My whole life I have believed in honesty. I live by it everyday. Personally, I feel like so many people need to be more honest. Not only to others, but to themselves. Honesty is such an important part of life. Lying will get you nowhere, and it’s not acceptable. People may believe that lying can be a good thing because it can help others from getting hurt. Personally, I feel that you should always tell the truth, even if you end up in trouble.

Being honest is important. If someone asks for an honest opinion, you can give it to them, but you don’t have to hurt them with what you say. You can be empathetic to that person's feelings and gently tell them the truth. Lying can just hurt someone more than the truth. Then, there’s always the consequences of lying, which may involve losing people you care about, or getting into major trouble. Normally when you are honest, you don’t lose people you care about. You can still get into trouble if you did something bad, but it may be less due to you being honest.

There are so many people that lie just to help save themselves. At some point, the lies all come back to haunt you. If you lie because you forgot your homework, what good is it doing? If you tell your teacher the truth they will remember that. Being honest will always help you. Maybe not at the moment, but at some point it will. No good ever comes out of lying. Good will only come out of being honest. Telling the truth can be a very hard thing to do but it shows that you are a responsible person with integrity.

Lying is changing a story every time it’s told. People who lie can be selfish and scared. Telling the truth is being selfless and brave. Telling the truth is the right thing to do, which may be really hard.

This is what honesty means to me. This is what I step up to. I want you to step up to honesty as well. We need to do what’s right and not what’s easy.