Di Bassinga Diaries: Humble Yourself

The scale is a beautiful thing, because once you step on and get your result, that's it. You can't twist its arm and force it to lower the number, and, short of throwing on extra clothes or downing a bunch of water, you can't do much to raise the number. It is what it is. Life is full of these little realities, but feelings tend to get in the way of responding properly to them. How many times do we lose our tempers because "we should be there by now" but traffic is heavy; how much time do we spend complaining about things that are out of our control? Or worse, how often do we count ourselves out because of an underestimation of our abilities? Perhaps, I'm the only one. There are instances almost every single day in which I will respond to a situation that I've created in my head or that my emotions have led me to believe is real, rather than responding to the reality of the situation. I might be the only person who struggles with this, but I'd be willing to bet that I'm not. Take a look at yourself. If you look deep enough, you may find that you need to take a step back to humble yourself.

There's a balance to be struck when it comes to achieving true humility. We generally think of the over-the-top arrogant individual when it comes to those who need to be "humbled." Society seems to define humility as "lowering yourself from a pedestal." We might look in the news and see a celebrity who refuses to give credit to those who've helped them along the way and think they need to humble themselves. Maybe there's a classmate or coworker who is constantly bragging about their achievements and abilities who would do well, in your opinion, to take a seat and quiet down. Or maybe you, yourself have taken one too many steps on a ladder of ambition and you've been knocked down a few levels. This understanding of humility isn't necessarily wrong, but I believe it's grossly incomplete. There is another side of this coin that we don't often attribute to humility: to elevate yourself to a level at which you are capable of operating is just as humbling as lowering yourself back to that level.

The emotions on this side of the coin--in my experience--tend to be those of anxiety, fear, or laziness. These are feelings that I believe most of us can relate to, and, though they are very real emotions and feelings, I believe that we give into them far too much as a society. Humility is rooted in reality, so take the time you need to get well, but don't take much more or less than you need. At some point, we need to just put ourselves out there and try to make something happen. Now, I can only truly speak for myself. My whole life, I've shied away from responsibilities that I had every ability to take on because I simply wasn't feeling up to the challenge. It's an easy trap to fall into; and, for the longest time, I thought that it was a humble thing to do, to hang back and let other, capable individuals take the wheel. Once I stepped up to the plate myself, however, I found that I liked it there--I enjoyed the challenge. I needed the challenge.

I like to define humility as living at peace with reality. It starts with responding to the world as it is. I write to myself as much as to you, the reader: If you want to see change, then you need to start looking for places where you can make it happen rather than simply complaining about or sulking in the problem. That's if you'd like to see change (you need to be honest about that as well). There are many of us who are far more capable than we'd like to believe--perhaps because it scares us. To those people, I'd urge you to take a moment to humble yourself. Do a little more than you're doing right now. It's a challenge for sure, but I believe you'll be better because of it. And for those who have taken on too much, it's okay (and necessary) to take a step back to recuperate; be sure to make time to take care of yourself, just don't pull back so much that it defeats the purpose of rest (to prepare yourself to get back at it). What would tomorrow look like if you did everything that you were fully capable of doing? I ask you to join me in this challenge: humble yourself and find out.