Welcome to Integrity: The Best Foundation, the book and video series designed to help you live and lead with integrity.

Earlier, we looked at the Pillar of Influence, and we discovered how integrity guides our use of power. In the Pillar of Trust, we learned that integrity is the key to building relationships. And today, we are going to explore the pillar of dignity. What do we mean by dignity? Well, most people think dignity is the quality of being worthy of respect. But dignity is much more than self-respect. Human dignity defines our self-worth; it provides insight into the meaning of our life, and it clarifies our purpose.

We remember Nelson Mandela as the ambassador of human dignity. After years of isolation in a tiny prison cell, Mr. Mandela emerged with a vision as big as South Africa. And through his extraordinary life, he showed that tyranny and discrimination never possess the last word. Despite the thickness of the prison walls, the world would still hear his voice. Listen to what Nelson Mandela said. I will read it for you:

"Prison authorities conspire to rob each man of his dignity. In and of itself, that ensured that I would survive. For any man or institution that tries to rob me of my dignity will lose, because I will not part with it at any price or under any pressure."

Viktor Frankl was imprisoned in four different concentration camps during the Second World War. As a psychiatrist, Frankl observed what enabled people to endure hell on earth, and to survive the most unimaginable circumstances. And he discovered that it was when they found meaning in the madness. The prisoners who were most likely to survive the Holocaust held to a purpose, and they were guided by a sense of dignity. Dignity kept them from giving up, and gave them hope.

After the war, Frankl wrote a book entitled Man's Search for Meaning, and it sold more than 10 million copies, and is considered in the Library of Congress as one of America's most influential social books. Viktor Frankl disagreed with Nietzsche's idea that the primary drive in humanity is for power. And he also disagreed with Freud's idea that the primary drive in humanity is a desire for pleasure. What Frankl argued was the primary drive is a desire for meaning and purpose. He believed that dignity enabled those struggling in difficult circumstances to thrive. Even when you can't change a situation, you can change your relationship to that situation.

A victim mentality denies dignity. A person with dignity refuses to give up because of the pain. They have a realism that faces the difficulties, and it says, "I refuse to let the difficulties define or deplete me."

We're going to learn from an amazing historical example. And together, we're going to follow a woman named Ruth, an incredible woman who refused to become a victim, and overcame insurmountable odds. Instead of thinking life was unfair and her problems defined her, Ruth determined to shape her own story. She accepted each challenge as an invitation to make something beautiful and meaningful. And, just like Nelson Mandela, Ruth refused to let pain and problems define her. Ruth lived about 1200 B.C., in a small country called Moab. She married a man by the name of Chilion. So we're going to refer to her in these next few chapters as Ruth Chilion.

Now, Ruth experienced more than her fair share of problems and setbacks. She lived in Moab, a small country, despised by the surrounding countries. She was a woman at a time when women had few rights. Her family was a family of poverty, and so she was allowed to marry someone from another culture at a time where interracial marriage was not considered with favour. When she married, she had to leave her family. She had to learn the other families' culture and language. Once she had done that, her husband died. And now she is without children in a family that, because she has no children, can send her away. And they asked her, "Why don't you go back and fend for yourself?" But Naomi, her mother-in-law, heard Ruth say, 'No, I'm going to take care of you. I'm going to love you, and help you'.

Then they discovered that it was okay back in Bethlehem. So they went back, took the treacherous trip, and when she arrived in Bethlehem as an immigrant, with poor language skills, a heavy accent, no work skills to offer, the community saw Ruth as a burden. And Naomi was depressed and said, "You know, I really have nothing to offer."

But Ruth chose to continue. She went to the fields early in the morning to just find enough to eat. She worked diligently. And when she learned that there was an opportunity through law for her to advance, she had to make an appeal for someone to come to her legal aid. When she made that appeal, the man agreed to do it--in fact, took some interest in her and hoped to marry her.

But there was a problem: There was another man who had first claim and maybe would marry her. And so they went to court. He thought about it and decided not to marry Ruth. Ruth and Boaz were married. And if you go to ancestry.com, you would discover that Ruth is the great grandmother of King David, and became one of the most famous citizens of Bethlehem. Dignity gave her purpose, and her pain did not define her. Dignity offers us hope in our circumstances.