No, that is not a quote from George Orwell’s 1984, I mean it because it’s a spiritual truth. Humility is strength, pride is weakness. It doesn’t matter what form our pride takes either, could be shy, withdrawn, and insecure, or arrogant and pompous.
Pride is not feeling good about oneself, being confident, or being “proud” of one’s accomplishments. None of the modern day definitions really apply very well, so I kind of describe “pride” as the opposite of 1 Corinthians 13:4-8. Where love is patient, pride is impatient. Pride is full of envy, boastful…proud, even! It dishonors others, it is self seeking, it is easily angered, it keeps a record of wrongs. It delights in evil, does not rejoice in truth, does not protect, NEVER trusts, never hopes, and does not persevere.
Pride is often an infection that sets in after shame has wounded you. It is usually NOT the result of being admired, praised, or loved, but rather the fruit of being pounded on by the world. It is like the scar tissue that tries to cover over an unhealed wound.
Absolutely no one who tells you how wonderful and perfect and vastly superior they are is trying to convince YOU of those things. They are trying to convince themselves.
We all encounter pride, we all deal with it to some degree. It is that empty, envious, insecure spot that nothing can fill because you are feeling deprived, left out, and unworthy. It is often tightly entwined with shame.
I have a theory that the first sin was actually when Cain killed Abel. He was full of pride, full of envy, easily angered, self seeking, and so he struck out. Genesis 4:7 only tells us, “If you do what is right, will you not be accepted? But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but you must rule over it.”
We need to learn how to rule over our pride. Pride tends to make you weak and reactionary. We need more strong people with level heads walking about in the world.
Back to my original point however, pride is weakness. For most of us it doesn’t end in literal murder, but it is kind of like just sitting there and punching your own self in the head all day long. It makes you easily prone to offense, it puts you on guard, it causes you to be fearful, and it leaves you vulnerable to attack. Someone who has humility cannot be offended, manipulated, played, or ruled by fear. The more humility you can cultivate the more impervious you become to attacks from other people and the less likely you are to react to some perceived (real or imagined) threat.
You stop taking things personally because you understand it isn’t all about you, all of the time.
I’ve done a fair amount of work with pride, so here’s the bad news, the only way I know of to deal with pride is to confront a great deal of pain that gave birth to it. It’s like having to reset a bone so it can heal properly or abrading a scar so it smooths out now. Regardless, not a pleasant experience because one has to feel all the things that made one defensive and walled off and unwind them so they can heal properly.
My pride was never boastful or loud, it lay there hidden, lurking in the reverse of 1 Corinthians 13 where we’ve gone and inverted the message to say, (pride) NEVER trusts, never hopes, and does not persevere.
The residual taint of trust issues I have leftover today are slight, but they are still rooted in bits of pride.
I am chuckling wryly here, I am just fine, but I have now spent an entire month basically watching a lot of people marinating in pride, which amounts to just standing there punching themselves in the head over and over again. Watching this mess is just crazy making! I have now gone quite mad and it was a short trip to begin with, but I think I have now arrived. I’m just wandering about mindlessly muttering, stop that! Just stop it!
As you probably already know, people are complicated and while the solution really is that simple, “just stop it,” almost no one in the history of forever has managed to “just stop it” because someone else said those words to them.
So this is my free gift, my feeble offering, my proclamation declaring, you don’t have to live that way. There is a better way, another way, once actually called “The Way.” Letting go of some pride is like lancing an infection or setting down a heavy load. It’s a giant sigh of relief. Four stars, highly recommend.
pkadams said:
We are definitely riding the same spiritual and life waves lately. Amen to this post!
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Randy Epps said:
Pride: the SIN that leads to all sins.
GREAT, THOUGHTFUL POST!
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insanitybytes22 said:
Yes, the sin that leads to all sins! Thank you for your kind words.
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Citizen Tom said:
Thoughtful post.
I think we tend to overcomplicate words. How should we define humility and pride with respect to their Biblical usage? Humility is the willingness to put God before our self. Pride, on the other hand, is the determination to put our self before God.
How do we complicate these words? We emphasize peripheral characteristics that we associate with humility and pride.
