The most important thing to you should be principles

[QuoNina]

Excerpt taken from Stephan Covey's book: (Paraphrased) What is important to you? Friends? Materials? bf/gf? School? Parents? Job? Enemy? Hobbies? Heroes? Self? They can all disappoint you by accident, by occasion, or just by nature.

What really should be important to you is principles. Honesty is a principle. Service is a principle. Love, effort, respect, gratitude, justice, loyalty,...are all principles. They wont speak on your back, disappoint you, or leave you alone. They do not prefer anyone. Each constitutes itself alone. They are the key to other things that are sounded to you. And belief is how you make those principles alive.After I read this paragraph, I just felt it's true to some extent and very useful in cultivating the mind. Disappointments in life mostly came from things we want. Recognition, relationship, friendship, money, or your favorite object(s). And, sometimes, to avoid those disappointments, we twist ourselves to hold on to something. We may boast to win others' trust; we may cheat to get what we want. What ends up is the distrust we have against ourselves or the indifference of the distrust that comes from our own hearts. Neither would make us happy and contented.

However, on the other hand, holding onto a certain principle and being completely ignorant of things you care don't make sense to me, either. Let's just take honesty as an example. Do you always have to be honest in answering questions? Do you outright point out your boss' mistakes? Do you elaborate on how severe their health condition is to a patient who is near the end of his life? Are you really lying when you tell your girlfriend she is the most beautiful woman you've ever met? In most of the circumstances, helping others to get in touch with the reality by being honest is great. But one single principle doesn't work well alone. When speaking to your boss, you need honesty and respect. When speaking to patients, you need honesty and humanity. (When speaking to your girlfriend/boyfriend, oh, you are probly just blind.)

I think the most capable people are the people who are able to adopt many principles, and integrate them into their everyday lives, in dealing with themselves, others, activities, and other things.

What do you think of the excerpt (and/or my interpretation)?
What principle(s) have you hold on to? Did it/they work? Why or why not?
Or ...just... say anything. :P

[DataFever]

However, on the other hand, holding onto a certain principle and being completely ignorant of things you care don't make sense to me, either. Let's just take honesty as an example. Do you always have to be honest in answering questions? Do you outright point out your boss' mistakes? Do you elaborate on how severe their health condition is to a patient who is near the end of his life? Are you really lying when you tell your girlfriend she is the most beautiful woman you've ever met? In most of the circumstances, helping others to get in touch with the reality by being honest is great. But one single principle doesn't work well alone. When speaking to your boss, you need honesty and respect. When speaking to patients, you need honesty and humanity. (When speaking to your girlfriend/boyfriend, oh, you are probly just blind.)



Being honest does not necessarily mean telling your boss what his mistakes are. Being judicious is also a principle. And if you are truly in love with your girlfriend, then she probably is the most beautiful person in the world. After all, beauty is more than skin deep.

So, yes, what you say is correct. You cannot base your life on just one principle. You must have a core set of principles. From that core set, you can face any situation appropriately.

[drachasor]

So, yes, what you say is correct. You cannot base your life on just one principle. You must have a core set of principles. From that core set, you can face any situation appropriately.

I beg to differ. You can most certainly base your life on one core principle. As it happens, that probably means you'll develop other, "sub-principles" as rules of thumb for most situations -- but only because they support the core principle. Having multiple principles that are equally important means you need to develop some other principle that tells you have to decide what to do when those core principles come into conflict. Multi-valued ethical systems are tricky that way. A single-valued system is a lot easier to deal with and work with.

Utilitarianism is such a single-valued system. The core principle is the happiness/wellbeing of others. Honesty comes out of this, because lying almost always risks hurting people (there are exceptional cases where it is better to lie, but they are very rare). Most other things that are important to people come out of the core principle as well, because by being important to humans, they are inherently wrapped up in the happiness of others.

Anyhow, just because other people can disappoint you, doesn't mean you shouldn't find them important. Heck, you can disappoint yourself by not following your own principles. That doesn't mean you should give them up or forswear them. Rather, you have to learn to accept disappointment and work through it.

-Drachasor

[DataFever]

Utilitarianism is such a single-valued system. The core principle is the happiness/wellbeing of others. Honesty comes out of this, because lying almost always risks hurting people (there are exceptional cases where it is better to lie, but they are very rare). Most other things that are important to people come out of the core principle as well, because by being important to humans, they are inherently wrapped up in the happiness of others.

-Drachasor

Starting from the single principle of the happiness/well-being of others, and having no other principles except that which can be derived from that principle, will lead to unsolvable conundrums. What do you do in the situation where that which achieves the happiness of one person will cause the unhappiness of another? There must be a second core principle that will enable the resolving of those issues.

[drachasor]

Starting from the single principle of the happiness/well-being of others, and having no other principles except that which can be derived from that principle, will lead to unsolvable conundrums. What do you do in the situation where that which achieves the happiness of one person will cause the unhappiness of another? There must be a second core principle that will enable the resolving of those issues.

Well, I suppose you could say that the happiness of any two people is worth just as much. Sure, there will still be some morally ambiguous actions, but I don't think you can ever get rid of that.

-Drachasor

[QuoNina]

I've learned something from your little discussion. :P

I suppose different values hold different weights for a person. Anyhow, just because other people can disappoint you, doesn't mean you shouldn't find them important. Heck, you can disappoint yourself by not following your own principles. That doesn't mean you should give them up or forswear them. Rather, you have to learn to accept disappointment and work through it.That's sometimes a very hard thing to do. :laugh

[Bishop]

It's all about perception. In your personal moral you may hold a single core principle while another person may hold 2 or more principles equal and just as important.

Also the principle love can bring pain, hate depression.
Respect can bring upon envious rivals.
Justice can bring upon the truth of how unfair the world is.
Effort can bring upon dissapintment.