“Reputation is what other people know about you. Honour is what you know about yourself. Guard your honour. Let your reputation fall where it will.”
(Novelist Lois McMaster Bujold, quoted in The Times)

My comment: What you know about yourself can give you secret misgivings, e.g you know you lied to someone when you were younger, or were unkind to a girlfriend , or told a tall story at a job interview.

Well, we all make mistakes; we are human.  It is the self-knowledge and the effort to avoid similar or maybe more egregious mistakes in the future that matters.  Otherwise, a decent person could not live with himself.  Some people never improve because they are incapable of self-analysis and their moral compasses are stuck on “Me, me, me”.   I think one’s reputation grows naturally as the urge to lead a kind, truthful, thoughtful and generous life grows with experience and self-knowledge.