Faith, Spirituality, and Personal Ethics

How do we acquire our personal ethics and is this something that can be taught?

Where do we receive our core morals, values, and principles from that would allow us to establish a foundation for practicing good personal ethics?

These are thought provoking and deep questions that are not answered easily.

In my own business experiences totalling 32 years, I looked hard and far to find the appropriate answers.

Regarding the first question, I was fortunate to have been born to educated parents who did in fact teach me the values of being honest, responsible, and accountable for my actions. They taught me how courtesy, respect, politeness, and manners mattered much. My mother was a practicing Catholic and placed a high value on her faith and belief in God.

Yet, even with the privileged benefit of their knowledge and emphasis on doing the right things, I later in life failed when I committed white collar related crimes in a family own business. My lack of personal ethics was overun by ambitious thinking, greed, and arrogance.

I readily rationalized and justified my business practices as entitlements that initially were ethically questionable, and ended being illegal in nature. The personal ethics taught to me was not enough of a base and deterrent to prevent illegal behavior from taking place.

That led me to continue my search and tackle the second question posed today.

In doing so, I fortunately reopened my eyes and soul to my Christian upbringing, the Bible, and belief in God. I discovered that grace and humility very much are responsible for core values and quality personal ethics.

It isn’t my purpose to preach here or suggest that Christianity and the Bible is the only way. The many religions practiced have common threads of decency, thoughfulness, prayer, fairness, respect, tolerance, and love that in my view can establish the proper foundation to fundamental and quality personal ethics.

I would suggest to all of you that regardless of your religious beliefs and what Master you answer to, the faith and spirituality you have forms the very morals, principles, and values that are required in our every day lives.

Without them, I have found it impossible to practice quality personal ethics.

Incarceration has a way of waking you up and my call certainly took place a few years before that. It is through a belief in a supreme being, a God, that my faith and spirituality has become the number one priority in my life. This allows me to ask who I am, what am I doing, and what am I contributing on a daily basis.

The old adage of practice makes perfect is most applicable when it comes to our morals, principles, and values. They must be utilized each 24 hours we have to the best of our abilities if we expect to experience fulfilling and sustained lives.

Do your best every day. No one is asking more or less from you. And remember that faith and spirituality is quite essential to practicing good personal ethics.