Essay: Army values

Everyday in life it is a battle, not necessarily a battle between good or evil, but a battle between making decisions, more or less choices. We are constantly presented with choices in our lives and whether we make the right or wrong choice is up to us. Since humans are not perfect we often make the wrong choices and the wrong decisions. Often when we make the wrong choice it results in consequences that often affect the people around us.
When a future soldier decides to dedicate their life to joining the military they vow to live up to everything the military stands for, including the seven army values. The seven army values are loyalty, duty, respect,selfless service, honor, integrity, and personal courage. Loyalty is always remaining faithful in the mission and to your fellow battle buddies. A loyal soldier will always support their leadership and stand up for their battle buddies. Duty is always fulfilling your obligations to the mission, your country, and your fellow soldiers. Doing your duty means always being able to accomplish the task as a team and never taking “shortcuts”. Respect is always treating your battle buddies how you want them to treat you. Respecting others allows us to truly see the best in others and self-respect allows us to put our best effort in everything we do as soldiers. Selfless service is realizing that as a soldier you have to put the welfare of the nation, the mission, and your battle buddies before your own. The basic building block of selfless service is the commitment of each team member to put more effort into adding to the teams total effort. Honor is a matter of carrying out, acting, and living the values of respect, duty, loyalty, selfless service, integrity and personal courage in everything you do as a soldier in the U.S. Army. Integrity is always doing what is right both legally and morally twenty-four seven. Integrity is a quality you develop by adhering to all moral principles. The more choices you make based on integrity, the better the outcome of all of your choices you will make. Personal Courage is the ability to face your fears, and face adversity whether it is physical or mental. Facing moral fear or adversity may be a long, slow process of continuing forward on the right path, especially if taking those actions is not popular with others. Building personal courage is as simple as standing up for others and acting upon things you know are honorable. All seven of these values are key to helping create better soldiers who make better choices (Army Values).
Since honor is the only army value that has truly embodies the other six army values, it has to be the most important army value. There are many definitions for the word honor, where some people have a different definition than the army does. The dictionary has three definitions for the word honor. The first definition is the quality or fact of being honest; uprightness and fairness. The second definition is being truthfulness, sincerity, or frankness. Finally, the third definition is when a person is free from deceit or fraud (Dictionary.com). However, most people just believe that honesty is just doing what is right and admitting when you are doing something wrong or not good. When you pledge to join the army and become a part of something bigger than yourself, so as a soldier you must uphold the value of honesty. To be honest, it is a display of the truth, and the facts behind are just a consequence of being honest. In simple terms, honesty is not only to tell the truth, but also to live the truth. Honesty is based on the truth, and the most general sign of this is not telling lies. Even the most simple and “inoffensive” lie could become problematic. Honesty includes not only being honest to other people, but also being honest to ourselves, by not denying who we are and what we feel and believe.