The Habit of Sincerity ¹

The formula is quite simple, but one should not underestimate our use of the word, sincerity: Being deliberate, intentive, or putting forth honest effort would not suffice if the preceding effort of one's reasoning were not equally so driven. To complicate matters further, excessive deliberation in one's reasoning may only serve undermine our goals in doing so. What we require is to develop, not only an intuitive sense, but an intuitive manner which enables keen judgement and clarity of purpose. This is a matter of conditioning, an orchestration of habit.

Habit as a general phenomenon always infers a motif for the individual; while often difficult to deduce from without, the individual may employ and develop that motif through an internal narrative. Such a narrative would involve one's goals and aspirations as well as self-image and the outward manifestation of character or manner. More often than not, the elements of one's personal narrative wind up at odds with one another, which represents a failure to integrate vision with the play of one's life. In this, we come full-circle and may recognize that sincerity not only presents a virtue to strive for, but a prerequisite in achieving that state of virtue. To make sense of this, we must consider sincerity as a penetrating virtue, one which our lives and character must be made to engulf over time--a feat not achievable without growth.

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