There is often a fine line between confidence and pride. Confidence is a necessity for our success while pride eventually leads us to self-destruction. Good self-image is a plus but inflated ego… not so much.
I have on-point self-awareness of my pride which at times I wish I didn’t have (maybe you can relate). I’ve gotten in the habit of examining my heart when life doesn’t go just right and during that exam I ask myself “What is the root of this negative feeling? What does it stem from?” Nine times out of ten I can boil it down to ego (aka, pride).
Let’s use the word ego in place of pride. To me pride is more external; ego internal. And these negative feelings are definitely internal.
The ego is sneaky. You think you are having a valid feeling and when the heart exam is done, you realize the diagnosis is a bruised ego.
We can lie to ourselves and say that pride and confidence are the same thing, but the truth is they are in no way the same.
Pride motivates us to do what is best for ourselves even at the expense of others.
Pride is a liar and tells us we don’t need anyone to help us… that we can do everything all by ourselves.
Pride makes us overly confident and bragging is inevitable.
Pride makes us act like no one else in the world can do what we’ve done or in the way we’ve done it. We get all puffed up and people get tired of listening to us and dealing with us.
Pride makes us boastful, rude, critical and arrogant. These tactics are used to elevate ourselves.
So where am I going with this? If not pride, what?
Confidence and humility!
There is nothing wrong with having confidence. Like feeling good about a presentation you’ve spent the last month preparing for, or knowing she’ll say “yes” when you ask for her hand. But confidence needs to be coupled with humility to keep you well away from pride.
Humility conquers pride.
Humility is not pushy like pride. Humility pays compliments to others and is not puffed up with it’s own importance.
Humility shares itself with others to meet their needs. It is not a hoarder like pride. Humility comes from the heart and is pure.
Being humble in no way means we are weak. It means we are sincere, trustworthy, reliable, considerate, thoughtful, helpful, available, genuine and authentic.
Which life do you want to live?
Here is a great quote that sums it all up:
“There’s a thin line between
Confidence and Pride
It’s called Humility.
Confidence smiles.
Pride smirks.”
#smallsteps
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