Integrity and My Shoulder Angel

(Emperor's New Groove is my all time favorite movie, by the way)

Do any of you ever have the Temple Recommend Interview questions roll through your head during the day? I do. I know. Weird.

The other day I was in Goodwill and I found a laundry hamper that was exactly what I was looking for, for Claire's room! I was excited, but the price was a little bit higher than I was hoping for. It was only a few dollars more than I wanted to pay, but heck, a few bucks means a lot when you have to pay rent, utilities, a truck payment, insurance and you've got grad school application fees, etc. But I digress.

I noticed the price tag for the hamper was on the lid. I didn't even want the lid, so I thought, "I could just ditch the lid here, tell them I couldn't find a price tag and offer what I wanted to pay in the first place!"

Enter Shoulder Angel.

All that little shoulder angel had to do was utter one small phrase, "honest in your dealings with your fellowman" and I was toast. I realized I wouldn't be able to answer that question honestly if I ditched the lid and pretended to not know the real price. So, I kept the lid on, tried to negotiate the price, and didn't win. I paid full price.

Would it have been that big of a deal if I would have ditched the lid and lied? To most people, no it wouldn't have. But I've read about Jacob and Esau and I wasn't about to sell my birthright for a mess of pottage. Some things just aren't worth it and a few dollars difference wasn't worth giving up my integrity. So my shoulder angel gave a big 1-2 punch to my shoulder devil and I walked out of the store feeling extremely triumphant. Thank goodness for those shoulder angel's!