The Most Important Qualities

I’m not sure why I feel like writing about this right now. But I do, so I shall.

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Of all the qualities a person could have, there are just a couple that I value really highly, both in myself (and I strive to be a person who exhibits these qualities consistently) and in others.

Intelligence is not one of these qualities. Sure, I’m drawn to intelligent people, and sure intelligence is attractive. I don’t believe I’m especially intelligent (really, I just wear glasses and say a lot of shit with confidence-y’all are thrown off by the Thelma vibes, but I’m actually really a dumbass). Intelligence is cool and all, but it’s definitely not one of the most important qualities. Smart people can be real shitheads. Smart people can use all of those smarts to manipulate. Intelligence alone doesn’t make a wonderful person.

Ambition is not one of those qualities. Ambition is also an attractive trait. Ambition is something I’d like to have more of myself. Ambition isn’t a bad quality. But whether a person is ambitious or not doesn’t truly tell you anything about their heart.

Kindness is not one of those qualities. I do not consider myself a “nice” person. To be honest, I don’t believe many truly kind/nice people actually exist. I think what we actually have are many cowardly people, afraid to let other people know what they really think. Kindness is usually just fakeness. Kind people have the same amount of mean, insulting thoughts that I do. They just don’t express them. I believe they should. Kindness is not a quality I admire. At least, not when it isn’t genuine….

Genuine

The quality I most admire in other people, and the one that I hope to consistently exhibit myself is that of being genuine. Genuine people speak their mind. Genuine people don’t change their views based on who they are talking to (either to impress or to argue-some people want to always agree, some want to always disagree, and people like this will sacrifice ideological consistency in order to do one or the other). Genuine people will say what they believe to be right and true, regardless of how other people react to it, regardless of how this expression of their views could help or hinder their reputation. Genuine people show you who they are. It’s more than honesty. It’s a way of being that is wholly authentic at all times.

I always admire genuine people. Or (at times) people I perceive to be genuine.

Genuine people are not manipulative. They won’t pretend to be your friend when they can’t stand you. They don’t bite their tongue. They don’t hide how they feel.

I get quite a lot of “Jyvur, be nice.” I’m not nice, but I am genuine. People know where they stand with me. And I wish everybody was like that. I once had a guy at work ask, “You don’t like me, do you?” and I replied, “Honestly? No. But it’s fine. We don’t have to talk.” And I responded that way because I value being someone that people always know where they stand with. If I talk shit about you, you probably already know I don’t like you. If I’m happy and bubbly to your face, you’ll probably never catch me saying a bad word about you. I think everyone should be like that. Everyone should be upfront with how they feel and who they are.

Everyone should be genuine.

And I don’t know why, but this is the single most important quality to me. Once I realize a person is not genuine, I lose all respect for them. (And because I myself am a genuine person, they can usually tell).

Integrity

The second most important quality a person can have is integrity.

A person with integrity has a moral compass. This can be a very subjective moral compass, but it’s a moral compass nonetheless. They consider the ethics of a situation before proceeding. They have lines they will not cross.

To give you an example of my own, back when I was still writing my book ‘Incel’ I decided early on that I’d never make money from that book. I decided that if I self-published it, I wouldn’t even recoup the losses of paying for editing/graphic design/formatting/marketing/etc.

The idea of financially profiting off the emotional pain of other people didn’t sit right with me. And I wish I’d considered this aspect sooner in the writing process, but as I got further along, the idea of profiting in other ways started to bother me. I expanded my platform off that book. I became more well-known. Maybe not by a lot, but I profited from that book.

Worse than that, I realized my motives for writing it in the first place were not altruistic. I profited emotionally from writing that book. I had many problems in my personal life that needed to be sorted out, and instead of dealing with them, I got this weird emotional bandaid from lurking on incel forums. I got a thrill out of talking to people from that side of the internet. And yes, I’ll admit it, I enjoyed the male attention. I don’t like that about myself, and it wasn’t conscious. It was there, but I did a very good job of hiding all of that from myself. The cognitive dissonance is real. I convinced myself that I was writing that book for the right reasons.

I really want to be a person with integrity, and integrity means having a static moral compass; it means owning up to mistakes, it means taking accountability, and it means guiding all of your actions based on what you believe to be right and true.

For whatever reason, I believe it is wrong to benefit from the emotional pain of others. That’s a fundamental component of my moral compass. But I did benefit from the emotional pain of others. I abstracted pain that wasn’t mine as an excuse to talk to a group of people that I found interesting, that gave me a sense of validation and emotional catharsis. That’s why I wrote it. For me. For my own sad little life.

So that’s a big part of why I had to trash that book, and why I feel a need to talk about it. I want to be the kind of person who owns up.

Listen, we are ALL shitty. We all have flaws. We all do the wrong thing sometimes.

That’s where integrity comes in.

People with integrity say, “I fucked up here.” They say “I was selfish and was only thinking about my own feelings.”

Because if everybody fucks up, integrity is what people can exhibit to show “I’m a human, and so I fuck up, but I want to do what’s right.”

I want to be genuine and I want to have integrity. These are the most important qualities to me.

I admire others with these traits, because every other quality is nothing without them.

It doesn’t matter how smart, “kind”, intuitive, or hardworking a person is. If they are sneaky and fake, it doesn’t matter. There are a lot of very smart shitheads. If they can’t own up to their own faults and mistakes, it doesn’t matter.

Be genuine. Have integrity. That’s the best any person can do.