the value of intergrity

                                                 The value of Integrity

 It is my opinion that men don't understand the purpose or value of integrity today.
In fact, I believe most men avoid looking at it seriously at all costs--it's too uncomfortable to have to look at this.

 Let me clean that statement up--I didn't see the purpose or value in my own integrity.

 That all changed one Monday night in 2010 as I came face to face with the wake of my own integrity--or lack of it.

 I went to that Monday night...clearing round...and then the integrity round.

 There's nothing like a crisis in a man's life to bring him to looking at making changes--to throttle him into movement...and I was throttled.

 I tried to muster up the voice and courage to get to my feet.  I headed to the center of the circle to face everyone.  I had always heard "the circle is strong enough for that" but was it strong enough for the good, the bad, and the ugliness of this?

 I had no choice--I had already lost my job, lost my reputation, my family's respect and my credibility.

 I confessed it all to that circle of men...it all came out...it sounded ghastly...it sounded depraved and awful...when I was finished I stood there, head down and full of shame...I was looking into the hardest place--the mirror. My integrity was ugly rags that couldn't cover me.

 I remember looking out at some of the men and seeing some faces that were angry and disapproving, others in shock and I couldn't look at them in the face so I bowed my head.  This can't be happening I thought...this can't be where and how my story ends...this isn't who I'm supposed to be.

 Some men indeed were angry at me....some never spoke to me again after that night.  One man cleared with me months later. Many men to my surprise decided to walk this journey out with me...and that was more than I had expected.

 I still stood in the center of the circle..shirt soaked with sweat, my head burning up and yet I was chilled by the AC that had kicked on. I longed for tears to shower me and clean me from the dirtiness of my own story...but they failed to come.

 Out of the awkwardness of the silence... as I stood there came a voice saying "I forgive you Glenn"...then a second..."I forgive you Glenn" ...then a third...a fourth and fifth.  I knew a few of the voices but they came from different directions--and I was shocked.

 Have you ever heard something and wondered if anyone ever heard it too? But you were afraid to ask-or talk about it?

 That's when I heard a voice--it came from behind me--it emanated from the empty spot in the circle where I had been sitting before I moved to the center---it said "I love you Glenn."

 Now I had rarely been granted forgiveness in my life, but I definitely had never heard these words ever.  To this day I believe it was the voice of God the Father giving me strength and courage for the journey that lay ahead.

 I turned my head and opened my eyes but no one was there in that spot. I started to sob heavy tears. How is it I could always be ready to fight but not prepared to hear love?  It came at me like a right hook that I never saw coming--and--It knocked me out...I haven't been the same since. It ruined isolation for me.

 I don't remember when the last time I had allowed myself to cry--but it had been many years.  The salty warm sensation brought back memories of growing up--memories long since locked away and that had been walled up--never, ever to be reopened or touched--and never to be felt again.  That sadness was from a deep reservoir that I dare not acknowledge or examine lest I be swept into its swift currents and never be found again.

 As I look back on this past Monday evening and what transpired, I can't help but smile as I recall the voices of many men challenging each other. I no longer hear something
unimportant, nothing militant or procedural...I hear the calling to have words and actions in congruency in the way I was challenged from the voices within--and then challenged from the outside voices.  I could fight against them or fake them, even stay silent to them...but to quote a New Adam Friday night quote--"but then--that's not why I'm here."

 The value of being in integrity as a man--to me is equivalent to having my fractures pushed back into placement and bandaged--it was the ER help I needed to begin to heal. It hurt bad having them set...

...But it is these scars that have now become my gold.