Elevate My Humility

How do you measure humility? I believe that this very delicate measurement varies for each individual. Some of us can point out examples of displayed humility, others give a self-owned perspective of their own humble self. You can tell right away that humility is lost in the irony of boasting about one’s self to explain how humble they are. So, how can you check yourself before you wreck yourself?

Your own silent inner dialogue can serve as your private monitor of your own growth, and give you a sense of progress that no one else needs to know about. Unless your bestie asks you over a glass of wine or five, and you trust enough to share some intimate profundity. Expressing one’s own humility to a trusted ally can make a healthy bond.

Why elevate out your humility? It is just a technique to maintain some smoothness that is brought on by you, for you, within you. The deeper your sense of when to be humble offsets your need to blurt out something you may later regret. No need to shout back at someone if they started it, or lash out in retaliation when you are hurt by another.

For the same reason you seek to be reasonable when explaining a tough subject to your kids or someone you love, and the same reason you try and be thoughtful of others when they need it most. So, what is humility, exactly? [each underlined word has a link to expound the definition]

Humility; Noun

A modest or low view of one's own importance; humbleness.

down-to-earthness lowliness meekness modesty

A very fine line is drawn between strength and humility. Can you envision a balance for both? Imagine the sign for the Zodiac for LIBRA. Let’s say you get a heap of irritation dumped into your left pan and immediately the right pan almost flies off the handle and seems stuck in air on the right. It is at this critical moment how you choose to seek the balance to return. Not saying it is easy, I’m saying you have 100% control over how you decide to do it.

By putting equal amounts of both sides, you can reach a healthy balance for yourself. The opposite of Humble is pride, arrogance, vanity, or conceit. You have ZERO control over someone else’s shit, but you do have the means to balance out your own inner scales. I am a Libra, so trust me, I live this scenario like a ninja. I know it can be done, with intent and practice. Nothing on my Substack page is offered to be quick and easy. As I frequently say: Baby Steps. With that in mind, let’s clarify the process to beginning this new ninja skill of balancing your humility on call.

There is really no way to balance someone else’s perspective of their own conceit vs humbleness, whether equal, or their humbleness outweighing their vanity. Just like the concept of acceptance or understanding; those can only come from within.

For ourself, here’s how we can measure tangible actions to manifest humility:

How well controlled are you when it comes to being hurt, or offended?

How do you shift your focus from being hurt to being humble?

In the same way we can ‘donate’ our time to someone else by giving them all the attention they need whilst disparaging you, the same practice here helps us realize that in the moment of being verbally attacked, or insulted, or denigrated, each of us can separate the definition of humility from the reaction of defending ourself.

It is an innate physiological response to trauma to become enraged. On the cellular level, our bodies innate immune response is the body's first line of defense against harmful substances, such as viruses and bacteria. It's a physiological response that involves initiating physical barriers, cells, and chemicals. We are born with this, and the same types of responses occur when PERCEIVED threats come into view. this auto-response spills over into our thought patterns, and if practiced over a lifetime can become ingrained pretty deeply. Luckily, the same is true for carving out a new thought pattern, to eventually replace the old guard.

It is here in this moment, that a purposeful pause to balance out your inner scale of equanimity can pull your self awareness up a level. As you feel yourself tipping the scales back into a reasonable state of balance, your humility surges in and brings you up to saint status. For a minute. It is always a slow process to begin a new reaction pattern, but as you try this technique a few times, and later many times, you will realize you have a new inner superpower to command your mood over someone else’s crisis lashing-out.

How often do you flip someone off when that person flips you the bird first? They are angry, which tends to make you angry. Someone calls you uncaring, so you break out the deflection shield and say, “Well you have poor taste in clothes.” You get the idea, however you react to a perceived insult is step one on how to pour a measure of humility onto one side of the scale. Just for a minute. Just for yourself. You are practicing something that many, many people do not try to better themself at this level. You can always rotate the pan on the right to dump out all or some of what you poured in to balance yourself, if you so choose. At any time. A minute later, a day later, or hold out for three days if you’d like.

The self-awareness to hold off your auto-response of automatically feeling vulnerable will give you the strength to be the calm one. The mature one. The one in control. You may even get an apology if you hold a neutral face and take a deep breath, inviting your adversary to do the same. Or it may take three weeks to consider a truce, but you still have something that NO ONE CAN TAKE AWAY - your calmness and humble demeanor. How many of those can you count? How about more to come…?

Having these moments of intentional restraint, because you are practicing balance and humility, can become your rock for a life replete with humility. That helps not only your blood pressure, but also your friendships. You can do this. You can practice it on numbers of people you know in your life. Even others in a car with road rage, you can practice on those unrestrained selfish little babies. They will never know you are practicing the cultivation of more moments in your life that you can feel your scales tipping in your favor.