We speak of the humble as thinking of others as better than themselves and putting others before themselves. Yet it is not necessarily our submission to God that drives these traits. A wimp can think of others as better than himself and put others before himself out of fear and excuse his behavior as humility. I suspect that even in his later years the Apostle Paul understood that he was smarter than most people, and he deferred to no one except God when he spoke for God.
We usually speak of pride in connection with arrogance and haughtiness. We understand that a narcissus is full of pride. Yet these manifestations of pride are not your focus. I think the point you want to make is that pride is putting self first and that we can be prideful because we are afraid not to put our self first. However, I doubt that was Satan’s problem. Satan was jealous of God. Satan wanted to be God, and he was determined to take from God what can only belong to God.
Was Satan afraid? He probably is now, but I doubt he was at first.
Jealousy and envy unmixed with fear probably result in the worst manifestations of pride. Are they the most common? Or is fear driven pride? My guess fear driven pride is the most common.
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jsneese62 said:
I believe there are many manifestations of pride jealousy I believe was the first form of pride, over the centuries it has expanded. Like my former best friend she was struggling to pay rent and buy food, but told me she had to much pride to ask for help. She said she would rather go hungry than go to a food bank.
My sister is prideful in that she will never let any wrong done to her go she holds them up as a torch to her victimhood. Her pride comes in the form of her never being the one in the wrong it is everyone else.
Satan has expanded the sin of pride over time to make it as varied in humans as possible. Like you I don’t think he felt fear at first, but I am pretty certain he does now. So much so he wants to take as many with him as he can.
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Citizen Tom said:
It does seem as sinners, Satan included, want to make certain that they don’t go to Hell by themselves.
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ColorStorm said:
‘Satan is probably afraid now……’
Ha. Not sure Tom. Maybe. But, after all, he is that angel of light.
Somehow I’m guessing with all his experience of craft/trickery/sorcery- he still thinks he will outmaneuver God- and somehow will seek to subvert the court of heaven- by a mistrial!!!!
Til the very end he will gather confederacies to work his purpose- as he is savage in his wildness.
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insanitybytes22 said:
Those are some interesting questions Colorstorm, and I’m really not sure about the answers! I tend to lean towards satan is not jealous of God, he is actually jealous of man. We are the apple of our Father’s eye. The whole custody battle is over the soul of man. We are the prize.
Satan might be crafty, but he’s not delusional enough to perceive himself as equal to God or even in the running for that job! They are not even close to equals. The battle that rages is not over who gets to be the boss of the whole universe. That battle has already been won, and he is defeated.
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ColorStorm said:
Agreed.
Note how WP didn’t like my ‘wiliness’ and changed it to wildness. But u get the point.
While it is true he IS defeated, I still think he thinks….. it’s a technicality that can be overturned.
Good luck with that.
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Citizen Tom said:
It is kind of difficult to get into the mind of Satan. God we can only understand to the extent He has explained Himself.
I tend to agree with you. Can you imagine what it must be like to actually know what Hell is and to know that is where you will spend Eternity? If Satan perceives the Holiness of our Lord as weakness, then is it not likely that he thinks he can overcome God by using His Holiness against Him? That is the ultimate sin of pride. Because the prideful love themselves above all else, they are indifferent to others, even God. Everyone else is just something to be used, and Satan will try to use even God to suit his own ends.
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insanitybytes22 said:
True, Tom. Job is one of my favorite books for a lot of reasons, but one thing it does is help to put satan in the proper perspective. He is not God’s arch enemy, His nemesis, he is His servant.
So God is not at war with satan, desperate to foil his diabolical plans, we are. God is in no way vulnerable to satan, we are.
God is not deceived or manipulated by satan, we are.
So we need to surrender our pride and avail ourselves of our Savior, because we have a very real enemy who wants to destroy us and we are simply no match for him.
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The Night Wind said:
While I don’t necessarily endorse his theology, Emmanuel Swedenborg theorized that the fires of Hell weren’t literal, but that the intensity of hatred, anger and pride there caused prophets to envision it as a heated furnace. He said that everyone there is fighting over who is the greatest and most powerful; and every time one demon gains control in some part of Hell, the envy and outrage of the others overthrow him and another demon takes his place.
