Green Peppers, Guilty Conscience, And A Better Self

What if “doing what’s right” starts with an inner test you can feel, not a rulebook you borrow? We dive into the everyday practice of congruence—aligning intentions, actions, and outcomes—and why that alignment quietly shapes trust, relationships, and self-respect. No grandstanding, no moral scoreboard, just practical integrity you can apply when the world’s rules shift under your feet.

We talk through the difference between personal integrity and moralism, and why a simple personal code—openness, honesty, compassion, kindness—works only when it shows up in small choices. You’ll hear a fresh take on reciprocity, including the moments when giving isn’t returned and boundaries become necessary. We share a surprising story about green peppers that turns into a lesson on fairness, restraint, and how a tiny gesture can carry real weight. Along the way, we explore how to repair mismatches between what we claim and what we do, and why the dignity of your actions doesn’t depend on someone else’s applause.

If you care about living your values without becoming rigid or self-righteous, this conversation offers a grounded path. We unpack how to handle silent gratitude, how to keep integrity when others don’t meet you halfway, and how these choices matter most in close relationships. You’ll walk away with a clearer sense of how to test your decisions: does this match what I say I believe, and can I stand by it tomorrow? Listen, reflect, and then tell us where you draw your line between being kind and being taken for granted.

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Chapters

• 0:00 Defining Doing What’s Right
• 1:44 Personal Integrity Versus Moralism
• 3:28 Congruence Of Intentions And Actions
• 5:20 Principles, Truth, And Child Care Values
• 7:15 Limits Of Trust And Reciprocity
• 9:40 Basic Human Principles Reclaimed
• 11:13 The Green Pepper Anecdote

