It is easier for some to be ‘moral’ than others.

The most important human endeavor is the striving for morality in our actions.” –?Albert Einstein

I arrived back from an overseas trip late at night.? Four weeks earlier I had parked the car in the hotel car park and I had the ticket to prove it.? The next morning, I needed to get some fruit so I asked how I could exit the car park to do an errand.? They endorsed the ticket so that I could exit, and as I did so, the machine ate the ticket.

Later, when I drove back in, I picked up a new ticket.? Now my parking charge was just for one day - $30.

Hmmmmm. Now the moral dilemma arose.? The voice ‘for’ only paying for one night said: ‘They are a huge corporate; it doesn’t matter; it is their process that is flawed; no one will know; otherwise, the cost is $350 etc etc.’ ?

On the ‘against’ list was: bad karma if you do the wrong thing; how are you going to really justify this to yourself afterwards?? All your actions make up who you are, do you really want to be a cheat?

I am not proud to say that I was not sure what I was going to do.? When it was time to check out, I still had not decided.

Then I heard myself say: ‘I was here for 28 days even though my ticket shows 1 day’.? I paid the full amount due and as I was walking away, I felt a slight sense of self-righteousness, immediately followed by the realisation: ‘You did the ‘right’ thing for your own sake, you worried about karma, you worried about how uncomfortable you would be if you didn't do the right thing.? It was all about you!’

Karma works as a moral squeeze.? And if we have been subject to strong values in our childhood, it is harder for us then to integrate off-value behaviour.? But ultimately, my decision was about my own fear and discomfort.? True, I had had some thoughts about how doing the right thing is the glue of our society but it hadn’t been one of the motivating elements in my decision.

Also, paying the $350 didn't mean I would have to live on oat porridge the rest of the month.? ?

How then am I in any position ever to judge anyone else?? How is anyone?? I do assume this kind of dilemma is not only mine?

Last week I attended The Trauma-Informed Corrections Conference and spoke on the topic ‘How Leadership Behaviours Mitigate Employee Trauma’.? On the first day, Professor Roger Gurr, Clinical Director (Psychiatrist) Headspace Early Psychosis, Western Sydney, shared with us how trauma affects our self-regulation in six different ways:

1. Generalised affect dysregulation (anger, suicide rumination, inhibited or disinhibited sexuality, impulsivity, risk-taking)?

2. Altered self-perception (ineffective, permanently damaged, believing shame is justified)?

3. Relational perception (inability to trust, and/or re-victimizing oneself, and/or others)?

4. Meaning-making (learned helplessness, hopelessness, lack of faith)?

5. Attention and consciousness (including symptoms of dissociation)?

6. Somatization (physical symptoms in the absence of aetiology)?

He shared that 65.2% of the prison population have experienced or witnessed trauma, 49.2% have received psychiatric care prior to incarceration, and 62.9% have a mental illness diagnosis.

In other words, it is likely that at least 60% of those who are incarcerated are traumatised and their trauma is likely to be a key factor in them not functioning well.

On the morning of the second day, I was walking from the carpark to UTS, the conference venue.? Towards me came a man who appeared to be homeless, and with him a small dog on a dangling leash. The dog, apparently lost in its own world, stepped in front of me, and the man screamed: ‘You fuckin’ bastard, look where you are going’ - directed at the dog, I think.? My first thought was: ‘This is trauma speaking’. ?

“Morality is a private and costly luxury.” – Henry Brooks Adams ?

The second thought was how privileged I was to be able to make the ‘right’ decision in the hotel car park, how much, much easier it is for me than the homeless man.? This in no way makes me any better than him, on the contrary there should be a higher expectation on me to do the ‘right’ thing as I am so much more able to do so.

If he faced a similar dilemma, it would make sense to think that the money would have played a greater role for him than me and most of the effect regulations associated with trauma would have made it much harder for him to ‘do the right thing’.? For me, on the other hand, only my own greed stood in the way.

The deeper we understand, the easier it is to love, but also the deeper we understand, the clearer it becomes that any type of self-righteousness is deeply delusional.

“Morality is not the doctrine of how we may make ourselves happy, but how we may make ourselves worthy of happiness.” – Immanuel Kant

Thoughts?? Would love to hear them!? I love your emails about your responses to the thoughts shared, so thank you!

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