It may or may not be true; but it’s a far cry from the urbane and sophisticated portrayal that demons and Hell have been getting in the MSM lately.
One of the Catholic mystics (I don’t remember who) said that the reason that there is no repentance in Hell is because of the sin of Pride, and for that reason the Church categorizes Pride as the worst of the Seven Deadly Sins. This saint said that in Hell all of the souls blame God for their being there and their sinful pride prevents them from acknowledging God’s Justice. The story of the two thieves crucified with Christ is a type of this: one demanded that God repent and save their lives; the other acknowledged God’s Justice and was saved.
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PARTNERING WITH EAGLES said:
While Lucifer (from Latin) means “light-bearing”, this rebel wanted to be God, though he was created by God. Wasn’t satisfied that -at the time- he was the original archangel. What I find inscrutable is that after sending him to the pit, God releases him after 1000 years…
Revelation 20:1-3
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jsneese62 said:
I have had quite the job getting past a quick hot temper and being impatient with myself and others. There have been times I have yelled at myself to just stop it. Proverbs 16:18 Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall. This what I go to when I feel pride rearing its ugly head in my life.
I have a lot of very prideful people in my life like my sister she is one that keeps record of every wrong ever done to her by everyone that has ever been in her life she never lets go. My former best friend (we are still friends just not close anymore) her pride nearly destroyed our friendship completely.
I think pride is one of the most destructive forces on earth and it is promoted at every turn today and in every way imaginable. People are always boasting about one thing or another. My mom in one of her more lucid moments said “never toot your own horn it is better to allow others to see your worth than to shove it in their faces.” and I feel she was right in that because arrogance and pride are never a good or pretty thing.
I have done a lot of work in letting stuff go from my past, but I don’t think the cleaning is ever fully complete it is a life long thing. I have talked with my daughter concerning my sister and we both are concerned with the amount of bitterness and anger in her heart. She has pushed my daughter out of her life over things most people wouldn’t bat an eye at. She is now starting to push me away as well. I cannot stop her from doing that. Part of her problem with me is I no longer play the bash everyone game. It is tiring and soul sucking I just don’t want that stuff anymore
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insanitybytes22 said:
I’m with you, I also believe, “pride is one of the most destructive forces on earth and it is promoted at every turn today and in every way imaginable.”
No tiring, soul sucking, stuff allowed. I’m with you there, too! That’s just exhausting.
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jsneese62 said:
I need to make me a sign that says no tiring, soul sucking, stuff allowed here.
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The Night Wind said:
I’ve rarely known people consumed with the kind of pride you’re describing who came to an good end. Most of them have ended up despised by everybody and often had to be wards of some institution manned by people whom they consider their inferiors. It’s like the homeless camps we were talking about yesterday: most people would be shocked if they actually saw and heard the degree of arrogance, ingratitude, and entitlement that those people have.
“Absolutely no one who tells you how wonderful and perfect and vastly superior they are is trying to convince YOU of those things. They are trying to convince themselves.” I thought about cult leaders right away as an example. What you cited is the reason why, once they get big followings, they start believing their own delusions. I predicted that Vox Day would end up like that and apparently he has. That’s why I haven’t written much of him lately because he almost deserves to pitied than called out and exposed. If you’ve seen his videos recently, he’s sitting a throne-like chair basically pontificating about superior he is. Same with his social media posts: he doesn’t even allow comments—not only because he doesn’t want criticism: he doesn’t even want praise because according to him, such puny intellects have no influence upon his superior mind. Unchecked pride like that always leads to disasters like this.
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insanitybytes22 said:
Yes, Vox is certainly a good example of having an ego five stories higher then his IQ. I haven’t checked in on him lately because the world has been unpleasant enough already.
You are right, cultians and pride go hand in hand. Sometimes you can tell by the defensiveness and protection of their followers. Those who get hooked in have to protect the illusion of perfection their leaders seem to display. They become invested in the lie.
Good point too about the homeless and addiction. Gratitude and humility are healthy, they help you to see the path before you. Arrogance, entitlement, and self pity just feeds the cycle and keeps us stuck.
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Silence of Mind said:
Love is like this, that or the other thing; or pride is like this, that or the other thing, doesn’t tell us what humility and pride actually are.
