Being Honest with Oneself

The ability of a person to follow one’s ethical standards shows his or her personality. An individual is strong morally when he or she is able to stick to the moral principles in any situation despite the pressure and misunderstandings. Sometimes people are forced or encouraged to act against their ethical principles. For example, a friend may encourage his or her classmate to cheat in order to get higher grades. In another situation, such a “friend” may ask another person to lie in order to get something he or she needs. It may lead to many other negative consequences because people who break their ethical principles once are more likely to do it again. That is the reason why a person always has to follow one’s ethical principles in order to be the person one wants to be. The older a person gets, the stronger his or her standards may become because he or she will have a huge experience. I, for instance, am not very experienced; but, I already have a personal example in which I took a stand and made a decision of moral gravity.
The situation which is going to be analyzed in the paper is rather typical. Unfortunately, many people have experienced something like that in their lives. What makes matters worse is the fact that although people have experienced such situations, they have done very little in order to fix them.
In my personal experience, there was a situation when I and my classmate were working on the project together. It was a very time-consuming project, and it required a lot of time and energy. I had to study very hard in order to finish it because I wanted a good grade. At first, my partner also seemed eager about it. He said it would be great to finish it successfully so both of us would get good grades and valuable knowledge. Nevertheless, he was not devoted to the project for a long time.
The project required a lot of calculations to be done constantly; hence, students had to do them regularly and turn them in. Thus, these calculations were checked; and they were to sum up the entire project. In such a way, the project required constant work because students always had to be focused on it. It was not type of project when one would finish it in one instant; because in order to do it properly, a person would have to do some parts of the entire task regularly. In the very beginning of the project, my classmate and I decided to work together. We gathered together in order to study and perform the tasks; thus, both of us were doing the equal amount of work. That was a very effective way to study because I helped my classmate and vice versa. Nevertheless, my classmate soon lost any interest in the project. He used to struggle previously with the subject, and working on the project proved to be a big challenge for him. At first, he spent extra hours trying to figure out what to do next; and I helped him serving as a free tutor. I did not mind spending so much time because I felt it was a good thing to help a fellow student. Nevertheless, after some struggles, my project partner decided that he was no longer willing to study hard. He found many different reasons to skip our study hours, etc. At first, he said that he had no time or had some other tasks to do. Later, he simply did not come and even did not bother to explain the reason of his absence. In the end, I stayed without a project partner since he did nothing; and I had to do all the work myself. It was very difficult because with project’s progress, it required more and more time. I asked my project partner to help me since I had a hard time dealing with everything by myself. Instead of helping, my project partner refused to cooperate. He said that he did not have necessary skills, knowledge and time; thus, he proposed me few options. First, he said to turn the work the way it was at that moment. Second, I could do everything on my own if I wanted a better grade. He said that since he contributed in the beginning, I should not take all the credit for the work done because he had helped me, too. He found my objections and criticism of his attitude to be unconvincing. He said that if I finish the entire work, I would get a good grade; but then, it would not hurt me to “share” the grade with him. He made it look like it was a good thing to say that we were working together because that way he would also be rewarded. My project partner wanted to make it look like I was required to do the work on my own, but say that it was cooperation.
My classmate’s words left me speechless because I had never encountered such approach toward mutual work. My classmate clearly wanted to make me feel bad in case I would tell about his behavior to the professor. Thus, he thought I would still do everything by myself and would not tell on him. I performed all of the tasks and received a good grade, but I reported to my professor about my classmate’s behavior. I did not want to harm my classmate, but his actions were clearly wrong. He wanted to get credit for something he did not do. I realized that it would not be fair to hide the truth and not tell about his actions. After all, every person has to get what he or she deserves. If one person cheats at school and does not get punished for it, he or she may think that cheating is right as long as one does not get caught. Thus, such a person may use wrong or unethical methods in the future in order to get what one wants. This shows the need to follow one’s ethical principles and act according to high moral standards. That is something I have decided to do. I told my professor the truth about my project partner and the fact that I did most of the work by myself since he refused to help. My professor punished my classmate by not giving him credit for the work done. He had to do an extra assignment in order to get any grades at all. My classmate was very upset because it required double work, and that time, he had no one to help him since he was all by himself on that project.
This example showed me an importance of making the ethical decisions. I have decided to be honest with myself and people around me. It also showed an ethical principle such as honesty and its importance for me. People have to be honest despite any situation. They have to tell the truth because that is the only way for them to expect truth in return. Honesty is very important for me, and that was the main determinant of my actions in the example provided. Another example is integrity. One has to build and maintain a good reputation, and in order to do that, a person has to be responsible for his or her actions.
In my professor’s case, she also demonstrated ethical principles. The main one is just treatment to people. She showed that people should get what they deserve based on their performance and attitude toward work. A person can find many reasons to defend oneself and justify one’s actions, but he or she still needs to get a just reward for his or her doings; and if a person did nothing when he or she had to do something, the individual has to be punished.
Honesty, integrity and being just represent moral principles which determine one’s personality. They direct a person and emphasize on his or her actions. For example, I had no personal grudges against my classmate; on the contrary, I was very sympathetic of him. Nevertheless, personal relations to somebody should not stay on the way of ethical principles. I was adhering to the principles of honesty and integrity just like my professor was toward justice, and the outcome in the situation was right. People got what they deserved: those, who worked hard, got rewards; and those who did not were punished. Professor and school as representatives of higher institution, which should take care of things like that, did all they could to remedy the situation because they showed that such situations should not go unnoticed. They showed that there was equal treatment to all and that people should do things they are expected of and be honest about everything. The wrong outcome could be in case my classmate would receive the same grade; that would make me lose my faith in justice. Another wrong outcome could be if I did not tell about my classmate’s behavior and let things be the way they were. It would show my passiveness because people ought to try to improve the quality of things. If people did not report injustice and lies, others would just keep on cheating and lying. Obviously, there were some biases which were stopping me from telling the truth. I did not want to look like a sneak, and I did not want to angry my classmate. These biases made me doubt in my decision, but luckily, my ethical principles were stronger than that.
In the end, everything turned out for the best. My professor made a wise decision to make my classmate do another work. Thus, he was motivated to work because he knew it was his last chance to fix the situation; and thanks to my professor’s solution he was encouraged to study hard. I can also add that I am happy that I acted the way I did because it was the only right decision in that situation.

Walton Hall is an experienced writer at a leading writing agency https://essayelites.com . He loves a bit of adventure while traveling and he has a strong passion for the local food and drink, whatever it may be. The experience he gains in trips gives him the inspiration to write sparkling essays for students all over the world.