then you can know what you stand for and what it will take to keep you whole.

 

As a child, I was given the moral codes of my parents and the church my mother believed in. I was taught moral principles.  In the very strict culture, you are not allowed to go out and find your own moral compass.  

Your life is led by the compass of the church.

You follow.

There is no need for individual wholeness.  The completeness comes from being a good christian. You are dependent upon the 'good opinion' of others to be good. It is a very co-dependent relationship, one where your inner landscape isn't valued.

When the places that housed my morals crashed, I fell apart.

It was then, I discovered the world inside of me.

A heart, a mind, and a soul were now available for me to engage with. 

When I found my own wholeness, I no longer needed the compass of the church.

It took years to build my own compass and moral principles.

I didn't know what I was doing when I worked to keep peace inside of me; the wholeness was Me being Undivided.

I thought I was creating a new me, when in fact I was creating one without division.

A whole representation of Me.

There are many who feel that a victim of child sexual abuse will always be broken, and damaged.  I believe, that we can undo the damage, when we become empowered and live with our truths. 

And, now I can see how following our integrity will be very healing.

Perhaps we will have PTSD, but if you are living undivided, it will be less impacting.

I have compassion and understanding with my heart and mind. I know the path they have walked, the psychological damage that was done and the broken heart.

Both have experienced deep wounds.

And, yet both are stronger where they were broken.

My heart knows heartache so it loves differently.  My mind knows the narrow path of denial and religion and is now open to new ideas and reality.

Integrity for me truly is accepting what is without division. Without leaving pieces out.

Undivided.

Accepting reality as a whole is to live with integrity, as well as finding what connects the mind, body and soul.

What is your truth? What part of reality are you unwilling to accept? What part of you are you shutting out?

Wholeness cannot be found while being divided.