Humility is worship of God. Pride is worship of self.
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insanitybytes22 said:
I think you are right, in an intellectual context. The thing is we also need the other part of the equation, the emotional and spiritual aspect, in order to see even more clearly. Cain was worshiping God. One can actually pridefully worship God! The disciples are eager to worship and even have a conversation about who is the best, which one is better, who shall be first.
And sometimes people who despise themselves, who wouldn’t worship themselves if you paid them, are also plagued by pride.
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Silence of Mind said:
A prideful man only worships himself. If Cain had worshipped God he would not have murdered his own brother.
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Silence of Mind said:
Insanity, emotion inclines the appetites and therefore, cannot know anything. The human intellect, is endowed by God and therefore, spiritual.
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insanitybytes22 said:
I know, we have a powerful disagreement over this matter. I have no idea where that thought originated, but you are not the only one who holds it. Many people seem to believe the sin of the fall tainted our emotions and hearts, but somehow managed to leave our capacity for reason intact. Human intellect is allegedly “God endowed” and exists in complete truth and purity.
Nope, doesn’t sit well with me. Some of the world’s greatest horrors are the result of human intellect. We people can rational-lies anything.
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Silence of Mind said:
The world’s greatest horrors are the result of vicious appetites, not intellect. The intellect is the God-given power that makes us human.
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insanitybytes22 said:
I’m sorry, Silence. I cannot come into agreement with that. I’ve encountered far too many highly intelligent, horrific people that wouldn’t know God if He walked up and kicked them right in the behind. Intellect is not what makes us human.
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Silence of Mind said:
You have encountered God-given intellect driven by vicious appetites. All creatures are driven by their appetites. But only human beings have disordered appetites for power, lucre, pain, abusive sex, self destruction and narcissism. The intellect is not an appetite, it is a power. We are driven by our appetites like all creatures. Thus the power of intellect can be used for good or evil depending on the appetites that drive us.
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Barabbas Me said:
IB, my definition of Humility has always been “not seeing yourself as anything More or Less than you really are”. Pride is lifting yourself above where you should be, whether that means above your actual knowledge or station or position. Ultimately, Pride is “self-actualization”, if I may use that term, with little or no regard for anyone else. That would include God, but it wouldn’t have to. “Sin” is both a breaking of what God has commanded, ordained and endorsed as “good and right”… regardless if the person is cognizant of that connection or not… as well as a Self-Determination apart from the consideration of said God’s determination or the “good and right” where others may be concerned and connected. We “sin” because it is in our human “nature” to think of self before others. Where that comes from or how it got there matters little in either dealing with it or submitting it to God for His redemption and Transformation by the shed blood of Christ and the Life of Jesus supplied us daily in His Resurrection and applied by the Holy Spirit. – Barabbas.
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insanitybytes22 said:
Amen, I think we are on the same page there. 😊
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Barabbas Me said:
Amen.
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SLIMJIM said:
Good post I love how you noted how pride manifest in so many ways
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PARTNERING WITH EAGLES said:
No pride here, perhaps some sarcasm… (this may be why I’ve heard some married men say “happy wife, happy life”.) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EEkgTv3LEAc
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insanitybytes22 said:
LOL! I watch dry bar sometimes, too. Sarcasm is a real art form, we have to be careful with it, but laughter is sure good medicine.
Recently we were telling my hubby that in general married men tend to live longer and he says, “that’s because time passes more slowly.” It made me laugh.
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PARTNERING WITH EAGLES said:
Sigh – Just found this item … Dennis W. Regan, 75, of Waukon, IA, died Saturday, September 3, 2022, at his home in rural Waukon.
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insanitybytes22 said:
Oh, I’m sorry! Do you think it’s him? I’m pretty sure the comedian guy is still alive and tweeting today, but I didn’t look into it very hard.
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PARTNERING WITH EAGLES said:
Hard to confirm; there were many “dennises” on the web, [just type his name in your search box] but his YT channel’s last submission was over a year ago.
https://www.youtube.com/c/DennisReganComedy/videos?view=57
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Andy Oldham said:
You have given new insight to an often misunderstood sin/virtue. Some new things to consider. I enjoyed this read!
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