PRIDE OR HUMILITY? WHICH DO YOU PRESENT?

 By Danelle Carvell

                                                    

The beauty of humility is the way it lifts up others as well as ourselves.

I've heard it said that you should never pray for humility because that's one prayer God loves to answer and you might not like the way He chooses to humble you. Another warning about humility is that you should never claim to have it. Nothing makes you look less humble than boasting about your humility. It's always best to let others point out your strengths instead of publicly doing that yourself. 

The definition of humility is "the quality or condition of having a modest sense of one's own importance." I can tell just by talking to people within a few minutes, whether or not they are humble. The clues are right there within the things they say. And if I get to know them better, I can also see clues in their actions. 

Humble people are teachable. They are usually good listeners and they have a teachable heart. That means that they can easily admit their wrongdoings, and they don't need to be right all the time. 

Many people are instantly insulted when someone corrects them. They become defensive. Instead of being thankful for any kind of constructive criticism, they go into defense mode and begin attacking the person who is probably trying to help them by calling them to something better. 

Disregarding the council of others is a sign of pride. We should always be open to someone's wisdom and their good guidance. Older people are often full of wise advice that we can learn from. 

But sometimes wisdom can come from someone younger. According to the Bible, we should not reject a younger person's wisdom because wisdom is a gift from God, and it's not unusual for even children to be extremely wise. 

Another sign of pride, which is the opposite of humility, is feeling the need to brag about your accomplishments, the many splendid things you own, or how successful you are at your job. I know a guy who often talked about his latest fancy car, the expensive restaurant he dined at last night, or the beautiful home he lived in. He was obviously trying to impress me with these things, but as Shania says, that don't impress me much. 

I've lived long enough to learn that when looking for a good guy, you must look at his heart and not his accomplishments. That beautiful house can't give you comfort when you're married to a man who so much needs to be admired by others. We should look for the sincerity in people and not be chasing after social status or material things.

If he's constantly name dropping and needing to hang out with the important influential people, then no matter how much you admire the guy, it won't be enough coming from just you. So expect him to always be out looking for the attention he craves. Living a low-key life and not needing people to adore you is the way God wants us to live. 

The word that keeps coming to me is "security." Humble people have a positive sense of self. They are content and secure about who they are and what God gave them. They don't need to play the comparison game by constantly comparing themselves to others and pointing out where they are doing better.

The best example of this I can think of is the way women relate to each other in the workplace. My friend is in a constant state of stress at work because she must deal with prideful women who are trying to outshine one another every day. These women just can't relax. They are constantly criticizing the quality of her work and setting impossible standards that she can't possibly reach. 

Women do this to satisfy their own egos. By making my friend look bad, they can feel better about themselves. Prideful people don't like to be outdone. They consider anyone who might beat their accomplishments as rivals and a threat to their position or success. It's a sad way to live. 

When someone needs to criticize the people who are doing better, that's an obvious clue that you're dealing with a prideful person. We should focus on improving ourselves, not on outshining everyone else. There is such a thing as a healthy competition, but competition is only healthy when we ultimately want the best for others as well as ourselves. 

If you are truly happy for those who are doing better than you, then you are a humble person. If you don't hesitate to hang out with "low-level" people, you can consider yourself humble. Humble people don't need to rub elbows with those who project high social status. And they don't hesitate to serve others in a humble way. Even picking up trash would be something a humble person would happily do. 

Humble people are also quick to forgive. They don't hang on to unforgiveness and resentment because they realize that they also have made big mistakes in life. They know that they do not have the right to stand up on a pedestal, as if they've never done wrong. 

But we have to be careful not to confuse humility with being a door mat. Even a humble person knows what healthy boundaries are and that it's okay to enforce those boundaries. The beauty of humility is the way it lifts up others as well as ourselves. If every one of us practiced humility, we wound not only be happier, but we would project that happiness onto others. 

This is the way God meant for us to live. Humility is God's love in action.