A New Morale by Kaylee

A New Morale by Kaylee - October 2021 Scholarship Essay

My entire life I followed the idea that I should pick the option that resulted in less consequences. That was up until my junior year of high school in my LA III class. It was an am class, specifically my first class of the day. I walked into class drowsy that day and wished to fall asleep. My teacher announced to the class that we would finish reading The Crucible. We opened our books and the teacher started to read. We got to the part of the story where the main characters, John Proctor and his wife, get taken by the court because John’s mistress, Abigail, had framed them.
At this point in the story, the court had been lynching innocent citizens for telling the truth about not being involved in witchcraft. This astounded me; why would people tell the truth if they knew they would die for it? I looked around the class as all eyes were fixated on the words on the pages. I didn’t understand why someone would give their life to avoid sinning, then I understood; the consequences of lying are worse than that of telling the truth. We continued reading and got to the part where John declared he was not involved in witchcraft. I anticipated for everyone around me to be just as surprised. As I looked up I not only could see the nervous, horrified expressions, but I could feel the emotions. That day The Crucible taught me a lesson, but I had an incident that personally taught me about the importance of my morals.
Shortly after I read The Crucible, I decided to honor the morals I have for myself. Around this time, I decided to start working two jobs; I wanted to try a different job from the one I had at the time. My boss was very kind to allow me to only work two days a week. The reason I gave her for wanting to cut my hours was that I had a lot of things to do for school and other activities. I knew I had lied, but I thought my boss would not be pleased with me for trying another job or think that I don’t like my current job. I assumed there wouldn’t be consequences if I used this excuse. This lie, however, did end with consequences. My brother worked with me at the time, and he told one of our coworkers that I worked two jobs. This information eventually ended up being heard by my boss, and she talked to me about it. She was magnanimous towards me even though I had lied and not told the truth.
I know this incident ended with myself being perceived as somewhat untrustworthy, although, my intention was to not make anyone feel resentful towards me. I immediately thought back to The Crucible and could more clearly understand the meaning of personal morality. This lesson taught me that consequences will follow if I choose to honor my morals or not. I learned that the consequences of honoring those morals might be bad immediately, but that choice will end with a good outcome.