What attribute of your personality are you most proud of, and how has it impacted your life so far? This could be your creativity, effective leadership, sense of humor, integrity, or anything else you’d like to tell us about.
Most older people would criticize my generation by saying that we lack integrity: fortunately, I don’t apply to that. Integrity is honesty to yourself, to others, and to those you don’t know. It could also mean having a strong base of good principles to support yourself. So by either of those definitions, most teens have faltered from it, but it is a central part of who I am, and who I want to continue to be.
My integrity to be a good person and true to myself, has helped steer me to avoiding the pitfalls of those around me. I want to grow up to be straight-edge, so it was easy for me to turn down the peer pressure of drugs, smoking and alcohol among my peers. My integrity helps to keep me in alignment with academic honesty: I don’t cheat on my assignments, and I refuse to let anyone cheat off of my work. Of course I will help my friend on a homework assignment, trying to make sure they understand how to do a problem, and not steal my solutions. I am even honest to my teachers about a missing assignment: I forgot the paper, or I lost the worksheet, and I don’t complain about the repercussions of my carelessness.
In the end, my integrity has lead me to live a wholesome life because I don’t want to belittle myself or my abilities.
Published in Successful College Essays, Successful MIT Essays
