Who? What? Me?

I'll take character over reputation...your character is what you really are, while your reputation is merely what others think you are.

I think most of you just heard or read this quote when AJ Perez died last April 17. Actually, AJ wasn't the one who said it. It was Drake, a singer he adored. Enough for the intro I guess and let's get down to business. What would you take, character or reputation?

We may say that both words mean the same thing but it isn't. Putting it down into simpler terms, reputation is what you see based from what others think or what the society implies on a certain person or thing while character is what really makes up a person or thing. For me, I's take character. I know that reputation is sort of important in our society but I just want to know a person based on his character. Let's take a politician as our example(classic right?) He may have a good image but a trash character. But we know for a fact that it just doesn't happen in politics but also in our daily personal lives. Just like in our favorite topic, LOVE. Most people fall in love not because of the character but because of his reputation. They say that they love the person for who he is but man we gotta admit that it is a big lie or at least a mistake. They just tend to see the superficial. They commonly associate reputation with character. Yeah, their interrelated but in just a little way. Let's see here the movie "A Walk To Remember." Landon is branded as the black sheep of his school. He's into every trouble that is possible and thinkable. On the contrary, Jamie is known to be the kid who can't break a plate. Yeah she was indeed nice. She was the pastor's daughter and everyone loves her. But how did she fell in love with Landon? Simple. She scrapped everything that is superficial and let a ray of light penetrate her mind and heart and see what's inside of Landon's heart. She saw there pureness, truth and love. Tho most people, including her father, was not at ease with their relationship, Landon proved em wrong. He tried and did his best to change their perception. In the end, Jamie died. Just kidding but yeah she died but the ending I'm talking here is that Landon was perceived as good here. So what's my point? When you love someone, you just gotta give em a fighting chance or at least a chance. You should not just lean on what people think about em but let that ray of light penetrate your mind and heart and scrape all those ugly things people have tagged that person and see what's inside that person. I'm telling you, even the worst person has something good hidden in his heart. It's just that there's no one who appreciate it so he lets the dark side win. Maybe you can be the one to let that darkness fall and let goodness win? :)