what humility isn't

One may wonder why Lewis spends so much time talking about pride vs humility in A Year with C.S. Lewis.  But as he explains, pride is the chief of all the sins. And so learning to fight it, and learning true humility, are essential to living the Christian life.

He talks today about what humility isn't. It's NOT pretending that we're something that we're not. If we're smart, we're not being humble by pretending to be, or convincing ourselves that we are, stupid. If a girl is pretty, she's not being humble by telling everyone she's ugly.

Humility is truth and love hand in hand. It embraces who we are, honestly. And it focuses on sharing who we are, in love, with other people. If I'm smart, then I should use my intelligence to help people. To learn to speak their language, literally and figuratively, to express love to them. If a girl is beautiful, she should not pretend she isn't. She should focus, in love, on others, and express the inner beauty that Jesus puts inside of her that equals or surpasses her physical beauty.

We should accept the gifts He has given us and allow them to enable us to do His will... which means becoming even MORE the people He created us to be. Pretending NOT to be who we are stifles our gifts. Embracing humility, and therefore truth and love, we shine our gifts through a prism that brings out all of their hidden colors.

Thank You, God, for Your gifts, and for helping us in humility to embrace them.