Humility is….

I came across this little gem today in a great book named below:

“It is easy to play the world’s game which is the power game, the game which depends on setting myself apart from others, distinguishing myself, seeking the limelight and looking for applause.  I find that it is only too easy to become compulsive in my continual need for affirmation, for more and more affirmation, as I anxiously ask Who am I?

Am I the person who is liked, admired, praised, seen as successful?  My whole attitude towards myself becomes determined by the way in which others see me.  I compare myself with others, and I try to emphasize what is different and distinctive about me.  Those three temptations which Christ faced in the wilderness are equally my own temptations:

1.  to be relevant.  2. to be spectacular.  3. to be powerful

Am I able, like Christ, to put them down?  Am I prepared to shed all these outer shells, of false ambition, of pride?  Am I ready to admit that the mask is a disguise put on to cover up the insecure self? and the armour a shield to protect the vulnerable self?

Am I ready to receive a new self, based not on what I can achieve, but on what I am willing to receive?

Humility is….. facing the truth.”

Esther de Waal, Living with Contradiction, p.96