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:00

Some years ago, I started thinking about a concept which I call doing what's right. Now that might sound somewhat moralistic, and that's not the intention at all. I referenced in one of my posts the book The Four Agreements, which is an incredibly telling and enlightening book, which I think in some ways has informed this concept I try and live by. Doing what's right is as far as it's possible. The idea of doing what is right for you, because only you can determine that, and doing what's right for others as far as you're able. I say again, it's not moralistic, it has to do with personal integrity and an awareness of how the way that you are and what you do, albeit conditioned by so many factors, has to stand a test with you. And that test is am I doing what's right? Because if I am, I will feel it. And even though it might not be right for others, it actually is right for me. And it's difficult because we are told in so many different ways about what is right, and there's a shifting set of ground rules where that's concerned. My abiding belief has to do with congruence, and that is how our intentions and our actions and the outcomes, as far as we can influence that, all match. When our actions don't match our supposed intentions, that's called incongruence. It's when the words and actions don't match. And there are times in our lives where for all kinds of reasons it's just not possible to do that. And we have to go back to that and repair any damage we've done, and sometimes that's not possible. But I think the underpinning idea is that if we live by a kind of code or set of agreements with ourselves, then we model that through everything we do. In one of my podcasts, I talked about I do what I am. And that might sound a bit self flattering or grandizing, but actually it's really simple. And I think that demonstrates itself in as much and as far as it's possible through my actions, through the themes in the podcasts, and the things I believe in. And if you haven't already gathered by now, I have very strong views and principles where the care of children is concerned. And I and I think that matters because the things that I say are not really debatable. Because what I try and do is make statements based upon not just my own truth, but the truth, the evidenced truth and reality as far as I know it. One of the things I see is the evidence of how that works when perhaps after some while parents will communicate something to me which indicates that not what I do but who I am has impacted upon their lives. And I really do want to say this is not a boastful claim. This is much more to do with integrity and consistency. I don't always get it right, obviously, and sometimes I sometimes I get it very wrong, and that's perhaps because I allow myself to live by a truth which is not consistent with the behavior of the other. And so, for example, in my desire to trust and to give, sometimes I have found myself in situations where others have taken without reciprocation, or who have not appreciated the depth of intention for their own reasons. Nonetheless, my truth remains, and my integrity stands in its own right. So I suppose without turning this into a look what's happened to me, or a kind of look how wonderful I am, neither of which are relevant and both of which I find totally repugnant. There is something here, I think, about continuing to pay attention to what is right in your own eyes, not what's right in the eyes of others. It is for you to determine what is right. And you come back to some basic principles: openness, honesty, compassion, kindness, the sorts of things which I think have become buzzwords to some extent. But actually, if you look beyond that, what you'll see are some very, very basic human principles. I want to give you an example of this, and I feel somewhat exposed in doing so, but I'm going to do it anyway. I have an addiction which is rare, but I'm not ashamed to state it. I have a green pepper addiction, and I get withdrawal, I get withdrawal symptoms if I don't have enough of them. The same is true of garlic and ginger, but we'll talk about that in another podcast. And one of the things I find really difficult is that when you go to supermarkets, and hopefully someone will tell me there's an alternative, but quite often you find these bags of mixed peppers, green, orange, red, and I look at them and think, why? I don't like orange and don't like yellow. I'm not especially keen on red. I want green because that's that's what I need. So on a particular occasion I was I was out foraging, and some people call it shoplifting, but I was foraging and I went to a a uh a particular store that has a food department that begins with M and ends with S. And to my sheer delight, I found boxes of of unpackaged peppers and immediately went into foraging mode and gathered as many of these green peppers as I could find and felt incredibly satisfied by this. And as I as I stood up, I noticed there were some people behind me, and this woman looked at me and said, Oh, are there any more there? And I immediately felt guilty because I'd taken all of them. And so I said, No, you weren't quick enough. No, I didn't. I said, Yeah, no. And then I said, Did you did you want some? And this woman looked at me and said, Well, I did. So I I gave her some of the ones that I'd tried to scavenge and said, Oh, you just just just have just have these. And her face was a picture of surprise, and she looked at me and she said, That's incredibly sweet. I was tempted to say, No, it's the red ones that are sweet, but I thought, don't, don't push a luck. And I said, No, that's okay, you're welcome. But she and her companion looked and seemed flabbergasted. Now, in a sense, you might look at that and say, Well, you know, it's no big deal, but clearly it was. It really mattered to them, and I came away feeling a bit stunned by their reaction. Not because they were in any way kind of disproportionate in their response, but it just seemed to me I did such a simple thing, and because it didn't feel right to take all of the peppers. I can't believe I'm recording this, but it was right because I didn't need them all, and here was somebody who was wanting something simple, and it was a simple act of just ordinariness, I prefer not to call it kindness, but in some ways, what it demonstrates is the fact that if we live by rules, terms, agreements that have to do with fairness, recognizing, the application of that is phenomenal. We can do that in so many ways. Quite often we might do it without that being recognized and appreciated by others, but that doesn't in any way question the dignity of what we've done or the dignity of our intention, because that's about the other person. One of the things I talk about quite often is when if you hold a door open for a person and and they walk through and just ignore you. Unfortunately, I'm the kind of person who can't let that go. And so inevitably I will say something helpful like you're welcome. And when they look at me and I say, Oh, I'm sorry, I thought you said thank you, and then immediately they do, and they say, See, it wasn't that difficult after all, was it? Probably from a social skills perspective, not the smartest thing to do. But on the other hand, I that there is part of me that thinks you have to recognise that when someone does something, albeit without the expectation of acknowledgement, the lack of acknowledgement, actually isn't a good thing. So I guess what I'm trying to say in this unscripted podcast is if we take a position where we think that not giving to others but treating others in a way which has to do with this notion of what is right, and I accept that's subjective, then regardless of the outcome, our integrity remains intact. And I think this is particularly important where relationships are concerned, where our behavior towards others is important because that's how relationships work, unless, of course, the other party walks through the open door without acknowledgement, in which case hold this in mind it really isn't about you, it's about them.