A Slice of Humble Pie
Humility. This was the subject of discussion on Sunday and I sat down thinking this should be an interesting topic for someone who is struggling with not thinking highly enough of myself. At first thought being humble doesn't seem to be something I have to much trouble with. I mean, I think more highly of pretty much everyone than I do myself. Great, now I'm worried that I sound like I'm bragging about how humble I am.
It seems I have been confusing humility with self deprecation. This doesn't really translate to humility at all since it really does take a lot of focus on oneself to bring yourself down like that all the time. A good comparison that was shared was that humility is thinking of yourself less not thinking less of yourself. Being self deprecation really does draw a lot of focus on oneself even if it's not positive or uplifting it's still attention that could be shifted elsewhere.
I have thought before of how people will sometimes try to pick on others and bring them down to make themselves look better. I have always known this doesn't really work and thought how strange it was that people would resort to this. I have just realized that self deprecation is just the other side of the same coin. If there are 2 people on a ladder and one person pulls the other one down a rung it doesn't mean the other person climbed up any higher. In the same way if I keep climbing down this ladder it doesn't help the other person get to the top. I think humility should work in a what that you are assisting others to climb to the top. It shouldn't matter where we are on that same path. If we are at a more stable position we could either give them a boost or reach down to pull them up.
Though I have been attempting to build up a healthy self esteem and a realistic look of my skills, abilities and appearance I have had in the back of my mind that esteem might be seen as conceit. It's strange to think that I would be concerned about going from one extreme to the other but part of the problem with me is balance so I have never really understood being able to keep a level perception of myself. I don't think my concern was that far out there to suspect that once I started to lift myself up I might just launch in the other direction. When you've never been healthy it's hard to even see it as a possibility.
Though a sermon about humility seemed like it was going to be justification for me to keep my negative self esteem it actually showed me that I am not really being humble at all. I can not direct my energies into thinking about myself less rather than thinking less of myself.
It seems I have been confusing humility with self deprecation. This doesn't really translate to humility at all since it really does take a lot of focus on oneself to bring yourself down like that all the time. A good comparison that was shared was that humility is thinking of yourself less not thinking less of yourself. Being self deprecation really does draw a lot of focus on oneself even if it's not positive or uplifting it's still attention that could be shifted elsewhere.
I have thought before of how people will sometimes try to pick on others and bring them down to make themselves look better. I have always known this doesn't really work and thought how strange it was that people would resort to this. I have just realized that self deprecation is just the other side of the same coin. If there are 2 people on a ladder and one person pulls the other one down a rung it doesn't mean the other person climbed up any higher. In the same way if I keep climbing down this ladder it doesn't help the other person get to the top. I think humility should work in a what that you are assisting others to climb to the top. It shouldn't matter where we are on that same path. If we are at a more stable position we could either give them a boost or reach down to pull them up.
Though I have been attempting to build up a healthy self esteem and a realistic look of my skills, abilities and appearance I have had in the back of my mind that esteem might be seen as conceit. It's strange to think that I would be concerned about going from one extreme to the other but part of the problem with me is balance so I have never really understood being able to keep a level perception of myself. I don't think my concern was that far out there to suspect that once I started to lift myself up I might just launch in the other direction. When you've never been healthy it's hard to even see it as a possibility.
Though a sermon about humility seemed like it was going to be justification for me to keep my negative self esteem it actually showed me that I am not really being humble at all. I can not direct my energies into thinking about myself less rather than thinking less of myself.
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