What is Humility?
- Humility: the state of being humble
- Humble Origin: 1200–50; Middle English ( h ) umble < Old French < Latin humilis lowly, insignificant, on the ground. See humus
- Humus: < Latin: earth, ground; akin to Greek chamaí on the ground
Soul without Shame posted a quote on Facebook today about Self-Evaluation vs. Self-judgment. This got me to thinking about humility. My friend, Greg, tells me that humility is the objective assessment of one’s strengths and weaknesses. I hear this as a clear objective look at oneself or one’s situation… and I always include motivation to know more, to see more clearly.
We need to acknowledge our humility, which is not just being good and spiritual. Humility means to objectively see that you do not know, not to think that something is wrong with you because you cannot know. Nobody can know. You cannot know the mystery. The only thing you can know about the mystery is that it is unknowable and untouchable. You see it, you perceive it, but you do not know what it is. The moment you try to penetrate it, you forget you are trying to penetrate it. – A. H. Almaas – Diamond Heart 4: Indestructible Innocence
Taking note of the above, we could say that humility involves being on the ground, grounded. We could be aware of the vastness and magnitude of reality in relation to our limited perspective. We could see what we see – and want to know more, have more revealed to us, to get more intimate with ourselves, to be more in harmony with life or the divine. We might feel blessed or the presence of grace to have insight, frustration, confusion or even feeling lost.
Humility might include an understanding or intimation that we cannot “do,” an objective hopelessness that what we might feel is needed to satisfy or complete is beyond our capacity to do or even know what is needed next. So, humility, seeing things clearly, can include a profound vulnerability. We might be scared or full of wonder.
Just pondering humility…
Words can Kill
The world comes knocking
at the wise man’s door
like all good guests
laying problems at his feet
quietly, he feeds them
as gluttonous appetites
ravage the evening’s meal
bloated with their own assumptions
they raucously depart
hidden in the corner
a hungry servant
died on table scraps
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