A Sense of Honor

Once upon a time I was consumed with the concept of honor.

It arose out of a study of medieval times and knights and the literature of the High Middle Ages, of courtly love and jousts and deeds of justice.  I tried to hold myself to such a code -hard for a young man with no culture of such around him.  Eventually, I suppose, the passion cooled and I started to "get on" with life as so many others have done.

And now I find myself re-examining the concept as a living, breathing core of my life.

Why?  One is simply the fact that in the world we live in, a sense of honor is something that is seldom seen.  To be honorable, to seek to live and act honorably can actually be seen as being counter cultural as it is rare.

A second reason is that we need people in this time and age who are people of honor.  It does not matter where you are from, what you do, or who you are: the temptations to act dishonorably in an age where the art of "looking after myself" is the modus operandi of so many individuals, which then affects institutions, which then affect nations.

A final reason is simply personal.  A sense of honor is something that gives one a sense of buffering against the vicissitudes  of the world.  It is both the rod that strengthens the inner man by doing right because it is right and the shield that protects the outer man by knowing what one is doing is right when all others think it foolish, antiquated, or obfuscatory.

The boy has become a man, and that sense of honor - of living to a higher standard and purpose - is still there.  It need only have the breezes of thought and action breathed upon it to burst again into translucent flame.