Changes

It [''truthfulness''] means first truth-speaking, but beyond that to keep the speech in harmony with the deepest truth of which one is conscious. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/speech-and-yoga#p50</ref>

Straightforwardness means simply to be honest with oneself and with the Divine and not to be crooked in one's ways.

Self-justification is unwillingness to recognise a mistake and an attempt to prove oneself right even against the censure of the Mother. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/sincerity#p25</ref>

To be clear in one's own mind, entirely true and plain with one's self and with others, wholly honest with the conditions and materials of one's labour, is a rare gift in our crooked, complex and faltering humanity. It is the spirit of the Aryan worker and a sure secret of vigorous success. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/01/dayananda-the-man-and-his-work#p10</ref>

It is good if you have freed yourself from this bondage [''a rigid insistence that one must always do what one has said one will do''].Love of Truth is divine, but this kind of truth is a very mixed product accompanied as it is by hardness or a fierce anger. Truth does not insist on a blind adherence to the spoken word—as for instance, if a man says that he will kill another under the impression that that other has done him a grievous wrong and afterwards carries out his word even when he has found out that the other was innocent and no wrong done. That is what literal adhesion to the spoken word would come to, if scrupulously held as a principle. Truth on the contrary demands that a man shall cleave to the principle of Truth in things only, and in the case above the principle of Truth would demand that he should break his vow and not keep it. If a man pledges himself to something that is against the principle of Truth, e.g. against the principle of Love and Compassion or against that of obedience and surrender to the Divine, it is not Truth to keep that pledge—for it would be a pledge to follow falsehood and how can truth be rooted in allegiance to falsehood? That would be an Asuric, not a divine Truthfulness. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/32/misunderstanding-the-mothers-words#p19</ref>

==Honesty in Relation to Other Qualities==

Mental sincerity: the essential condition for integral honesty.

<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/honesty#p7</ref>

Because sincerity is so rare a virtue in the world, one ought to bow down before it with respect when one meets it. Sincerity—what we call sincerity, that is to say, a perfect honesty and transparency: that there may be nowhere in the being anything which pretends, hides or wants to s itself off for what it is not.<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/08/22-february-1956#p39</ref>

Sincerity means more than mere honesty. It means that you mean what you say, feel what you profess, are earnest in your will. As the sadhak aspires to be an instrument of the Divine and one with the Divine, sincerity in him means that he is really in earnest in his aspiration and refuses all other will or impulse except the Divine's.<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/29/sincerity#p5</ref>

…it is obvious that honesty, straightforwardness, loyalty and sincerity are closely related. I think that it is extremely difficult for someone to be perfectly sincere without being loyal and honest, but of course this demands the utmost. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/15/6-january-1951#p33</ref>

===Courage===

There is no greater courage than to be always truthful.

<ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/courage#p12</ref>

An honest man does not need the marvels of Solomon's throne to learn to speak the truth. The throne of truth dwells within his own heart; the rectitude of his soul cannot but inspire him with words of rectitude. He speaks the truth not because he is afraid of a teacher, a master or a judge, but because truth is the characteristic of an upright man, the stamp of his nature.

Love of truth makes him face all fears. He speaks as he should, no matter what happens to him. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/02/sincerity#p21</ref>

Only the heart that is free from fear, the spirit that is full of faith, the soul that is passionate for realization will remain for the final test and the last purification. …To all who have an emotional preference for the new ideas without a clear understanding of their supreme and urgent necessity, to all who understand the new ideas with their intellects only but have them not in their hearts, to all who, while loving and understanding the new ideas, have not faith to put aside the cloaks of prudence and dissimulation or courage to avow their faith openly before the world, the position is one of great perplexity. God is a hard master and will not be served by halves. All evasions, all subterfuges He cuts away and puts the question plain and loud; and before all mankind, before the friend ready to cut the ties of friendship asunder, before the enemy standing ready with lifted sword to slay the servants of God as soon as they confess their faith, it has to be answered: "Who is on the Lord's side?" Not once, not twice, but always that question is being put and the answer exacted. If you are unwilling to answer, either you do not believe that it is God's work you are doing and are therefore unfit for it, or you have insufficient faith in His power to get His work done without the help of your diplomacy and cunning, or you are unwilling to meet any plain risks in His service. To serve God under a cover is easy, to stipulate for safety in doing the work is natural to frail human nature, to sympathise and applaud is cheap; but the work demands sterner stuff in the men who will do it and insists on complete service, fearless service and honest service. The waverer must make up his mind either to answer God's question or to give up the work. There is plenty for him to do in a cheap, safe and easy way if he cannot face the risks of self-devotion. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwsa/07/the-wheat-and-the-chaff#p2</ref>

Falsehood in the body—that sort of juxtaposition of contraries, the inversion of the Vibration (only it doesn't really invert—it's a curious phenomenon: the vibration remains what it is but it's received inverted)—this falsehood in the body is a falsehood in the CONSCIOUSNESS. The falsity of the consciousness naturally has material consequences... and that's what illness is! I immediately made an experiment on my body to see if this held, if it actually works that way. And I realized that it's true! When you are open and in contact with the Divine, the Vibration gives you strength, energy; and if you are quiet enough, it fills you with great joy—and all of this in the cells of the body. You fall back into the ordinary consciousness and straightaway, without anything changing, the SAME thing, the SAME vibration coming from the SAME source turns into a pain, a malaise, a feeling of uncertainty, instability and decrepitude. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/agenda/02/october-2-1961#p15</ref>

===Vital Being===

Vital honesty: not to allow our sensations and desires to falsify our judgement and determine our action. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/honesty#p5</ref>

It is through a change in the vital that the deliverance from the blind vital energy must come—by the emergence of the true vital which is strong, wide, at peace, a willing instrument of the Divine and of the Divine alone. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/the-nature-of-the-vital#p51</ref>

The vital is an indispensable instrument—no creation or strong action is possible without it. It is simply a question of mastering it and of converting it into the true vital which is at once strong and calm and capable of great intensity and free from ego. <ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwsa/31/the-nature-of-the-vital#p52</ref>

Mental honesty: one does not try to deceive others or to deceive oneself. <ref>http://incarnateword.in/cwm/14/honesty#p6</ref>

''Q. Sweet Mother, what does “mental honesty” mean exactly?''

Things will be self-evident, Truth will shine through all forms, the possibility of error will disappear.

<ref>https://incarnateword.in/cwm/09/21-may-1958#p1,p2,p3,p4,p5,p6,p7,p8,p9,p10,p11,p12,p13,p14,p15</ref>

=Why is Honesty Necessary?=