“An uneasy conscience is a hair in the mouth.”

– Mark Twain, author and humorist

In the earliest days of my coaching career, only a couple of months after I left my job in the pharmaceutical industry, I joined a small consulting firm. Their unofficial motto regarding income generation was “you eat what you kill” – and unfortunately, I was starving. Of course, if we did “kill” anything, we had an agreement to share a portion of our income with the house.

After about 90 days with absolutely no income, my first client gave me a personal check in my name for $1,000. I literally held that check in my wallet for almost a week, unsure if I should share it with the company who – up to that point – compensated me only with a key to the door and permission to use the telephone.

To say I had an uneasy conscience was putting it mildly. I actually made myself ill to the point of vomiting due to my internal conflicts. Living by the quote “The truth will set you free”, I discussed this issue openly with my colleagues – and I was almost instantly healed.

Exercise:

Where in your personal or professional life are you faced with an uneasy conscience, where summoning the courage of your integrity will remove the hair from your mouth?